Disenfranchised #19

Jules Feiffer and Popeye: Happier in Comics Than in Life

“In Popeye’s world everyone (but our hero) was cheerfully corrupt, giddily greedy, amoral, immoral, without a sign of compassion or conscience—in other words, a farcical cartoon version of Depression-age America. . . . No strip has more contradictions, a noisy tenement of clashing impulses: gentleness meets with nastiness; courtesy meets violence; greed, loutishness, and brutishness knock heads with kindness, righteousness, and moral vigor.” —Jules Feiffer

“I yam what I yam and that’s all that I yam.” —Popeye (The Sailor Man)

Jules Feiffer was born in the Bronx in 1929. He laments his timing since he was “missing a basic Bronx gene, the ball-playing gene.” He lived for comics, though, saying, “I learned to read only so that I could read comics”. Forced outside by his mother, he impressed neighborhood kids drawing Popeye and Dick Tracy with sidewalk chalk. By eleven, he was drawing his own comics, like “The Streak” (inspired by The Flash), with pencil covers marked one cent cheaper than the comics at the nearby soda shop—whether to undercut the professionals or tacit admission that he wasn’t one yet, he doesn’t remember. There was nobody he admired more than Will Eisner (The Spirit) and E. C. Segar (Popeye). He studied anatomy at the Art Students League at the urging of his mom, who supported the family by selling fashion sketches to various department stores and clothing manufacturers.

After high school, Feiffer applied to New York University and Cooper Union but was rejected. He looked up Will Eisner in the phone book and showed up at his hero’s studio, hoping for a job. Eisner told him his portfolio stank but took a shine to him—Feiffer had absorbed everything he could about Eisner’s career and style. He was unpaid for his first year. He was bad at backgrounds and bad at inking figures. Feiffer spent a lot of time ruling border lines, drawing dialogue bubbles, inking shadows, and working on paste up. During his second year apprenticing, he told Eisner that The Spirit stories weren’t as good as they used to be. Instead of firing him, Eisner told him if he thought he could do better to try it. By the end of the 1950s, Feiffer was the sole author on most of The Spirit comics. He loved writing for The Spirit, but never felt like he was using only his own voice. Eisner had final say and would cut out any leftist politics he tried to sneak in. Feiffer inserted a lot of personal details from growing up in the Bronx but he filtered everything through Eisner’s sensibilities.

Feiffer was drafted in 1951. He would joke that he left Eisner’s studio for a slight increase in pay. He avoided most of basic training by helping letter helmets for various other soldiers and superiors. He narrowly avoided being sent to Korea to repair radios by faking a breakdown in repair class. He spent the rest of his two year stint working in the Signal Corps Publication Agency. In his downtime, Feiffer worked on a comic called Munro about a four year old who is drafted into the army. Munro was turned into an animated film in 1961 by Gene Deitch. He credits Munro with determining, “the direction of my work and life over the next fifty years.”

After being discharged, Feiffer moved to the East Village and took various jobs at advertising art studios. He would try to work six months and be fired so he could go on unemployment for six months. During this cycle of working and being fired, he practiced being a cartoonist. In 1956, he started a strip called Sick, Sick, Sick (later re-titled Explainers) in the Village Voice. He found his voice in these strips, commenting on relationships, sexuality, and politics. He was one of the first American cartoonists to point out the futility of the war in Vietnam. One night, while drinking a martini and eating a Stouffer’s Tuna Noodle Casserole, Feiffer saw Elaine May and Mike Nichols performing on a CBS show called Omnibus. He thought, “Oh my God—they’re me, but they’re better. They’d gone further and perfected it.” He made it a point to meet them which kicked off a lifetime friendship with Mike Nichols.

By the late 1950s, Feiffer’s career began to take off. In addition to his Village Voice strip, he started drawing comics for Playboy and had several comic collections published. He wrote and published his first novel. Nichols didn’t like it, but his note about not liking it was so eloquent that Feiffer couldn’t hold it against him. He did the cover and interior illustrations for The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster. Stanley Kubrick liked his comics so much that he flew him to California to discuss writing a script for a political satire he was going to direct called Dr. Strangelove. Feiffer admired Kubrick but turned him down, saying, “It became clear with Kubrick that he was going to control everything, that it wouldn't be a collaboration. I wouldn't be working with him, I'd be working for him.”

In the late 1960s, Feiffer started working on a play called Littler Murders. He wanted Nichols to direct, but Nichols didn’t like this either and refused. The play was eventually mounted starring Elliott Gould and received mostly unfavorable reviews. It was re-staged and re-mounted in London and took off. Feiffer went to see Nichols’ The Graduate (1967). He was bearing a grudge about being turned down and hoped Nichol’s movie would be bad. Instead, he saw a “revolutionary breakthrough in American cinema,” and wrote Nichols an affectionate note about how much he loved it. Nichols responded and their friendship was repaired. Little Murders came back to the states as a revival, this time directed by Alan Arkin. Nichols saw it and told Feiffer, “I didn’t get it! I just didn’t get it!” Arkin would direct the movie version of Little Murders (again starring Gould) in 1971.

