DS: About the comic strip--

WF: Oh! Yeah! Right! That! (laughter)

DS: Well, I’m curious...do you have any formal training as an artist?

WF: Um, no...I’ve never suffered any formal training in the field of art. And it shows!!! (laughter)

DS: Which artists have most influenced your work?

WF: Well...Max Ernst...Marcel Duchamp...Salvador Dali...? That ilk?

DS: Anyone who might have influenced you.

WF: Well, I love the surrealists. In the way of illustration proper, I’ve always been quite taken with the work of Arthur Rackham, and Edmund Dulac. I discovered them very early on.

As far as comics go, I’d have to say that Windsor McCay still remains my all time favorite.

When I was a kid I read the Sunday comics pretty religiously. Peanuts was always a favorite...Pogo...there were any number of them back then. Even Snuffy Smith, and Lil’’ Abner, were of interest to me back then. But mostly because of the style of drawing in itself.

DS: Disney?

WF: Disney never interested me. I’d say more so than comics, my greatest influence came from Chuck Jones and his work with Warner Brothers. In retrospect, I’m absolutely convinced that Chuck Jones’’ Warner Brothers years not only influenced my drawing, but also suitably warped my perspective of the world on massive scale.

I did read a lot of super-hero and horror comics when I was a kid. ‘‘Tales from the Crypt," and that kind of absolute brilliance. God! I can still see the panels from some of those comic books in my mind’s eye! Cool!

DS: Are there any comics in particular that you've followed throughout the years?

WF: Not really. Mad magazine was always a hit for me...let’s see...well...I largely
stopped reading syndicated comics around 1967. You see, by 1967 I was a blossoming hippie, so I started reading more ‘‘sophisticated publications.’’ Publications such as, ‘‘The Chicago Seed,’’ and, ‘‘Crawdaddy,’’ and even eventually, ‘‘The National Lampoon’’ (laughter).

I first saw Doonesbury in The Chicago Seed, but I've never really followed the strip. At the time I was more interested in Vaughan Bode, Dan O’Neill, Skip Williamson, S. Clay Wilson, Robert Crumb-- what was largely termed as, ‘‘Underground Comics.’’

Somehow I stumbled onto the European cartoonists in the early 70's. I can’t remember exactly how, but I think it was this school friend of mine who turned me on to Jean Giraud’s--Moebius’--Lieutenant Blueberry. Stunning stuff! One thing led to another, and before I knew it I was pretty much immersed in European comics. I still pretty much only follow the European creators. Milo Manara, Enki Bilal...the list goes on there. I should probably mention that I’m also a huge Ralph Steadman fan.

DS: So did you follow the more current strips such as Bloom County, or Calvin and Hobbes, or the even more recent Dilbert?

WF: Well, to be quite honest, no. I was certainly aware of Bloom County. I had read a few Bloom strips here and there over the years, and while I certainly thought the strip was quite brilliant, I just didn’t follow it. The same with Calvin and Hobbes, as well as, Dilbert. I just didn’t get around to reading newspaper comics in those days. In fact, I still don’t. I'm so busy with writing and illustrating my own work that I just never get around to checking them out.

More recently, however, I found myself compelled to read all of Berke Breathed’s work. This need arose from an incident I experienced after outlining a series of Back Forward strips in which the characters were in an episode of Star Trek. Anyway, this friend of mine said, ‘‘Gee...that’s great. Too bad Berke Breathed already did it.’’ ‘‘What?!’’ I gasped. So I went out and bought every Bloom County book I could find, and read them through. I was astounded! The strip was not only more brilliant than I’d imagined it was, but it was also very close to where I was moving with Back Forward. Now I have to consciously try to keep Back Forward from straying too far Bloom-ward, as it were. On the other hand, I find it's awfully hard not to give Breathed a nod now and then.

I’ve yet to get around to reading Calvin and Hobbes and Dilbert, although I have read enough of both Watterson’’s and Adams' work to recognize genius when I see it.

DS: Any other syndicated strips which grab you, stylistically or otherwise?

WF: Lynn Johnston is astounding. ‘‘Mutts’’ is pretty darn awesome. ‘‘Zippy the Pinhead,’’ is incredibly rendered--quite impressive considering the format. Joe Martin's, ‘‘Mr. Boffo,’’ always hits me when I read it. I don’t know. I don’t typically read syndicated comics, so I’m pretty hard-pressed to say much more on that front.

