Special Guest#5: EVERETT PECK!

Ebbene sì, c'è anche lui! Il creatore di DUCKMAN!

EVERETT PECK: Peck's drawings have been in The New Yorker, Playboy, Time, as well as in books, comics and movie posters. He has had gallery shows in Tokyo, Los Angeles, New York, and Washington, D.C. Peck has written animated cartoons for Rugrats, The Critic, and a TV series based on one of his own cartoon characters, Duckman.
Peck created the Duckman character for comic books. In 1994, it was turned into an animated series on the USA Network, where it ran for four years and won the CableACE Award, and was nominated for four Emmys.
Peck also created the Cartoon Network series Squirrel Boy, which ran from 2006 to 2007, although it was not as critically acclaimed as Duckman. Samples of his personal sketch have been collected in the book It's Not My Fault (ISBN 1-59617-461-7).
He was also worked as the character designer for Jumanji, did a slew of print ads for Nike and Honda, and animated several station IDs for UPN.

You probably wouldn't recognize Everett Peck in a supermarket, but I guarantee that you've seen his work. Just check the magazine rack.

Everett's distinctively hilarious ink lines have been in everything from The New Yorker to Playboy to Time, as well as on countless books, comix, and movie posters. He has had gallery shows in Tokyo, Los Angeles, New York, and Washington D.C. He's even written animated cartoons for Rugrats, The Critic, and a TV series based on one of his own cartoon characters, Duckman.

On top of that, just about every commercial illustrator working now was inspired by (ie: copies) Everett's style. But nobody can draw like Everett.

During the 1980's, Everett taught illustration and animation classes at a college in Southern California. I was not only lucky enough to have been there to take classes from one of the best illustrators of this generation, I also got to know him. 

Everett not only taught me about illustration, he prepared me for all of my future work -- how to stay creative by keeping the mind constantly working. Everett was always drawing; on notepads, in sketchbooks, and even paper place mats in restaurants.

This particular drawing was done in order to teach me not to work on spec for Black Biker magazine, as well as not to hack out comics with stale, offensive scripts that I hated. This helped me in my later screenwriting work as well (until I temporarily forgot and wrote an Ernest screenplay for Disney).

Everett eventually gave up his teaching position to paint and do animation (if you've seen Duckman, you know he succeeded fairly spectacularly). But I hope he finds the time to teach again someday. As brilliant as he is at his art, he's even better at inspiring students, encouraging them, and making them feel special and talented.

After one of my last classes with him, he gave me a drawing that he'd done for a book on television: It was called "Making Us Laugh." How could you not be inspired by that? There are plenty of great artists and writers that have inspired and influenced me, but only one of them ever became my friend.

Thanks, Everett.