Feiffer began working on another play which would eventually be called Carnal Knowledge. He offered it to Arkin who turned it down, saying it was too dark. Feiffer sent it to Nichols who was deep in post-production on Catch-22 (1970). Nichols told Feiffer he loved it but wanted to do it as a movie. Feiffer rewrote it as a script under strict instruction and guidance from Nichols. It was an intensive, line-by-line tutorial for screenwriting. Feiffer described the movie as, “two men descending that sexual slope from the innocent lust of young manhood to the muddled misogyny of middle age.” It was released in 1971 to polarized reactions. John Frankenheimer told Feiffer and Nichols that “it was like open-heart surgery” and Lillian Hellman said, “it’s a picture that so demeans relations between men and women that I can’t talk about it.”

Feiffer says he was “shunned by Hollywood for ten years” until Robert Evans called. Robert Evans was hired to run Paramount in 1967 with little experience besides a few acting gigs. He brought Paramount back from the brink of financial ruin as producer on movies like The Godfather (1972) and Chinatown (1974). He stepped down shortly after and had been producing his own movies since under a deal with Paramount. Evans was calling to ask if Feiffer would work on a screenplay for a musical version of Popeye. Feiffer was skeptical and asked if Evans was interested in a screenplay based on E. C. Segar’s comic strip Popeye or Max Fleischer’s animated Popeye. Evans gave him the right answer: “I want to do whatever Popeye you want to do.”

Feiffer worked on a treatment for Evans. He’d been feeling burnt out on his own comic and felt that, “working on Popeye took me away from who I was (boring!) and channeled me into who Segar was.” Evans liked the treatment but kept sending it back with notes. After the third treatment, Feiffer told Evans he just needed to start working on the script, saying, “Popeye was going to rise and fall on characterization, which meant. . . . transforming [comic strips] into film reality.” He asked for a $10,000 advance to write fifty pages. Evans agreed and loved the partial script so much that he used it to get Dustin Hoffman interested. Hoffman was effusive about the script, comparing it to Samuel Becket and The Graduate. Feiffer finished the script and sent it on to Evans. Evans loved it and passed it on to Hoffman who read it and immediately demanded Feiffer be fired. Evans sent Feiffer to talk to Hoffman and try to convince him to stick with him and his script. This conversation ended with Feiffer exploding at Hoffman and, in a story that seems apocryphal, waving around the script for Kramer vs. Kramer (1979) while yelling, “You make me jump through hoops to find out why you won’t do my beautiful screenplay, and instead you’re going to do this piece-of-crap?” Miraculously, Evans chose to stick by his writer and not his friend, movie star, and occasional tennis partner.

Popeye was stalled with no actors or a director attached. Louis Malle wanted to direct. Feiffer vetoed him, maintaining that only an American could direct it properly. He said later that he wished he hadn’t and that, “it would've been a different Popeye, but it would've been a much better film.” It was offered to Hal Ashby who declined. Jerry Lewis was interested and Feiffer said, “I’d rather kill myself.” Evans had one other idea: Robert Altman. Feiffer knew Altman personally; they both frequented Elaine’s (an Upper East Side hot spot). He also knew his work and reputation, saying, “[Altman] was a pure artist, meaning that he’d throw out the script first thing. . . . He didn’t much believe in words.” Evans had Altman sign a contract saying he wouldn’t deviate from the script. Feiffer laughed. Altman’s conception was aligned with Feiffer’s: he was interested in, “the idea of being able to put on screen a two dimensional world.”

Evans had to sell Don Simpson, a Paramount executive, on the choice of director. Paramount Pictures was co-producing with Walt Disney Productions. Simpson wasn’t happy with the project at all, later saying, “None of us really wanted to make Popeye, and we hated Altman, who was a true fraud. . . . He was such an alcoholic. He was full of gibberish and full of himself, a pompous, pretentious asshole. I guess Evans wanted him, because Evans thought they could party together. So the fucking director was beyond a fucking drunken disaster, and then we had Evans, who didn’t even know what a fucking setup was.” Altman was hired.

Evans saw Robin Williams on Mork and Mindy and thought he looked like Popeye. Hearing that Altman was involved, Williams agreed to star. Feiffer had been thinking about Shelley Duvall, a regular Altman player, for Olive Oyl even before Altman was involved. Duvall remembered being teased for looking like Olive Oyl when she was young. “It meant you were skinny as a rail, you had sparrow legs, and an Adam’s apple,” she said, “I mean, who wants to admit she was born to play Olive Oyl?” Michael Eisner, Paramount’s president, wanted Gilda Radner. Altman put together a reel of Duvall for Eisner, Simpson, and other Paramount executives. There was no love lost between Altman and Simpson. Altman said of the screening, “Simpson stood up and said, ‘Well, I wouldn’t want to fuck her. And if I don’t want to fuck her, she shouldn’t be in the movie.’ I was appalled. Simpson was a bad guy, a bum. That was the kind of guy who was taking over the studios. It’s a big plus to our industry that he’s not here anymore. I’m only sorry he didn’t live longer and suffer more.” Duvall was eventually cast and is the only aspect of the film that received near-universal praise.