DS: You often attack political institutions. More recently, you seem to have it in for, as
you coined the term, 'The Reshrublicans.' Do I detect some degree of discontent with
the Republican Party?

WF: No! Not at all! Why, I wuv all those widdle wascals! Listen. Just because a bunch of Nazi’s marched on West Palm Beach, and pushed my retired grandmother around for volunteering to count chads--which she felt to be her duty as an American citizen! Well! That’s no reason to dislike them? Is it? (laughter)

Besides, it’s the U.S. Supreme Court that really gets the credit for all that. The U.S. Supreme Court Election 2000 decision...synonymous with...what? Highly- Partisan Decision? Laugh riot? Utter Farce? I don’t know. There’s so many options to chose from! (laughter)

But almost kidding aside...I have no political affiliations whatsoever. Just wait until the Democrats get back in there. You’ll see. I only missed on Clinton because I didn’t have Back Forward going at the time.

No. I truly am a card-carrion dis-member of my own newly founded, ‘‘Great Hiber Nation Party.’’ The cool thing about, 'The Great Hiber Nation Party,' is that don't really know who’s in it. They’re all hibernating, and simply cannot be bothered with things like, voting--and more unfortunately, Back Forward! (laughter)

DS: So, what do you in your free time --between creating the strips?

WF: I feed the animals.

DS: What kind of animals?

WF: Mostly I feed carrots to the horses. Occasionally I sneak some hay over to the cows. Kinda hard to resist them when they’re all standing in your front window--staring at you all day. Then there’s the squirrels. I have a madcap trio of them out back. Oh, yeah, and I don’t want to forget, ‘‘Team Magpie.’’ This is a group of 8 magpies that I feed in the morning. They’’re a real trip. I can watch them for hours!

DS: Do you read--is there anything in particular that you like in literature?

WF: I won’t read anything--not even a newspaper--for a year or so. Then suddenly, I’ll go absolutely crazy and read anything I can get my hands on. That’ll last about a year. When I’m in that mode, I typically knock off a book a day. I just can’t put ‘em down once I get going.

DS: What do you think you will be reading once you get back into that mode?

WF: That’s an excellent question--because I don’t know. I have a rather substantial private library. During the 90's in particular, I was rather the obsessive completest when it came to collecting Modern First Editions. I’ve long since stopped that madness, though.

I want to read all of Cormac McCarthy’s work again. Problem is, McCarthy's such a great writer that he typically ruins me on reading anyone else for a while. So if I do that, I’ll save him, and, 'Suttree,'for last. Lately I’ve had an urge to read crime and mystery fiction. I’ve still got a couple of Ellroy and Hiaasen novels which I’ve stashed away for a rainy day. The same with a few recent Harry Crews’ novels.

DS: Do you especially enjoy any particular type of fiction?

WF: No. Once I start reading, I pretty much read just about everything. In fact, I tend to read non-fiction as much as I do fiction. But you name it, I’ll read it. Scarier still, you name it, and I’ve probably read it.

DS: Even, say...War and Peace?

WF: Believe it or not--twice! (laughter)

DS: You found it that fascinating?

WF: No. Not at all. I just thought I must of really missed something when I read it the first time. Turns out I didn’t miss anything. It really is just exactly what it is! (laughter)

DS: You have recipes here and there in your strips. So, do you spend much time
cooking?

WF: Yeah. I love cooking. I can throw things in pots and chop stuff up all day long. It's kinda therapeutic, I think.

DS: Any specialties?

WF: Most people who’ve experienced my spaghetti sauce quickly realize that there’s no turning back. I’ll cook just about anything I decide I want to, and generally with a substantial amount of success. I do take particular pride in my Vietnamese and Thai dishes, though. They, ‘present well,’ as Martha Stewart might say.

DS: Back to your strip, Back Forward. Tell me, how did you conceive of it?

WF: In February of 2000, I was sort of digging around in my head as to what kind of a project I might want to next undertake. I was thinking about finishing a novel I’ve had on the shelf for the past 8 years--a sequel to Alligator Alley--but it didn’t really grab me as something I wanted to follow up on. Especially with violence being as unfashionable as it nowadays.

I thought I might do a children’s book. So, I started paging through my old sketch-books to see what I might dream up. Back in the early 70's I’d done a number of mixed media pieces which featured, R.C.--albeit, a slightly more angular and detailed, R.C.. I’d more or less entirely forgotten about him over the years. Anyway, he grabbed my attention right off.

