Even though I have no desire to drink on the job myself I sometimes wonder if other people should. I began to think about this a long, long time ago when I got a farm laborer's job hoing cabbages. I remember the sinking feeling in my stomach when the farmer showed the three of us the field. It was sundrenched and acres wide with long, straight rows of cabbages diminishing in railroad perspective to the horizon. Our job was to rake out unwanted cabbages so the that every wanted cabbage had a foot of space to grow. He showed us how to do it then left us there, faced with the stark reality of sun, flies and endless vegetable rows. One of the experienced guys offered me a drink from his flask and I, with a look of superiority, declined. Boy, did I regret that! That was the roughest work I ever did!
I did learn something from it, though. Some jobs are so mind-numbingly tedious that they can't be done without liquor. Prohibition must have made some forms of work nearly impossible. I imagine that the only thing that made hoing possible was the knowledge that there was a jug in the bush at the end of each cabbage row.
Maybe this applies to animation. It's a creative job but there's a certain amount of tedium too. Maybe the old, golden-age animators were right to to get soused at lunch. Maybe liquor is the lubricant that made it possible to do all the great work they did. I say maybe because I don't know. Having an mp3 player and headphones is my substitute for booze and it seems to work... but everybody's different.
thanks to Jenny for the Freddy Moore picture that I stole from her site.
I don't know Eddie, wouldn't liquor keep one from concentrating? Did you mean after the day is done or during?
ReplyDeleteWhen/why were you working in the crops? How old were you? Please, more details!
that is a killer freddy moore drawing
ReplyDeleteThis post suddenly made me think about all those great animation veterans who were forced to work on godawful Hanna-Barbera and Filmation crap during the '70s and '80s. There must have been an enormous quantity of liquor needed, to make the daily work on Scooby Doo more bearable :(
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, that's a great Freddy Moore drawing.
Seems like Jack Kinney mused on this very suject in his anecdotal autobiography. Quoting from memory, I think he ended up saying something like, who knows how many ideas were quencheded by their prodigous intake of booze.
ReplyDeleteSun + Booze + Labor sounds like a recipe for dehydration, but apparently that wasn't the case for your co-workers.
Reminds me of a story someone once told me about having to run behind a truck and throw bundled Christmas trees into the back of it during the Winter.
Let's hear it for our nation's field workers!
There must have been an enormous quantity of liquor needed, to make the daily work on Scooby Doo more bearable
ReplyDeleteAccording to a teacher I had at animation school who worked on the original Care Bears show, YES INDEED THERE WAS!! ;)
Hey Eddie, I worked for 5 summers throughout my teenage years for a sunflower research company, 2/3 of the summer consisted of hoeing out weeds and thinning the sunflowers too.
ReplyDeleteIt was hell, and the pay wasn't lavish, but I kept coming back every summer because of friends. Most of us were actually best friends and were in the same grade in high school. We'd have to drive all over central MN, hitting up a different growth plot each day (averaging in size from 1/2 acre to a field the size of Nebraska), and most days were hot, humid, and downright miserable.
We also had the railroad tracks perspective at some of our fields! In the larger fields, it would take literally 5-6 hours to get from one end of a field to another, in one row, and depending on how thick the weeds were. IN THE PUNISHING SUN. At least there were water breaks, though. The worst part was coming back to the field weeks later, doing it again, and then getting stuck on a row that a some idiot didn't hoe well enough the last time, so everyone else was a mile ahead of you, skipping with joy, while you were left cleaning up the crap left from a poor hoeing job. :-)
What made the job bearable was the joking around (as long as it didn't interfere with getting the job done), the hours you could spend talking to your friends, and driving into small towns and stopping at mom & pop gas stations for lunch every day. Sitting in the air-conditioned van, listening to Paul Harvey at noon. I don't miss the job, but I do miss all the great the memories.
I do know a few artists who seem to be borderline alcoholics, but I haven't been able to tell if it improves their productivity. One guy seems to get drunk every time he's nearing a deadline, and still manages to get the job done. So maybe it does help some? Me however, I'm pretty much a teetotaler, so I wouldn't know for sure!
The drawing by Fred Moore is from the painstakingly acquired collection of James T. Walker, Eddie, whom you know--you really have him to thank.
ReplyDeleteI'm pretty sure a lot of the animators were a bunch of alcoholics. They all really hated the prohibition law and made a bunch of cartoons with it represented as an old man getting killed/blown up/burnt in Hell, etc.
ReplyDeleteWhich Golden Age animators were on the bottle? Disney was full of them I know, and there's a rumor Don Williams was an alkie.
- Thad
It is actually a good idea to drink alcohol when performing farm labor in the summer. Alcohol is a vasodialator...alcohol causes the blood vessels to expand, get closer to the skin surface and get rid of excess heat to prevent heat stroke. This is also why it is dangerous to drink alcohol when doing outside farm chores or ice fishing during the cold, Minnesota winters.