Popeye would be shot in Malta for no other reason, it seems, than being extremely far away from Paramount. Malta has very little indigenous wood so the set materials, which were primarily wood, needed to be imported from Canada and the western United States. It was off to a rocky start. Will Kroeger, the production designer, thought the architects did too good of a job with the set; it was too perfect looking. They offered to draw imperfection into the blueprints but Kroeger didn’t want manufactured irregularity. He had them take the set down and then took away their power tools, measuring tapes, and levels before they rebuilt it. A recording studio/screening room was also built. All of Harry Nilsson’s musical numbers were recorded there, and it’s where Altman screened the dailies.

Robert Evans flew over and immediately had to call Don Simpson in the middle of the night. His bag had been lost and his bag had “things” in it. He asked Simpson to talk to his secretary to get Henry Kissinger’s number and to call him to take care of it. Somehow, that worked and Evans bag and “things” reappeared. While in Malta, Evans was indicted for fifteen felony counts for buying cocaine in an entirely separate incident. “Popeye was the first time the Walt Disney Company opened their arms to an outside partner, and I was arrested for cocaine,” he said. Being so remote posed issues for everyone’s supply lines. David Levy, another producer, claims that props needed for the movie were having drugs hid in them and shipped over to Malta. Robin Williams said, “When we were on Malta, we were on everything but skates. And then they sent the skates and it got interesting.”

The movie eventually started filming, and, as Feiffer expected, Altman was letting the actors do whatever they wanted. “Bob let Robin fuck with the dialogue and turn it into a Robin Williams stand-up moment. . . . it trashed the moment and it trashed the scene,” he said. He went to Altman after filming and blew up at him. Altman didn’t budge. Feiffer left and wandered around the set. He reflected on his recently ended relationship—his girlfriend of six years had broken up with him three weeks before he left for Malta. “That gave me motivation to climb to the top of this fake town without regard to treacherous decks and look down on this wondrous fantasy creation. I was contented, living inside this cartoon I had written, to know, as I knew at seven, that I was happier in comics than in life.” The next day at breakfast, the entire crew ignored him. The cold shoulder from everyone lasted all day. Feiffer went to Altman and said he was going back to New York. Altman told him he couldn’t quit and insisted he didn’t know anything about Feiffer being ignored (it seems the other person in the room with them the night before had been gossiping). Altman said, “you’re the only man who’s not afraid to tell me what’s really going on,” and that he would do whatever he could to keep Feiffer in Malta. Together, they re-cut the scene of Popeye and Olive Oyl meeting for the first time, removing some of Williams’ improv and restoring some of Feiffer’s dialogue. “I no longer wanted to leave and also felt terribly moved by this generosity of spirit,” Feiffer said, “The guy was nuts but he was also a brilliant and generous-hearted man.”

The shoot dragged on. Altman was in Malta for eight months, the actors for three. It wasn’t supposed to rain between November and May but was raining almost every day. The production went two million over budget and twenty six days over schedule. Five weeks before production wrapped, Feiffer left. "The further we got into the movie, the more it moved away from Segar and more toward Max Fleischer. And when I left town, Segar left with me,” he said. The end had to be rewritten because they could no longer afford to shoot expensive sea battle sequences. With no budget and no writer, Williams suggested, “I could walk on water, like Jesus,” as a joke. Evans liked it and they went with it. You can see the movie lose steam in real time, the anti-climatic end sputters out in stark contrast to the idiosyncratic beauty that precedes it.

The movie premiered on December 6th, 1980. Roger Ebert praised it as “sophisticated entertainment.” Vincent Canby said it was a “mixed bag,” calling it an “immensely appealing mess.” Pauline Kael was extremely complimentary to Shelley Duvall and not much else. “Two-dimensionality is tiresome,” she said. Despite being the eleventh highest grossing movie that year, Paramount and Disney claimed it was a failure—it didn’t perform as the blockbuster they hoped and rumors calling it “Evansgate” circulated. Evans said, “I really thought this was going to be the best thing I was ever associated with.” Altman defends it, saying, “You should watch Popeye with a kid. Kids love that movie. They get it.” Feiffer came around, sort of, and concedes that Altman partially succeeded. He recognizes that, though, “half my script never made it to screen,” Popeye is, “an odd, engaging, and eccentrically charming film with astonishingly convincing cartoon characters brought so completely to life.”

Shortly after the film’s release, Feiffer got a phone call. The caller said she was Marie Segar Clausen, E. C. Segar’s daughter. She’d heard Feiffer in radio interviews saying that he was trying to capture the spirit of Segar’s original comics in his script. She didn’t believe him, she’d heard similar sentiments before and it never amounted to anything. Marie Segar Clausen went to see Popeye anyway. She told all this to Feiffer, and said, “it was her father up there on the screen.” She thanked him. Jules Feiffer hung up the phone and wept.

***

Thank you for reading. Disenfranchised will return.