The first twelve or so Back Forward color strips posted on the web site are actually rough outlines for the children’s book that I thought I might have in mind. At the point I was creating those panels, I was largely thinking in terms of condensed story boards, which could later be expanded into a children’s book. Thing was, I really had no intention of doing a children’s book, but I just hadn’t fully acknowledged that yet.

I guess it was right after I completed the initial R.C. series that I went up to Oregon to visit Misha and Michael. From San Francisco, it’s about a 14 hour drive up to their place. The brain really gets a workout entertaining itself, as I tend to drive it straight through. On the way up there, I started to think about doing a comic strip instead. That's when I began pulling together the premise for Back Forward in my head.

I decided right from the start that I would create the strip only in the rigid newspaper print format-- in the highly unlikely event that a newspaper might actually be interested it at some point. Also, I kind of found the idea of having a discipline like that to be rather challenging.

Anyway, I was sitting around with Misha and Michael and we were discussing the strip when I got the idea for, ‘The Badge.’ The Badge is sort of a composite of Michael Chocholak, my old friend, Chris Bolta, the late Phil Hartman, and myself. Visiting Michael was kind of like discovering the key that would pull the Badge together as a character for me.

The Badge is also slightly derivative of a character of myself, who'd appeared in two graphic novels I’d done back in the mid-80's. Those were, ‘‘The Neo-Canton Legacy,’’ and, ‘‘The Phoenix Restaurant.’’ There’s a half-finished, third graphic novel in that series which will probably never see the light of day. That project was called, ‘‘The Hazardous Murders.’’ Anyway...that’’s more or less where the Badge came from.

DS: And the other characters?

WF: The other character’s just sort of followed suite. They were all originally designed to be nothing more than vehicles for defining the Badge, and R.C.’s, existence. You should understand that the first time you see these characters appear in the strips is, in fact, first time that ever I drew them. I was conceiving them as I created the strips. That includes to a large extent both R.C. and the Badge. Mr. Spot didn’t exist until I got around to dreaming him up in that initial series, you know? Everybody just kind of happened. The process is much like writing a novel. Characters just tend to show up. They plop down on your sofa, and say, 'Well! Here I am! Deal with me!'

DS: Didn’t you sketch the characters first?

WF: No! (laughter). I stopped filling sketch books around 1978. Ever since then, well...I don’t dink around. I just figure, screw it. Start drawing, and see where it goes. A sketch is a drawing where I come from, anymore. Of course, where I come from--a hole is a spot--so what more can you expect?

If anything, the first 70 Back Forward strips or so qualify as sketches--the basic outline for Back Forward. I mean, I was trying to figure out the mechanics of the characters, as well as the format of the standard syndicated comic strip right there. Not to mention just letting the strip as whole find its feet.

DS: Do you feel the strip has 'found its feet' at this point?

WF: More or less. It’s getting there. Around the time that the Badge began packing the telephone booth with the 5th holdouts from various television commercials, I realized that the strip was turning in a new direction.

Up until then, I really had to write the characters. Now they pretty much write themselves. It’s not easy by any means, but it’s certainly helpful for me if a character knows who they are. While not all the characters are settled in at this point, they’re certainly beginning to circle their wagons and make a stand for themselves.

DS: The Wap Trap...That was an interesting character...

WF: I was flipping through an old sketchbook when I stumbled on him. He was originally in a series of strips I did in the late 70's. He was a constant threat to another Lurkish/Muckish-type creature named, ‘‘Tippy.’’ Tippy lived in a clay pot inside a cave, and led a rather succinct and, well--rightfully paranoid life. (laughter)

DS: The Nuffins...?

WF: I just dreamed up the Nuffins. They came to me when I was doing one of the earlier black and white strips featuring R.C.

DS: So, you don’t always raid the sketchbooks?

WF: No. I’ve got all sorts of characters up my sleeve...or so I'd like to think.

DS: This is a terrible question, but how do you conceive of them?

WF: That’s like asking an author how one goes about writing a novel. But in my case, I can actually answer that question. I typically come up with a strange word--something odd --maybe even a name. Then I just draw what I think that word or name might look like. Weird, huh?

DS: But that's not how you came up with the Coyote... I mean, at this point he has no
name. 

WF: True, but I did qualify my response by saying, ‘‘typically.’’

DS: Please don’t take this wrong, but he does seem more like a dog than a coyote.

WF: Yes...there does seem to be some question....(laughter)

DS: How did you come up with the strip's title: 'Back Forward'? Were you staring too
long at your web browser that day?