ReplyDeleteKali: It was the summer of the year I got out of high school. I saw an ad for farmworkers and I thought it invoved milking cows and feeding chickens. I only hoed for a couple of days. The other guys didn't speak english and I had no one to talk to. The boredom drove me nuts!
ReplyDeleteAbout the liquor, I imagine it would only be effective if you drank while you worked or at lunch.
You put up a new picture! You look so tragic!
Craig: Ideas quenched!? I hadn't considered that. Maybe so.
Thad: I don't know if all daily drinkers are alcoholics. I don't even know if all problem drinkers are alcoholics. Maybe they are. I don't know.
Trevour: Everybody should have a a period in their life when they do physical labor. Kipling did a good job of explaining the reason in "Captains Courageous."
In regards to Care Bears and Scooby Doo, I highly doubt that alcohol was their drug of choice. I'm sure more than a couple classic shows were conceived in a room filled with bong smoke.
ReplyDeleteEverybody should have a a period in their life when they do physical labor. Kipling did a good job of explaining the reason in "Captains Courageous."
ReplyDeleteI haven't read that yet, but I think I will now! I agree though, I feel my work ethic was solidified from my summers in the field.
BOOZE = GOOD
ReplyDeleteI know quite a few anti-drinkers, including some great talent who are nervous wrecks, and can barely hold a conversation let alone look you in the eye.
A LOT of cartoonists are socially retarded, and so much so that they can't get work becasue of it.
I think booze is amazing!!!!! It teaches you how to relax! and later, when you aren't wasted you can use what you learned to relax in the same situations.
dont be sad kali!
ReplyDeletei'm not sad Marlo! do I seem sad? love me!
ReplyDeleteWriter George Hill was fired for being drunk on the job.
ReplyDeleteI don't think booze for hard labor under a scorching sun is the smartest idea. And its sort of the alkie English majors excuse to keep crawled up inside the bottle, "Hey!, It worked for Hemingway!"
ReplyDeleteNot that I am against loosening up. Just don't get hungover and miss work. Also, it points to times where you COULD have a martini for lunch, or smoke at the desk, without getting fired. Bring back the less oppressive atmosphere for work-- thats the key. Allow creative staff to wind down or wind up as needed occasionally. Do the smart Schlesinger thing, and head off to the track and get off their back.
This is off-topic, but I love Kali's new picture! Is that really a photo of you, Ms. Fontecchio?
ReplyDeleteI know quite a few anti-drinkers, including some great talent who are nervous wrecks, and can barely hold a conversation let alone look you in the eye.
ReplyDeleteA LOT of cartoonists are socially retarded...
That describes me to a tee. I don't want to be retarded anymore. (Notice how a lot of cartoonists in the animation biz use the term "retard" frequently?) I'm going to take Ms. Meekin's advice and imbibe more often. It might even help lower my cholesterol, too.
Oh J.J. of course it is I, who else would it be MARLO? Pshhh- her photos are all PRO. Mine are taken by some dirty toilet.
ReplyDeleteYou have high cholesterol too? We should start a club! People Who Can't Eat Bacon But Eat It Anyway!
"You put up a new picture! You look so tragic!"
ReplyDeleteI totally skipped over your reply somehow today- what a tard I am!
I look tragic?? Should I change it? Have I destroyed your image of me? I thought it made my silhouette look great, you know what I mean???
I look tragic??
ReplyDeleteI just assumed Kali was doing that "pouty Calvin Klein underwear model" look. I have no idea if she has inner turmoil or not.
It seems that the drinking/animator pendulum goes to one extreme or the other. The "old days" seemed to have a lot of lushes, while in more recent times animators are perceived to be more on the straight and narrow path. I remember having a couple of Canadian artists here in Cali who were quite taken aback at the fact that no one really wanted to have a beer with them either at lunch or even after work. They seemed to feel like things were less social as a result.
ReplyDeleteI think within the past five years or so, things have been loosening up under some circumstances. The Union Holiday party is now actually fun because more people seem to be drinking and are being "happy drunks"...or at least happy while drinking. Marlo's right in that most animators need all the help they can get in the social lubrication department.
Eddie - I had the pleasure of listening to this story at John's, accompanied by dire facial contortions as you reminisced watching those cabbages disappear over the horizon!
ReplyDeleteI'm still not sure whether
a) some jobs are so tedious and boring that they require ANY sort of reward at the end to entice you to complete them
OR
b) some jobs are so tedious and boring they require booze to numb your brain to a point that actions become mechanical, allowing you to complete them
Off topic - When my dad was still around he'd written a book on the origins of words and phrases. I think you'd love it! It's not in print anymore but I have a copy you can have if I see you again.
Kali- Pshhh- her photos are all PRO. Mine are taken by some dirty toilet.
Kali! You have a toilet that takes photos? That's amazing!
I think booze is amazing!!!!! It teaches you how to relax! and later, when you aren't wasted you can use what you learned to relax in the same situations.
Booze is lovely for becoming someone you're not.
It's nice to get out of your skin once in a while and enjoy yourself. As long as you can hold your liqour.
When I was at Disney, my girlfriend and I would knock a few drinks back at least once a week at the Smoke House or at Chadney's (now closed, alas)at lunchtime. This would make the second half of my day a little challenging(although sometimes it really helped), but my girlfriend never seemed to be affected at all. She had a number of amazing qualities, including what seemed to be an almost unreal immunity to alchohol. She could drink a few champaigne cocktails, or finish a caraphe of sake at lunch and hurry back to work, reinvigorated and ready to churn out some of the most beautiful work you've ever seen. I've never met anyone like her. I don't think she would have survived under the present climate though, Disney seems to to more interested in spying on its employees than letting them loosen up and have a good time.
ReplyDeleteKali: Your new picture is...well...tragic! You have such a sunny personality in real life. Doesn't this misrepresent you?
ReplyDeleteMarlo: Good point. You can acquire social skills while licquored up that you can use when normal.
Ok ok- I will change it to something more cheery!
ReplyDeletea wise man once told me, "if you can't draw drunk...you can't draw."
ReplyDeletethank you alcohol :)
in all honesty Eddy, I find that having the occasional drink or two ( or three, depending on if it is wednesday or later haha) helps with posing. i find that alcohol gets me to push expressions more, and the creativity really flows ( unfortunately, the linework doesnt )
ReplyDeleteIt's a generational thing. Moore's generation were all smokers and social lushes - and the proof is in the pudding, as far as I can see. Their legacy speaks for itself. I'd start drinking heavily if I thought it would help me draw more like them.
ReplyDeleteKali - what happened to your Captain Video Space Ranger scarlet mask? That was cool.
Jenny - do you mean Jim Walker, the animator? I wish he'd post some of his extensive W.C. Fields collection. He has one of the biggest collections of Fieldsian memorabilia in the world. I'm just nerdy enough to find that cool.
Marlo - BOOZE = GOOD, and CARTOONIST = SOCIALLY RETARDED, even the ones who can get work.
Sorry, but it's undeniably true. At least we can laugh about it, and illustrate it with funny drawings - which is more than Trekkies can do.
hammerson--
ReplyDeleteYou're right! As a callow youth, I worked cleanup at H&B. You'd go in to the bull pen at 10 a.m.to show your stuff to an animator & you could actually smell the vodka. Most were in the vodka stage of alcoholism (it IS hard to smell) tho' some would still be in the cognac phase (you kept a bottle of good stuff in your drawer & took an occasional nip as a reward for achieving some small production goal, like that jug at the end of a cabbage row.) I remember Kenny Muse (of Tom & Jerry fame) used to hold onto the back of a rolling office chair like a walker to keep from falling over. You'd see him shuffling thru the halls pushing a huge stack of layouts in front of him. He never did less than 100 ft./wk.
It is a generational thing, as Mike F. said. In the fifties at Disney's most of the animation crew got its daily footage done in the mornings, drank their lunch, then were worthless all afternoon while the more sober assistants cleaned up their work. The word was in that era that if one had a question for Walt one had better ask him before lunch, as he loved his cocktails, too. This was a bygone era. Disney, like the Bush administration, doesn't follow the Geneva Convention anymore. Booze is out the window as human drinking muscles are now required for covering one's corporate ass.
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ReplyDeleteIn my experience as a part-time marathon caricature artist, I've noticed how 'intoxicated' I feel after about the 5th straight hour of drawing without a break. I always say it takes beer afterwards to sober me up.
ReplyDeleteOk ok- I will change it to something more cheery!
ReplyDeleteAwwww...don't listen to Eddy! I like that photo of you. It looks classy!
Jeez, my mistake! I just remembered - the animator with the extensive W.C. Fields collection (a fitting subject in any discussion of alcoholism) is named TIM Walker, not Jim.
ReplyDeleteTim is a friend of Eddie's, I only met him once. Sorry if you're out there, Tim!
His name is James Tim Walker. People in the business know him as Tim but his film credits usually read James T. Walker, hence the confusion.
ReplyDeleteHey Mike--too late for you to see this response from me, probably--but yes, James T. is Tim. : ) He's a swell guy, and I didn't even know he had a Fields collection! He's risen even further in my estimation(if that was possible). He provided me with great things from his Fred Moore collection to post on my blog(including the drawing Eddie swiped here), for which I'll never be able to thank him enough...but he loves to have things seen and share them.
ReplyDelete