WF: Back Forward is kind of how I perceive the world. I’d prefer to let most folks
figure it out for themselves, but I think a hint might just be in order. So here it is. Back forward with your back forward, as you back forward. I don’’t know. At least it’s got a good beat and it’s easy to dance to.

DS: This may be one of those questions that one shouldn’t ask a cartoonist, but how do you go about creating a strip?

WF: The creative? The mechanics part?

DS: Either. Both. Take your pick.

WF: The creative part is when I dream it up. At that point the strip is essentially completed. Problem is, it only exists in my head. For me, that’s really the easy part because it’s the most fun.

The mechanics is just going through the motion of getting the strip out of my head and down on paper. It’s kind of boring for me because it’s already done. You know, it’s the tired old, ‘‘been there --done that,’’ routine. But often --and much to my surprise --there's usually a bigger surprise somewhere in the translation.

As an example, there’s one strip where Dr. Bumsteiner is being chased down by another one-armed man who has socks on his head. Well, it wasn’t until the last minute that I decided to ask the question, ‘‘Bob Dole?!’’ Those are the real jewels for me. The things that pop up at the last minute, and right out of nowhere. Of course, sometimes they don’t work. That one most certainly did, though--as witnessed by all the e-mails we received.

I generally lay out the panels, then I do the text and the word balloons, and then I add the characters. Next, I bake the thing at 375 degrees for about hour, or until the outside is crisp. Then, well...voila! I serve! What else can I tell you?

Actually, there's no real formula that I can give you. I approach each strip differently. In some cases, I've drawn the images without even knowing what the characters were going to say. It's kind of inexplicable.

DS: Do you like to create stories for, or draw any characters in particular? And if so,
why? 

WF: I really don’t have a favorite character to work with. I sort of roll around and
whoever catches my fancy--or whoever I feel best fits the course of the narrative--
winds up as my next victim. That’s a hard one to really pinpoint because I do tend to like whichever character I’m working with at the time. I did fall rather in love with, Mr. Groundhog, though. I had a blast drawing him. I also find myself trying to work Mr. Spot in wherever I can. I like his attitude. Mr. Spot’s kind of like the voice of reason. He’s that little person inside your head saying, ‘‘No! Don’’t do that!’’ and, ‘‘by the way, isn't it time to take the garbage out?’’ He's like everyone's little subconscious voice.

DS: Is there a least favorite character for you?

WF: No. Not really. There’’s certainly unresolved characters--like Frankensquirrel. I’m just not sure of exactly where he’s headed yet, but I do have some ideas about where he might be going. Right now, I’m visualizing a paste adhered to the underside of a Ford Explorer. Either that, or as the permanent resident of a wheel- well. Something colorful --like that. You pick your color! (laughter).

DS: If people come away with only one idea from your strip as a whole, what do you
want that idea to be?

WF: Um...entertained? I guess I’d just want them to go away with whatever they might have found in it, to be at the very least, somewhat entertaining. It’s not like I’m doing anything more than a comic strip, you know? And in such a vast field, with so many talents out there which far exceed mine, I guess I can really only hope for that much. I’m certainly very grateful for the audience that I have, though. Whatever their motives! (laughter)

DS: Where do you see the strip going, in both the short and long term? More recipes?
More extended stories driven by R.C.'s imagination? Mr. Spot berets or paper-weights,
as the hot holiday gift for 2002?

WF: I hesitate to say, because I never really know where the characters are going to run off to next. That’s the other fun part of it for me--at least so far. But I’ve got to say, those Mr. Spot berets, and paper-weights seem like a pretty cool idea to me!

DS: I think I know the answer to this one, but I would like a confirmation: what is R.C. wearing on top of his aviator's cap?

WF: Sure. It’s a vacuum cleaner attachment. I just can’t detail it out anymore than that without making him look like he’s got a bottle opener drilled into the top of his head.

DS: Well, this has been great. I'd just like to ask one or two more questions before we wrap this up.

WF: Shoot! Everyone else does....

DS: What do you want your obituary to read?

WF: He lived, and then quite suddenly, he died.

DS: If you were independently wealthy, what would you do?

WF: Buy my way onto a forthcoming episode of Survivor III--just like everybody else? Or wait?!! Maybe we've all already done that!!! (laughter). Oh, I don’t know. You can never really know these things until they happen, I suppose. Something good, I guess. There’s so many bad things running around that it seems doing something good might just be not only in order--but also quite unexpected, too.

DS: But if you didn't have to work for a living, how would you fill up your days?

WF: Ah, Diane...welcome to Back Forward.