The Marvel Method Archive

Stan Lee's instructions were vague

J David Spurlock 17 August 2016 Mark Evanier: "Joe Orlando was especially bothered by the amount of redraws he was asked to do on every job he did that way. He'd draw whatever he was given in the way of a plot and then Stan would look at the pencil art and say, "Well, you should have had the characters doing other things here...redraw these three pages." Joe said he wouldn't have minded the redraws if he'd been paid for them but he wasn't. So he was basically being paid because Stan wouldn't tell him what to draw and made him guess...and then he was penalized for having guessed wrong. This later became an issue between Lee and Kirby on some issues where Stan decided after the story was drawn that he wanted things to go in a different direction. Kirby did not like the Marvel method, partly for creative reasons -- he felt that the guy who controlled the plot should control the dialogue." Patrick Ford: What you have there are comments Mark made at the Marvel Masterworks Message board. He's paraphrasing from his interview with Orlando. I think that interview with Orlando may have been posted by Mark on an old Internet forum. Michael Hill: Right, I don't seem to have the original. Patrick Ford: Dan Best is the guy who posted the direct quote from Orlando, but Best didn't source his quote. Here's the quote Best posted. JOE ORLANDO: He really didn’t seem to have any ideas, but we worked out a plot, and he sent me the synopsis. I couldn’t believe it when I saw it. In one line, Stan indicated that he wanted a three-page fight sequence, in a garage, or whatever. Nothing else. So I called and asked him what I should do. He said, “You know, throw some tires around, do something with some oil, make it up as you go.'”Well, that didn’t help. Patrick Ford: Here are Mark's comments on Orlando. https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/marvelmasterworksfansite/ask-mark-evanier-t4954.html Ask Mark Evanier! - CollectedEditions.com With Mark Evanier's permission. Mark is willing to answer questions about comics, comics history, and whatever he's worked on. And everybody be sure to thank him for taking time out of his busy schedule! www.tapatalk.com J David Spurlock: Where is the Daniel Best quote from? Patrick Ford: I mentioned above that Best didn't source the quote. Patrick Ford: If you mean where did Best post the quote it was at his blog called 20th Century Danny Boy. I recall asking him to source the quote and he said he could not recall where it came from and didn't have time to go back and search through all his materials to find it again. Patrick Ford: I'll ask Mark if it's from his interview. Patrick Ford: Not from Mark. Patrick Ford: Here are all the interviews and biography pieces on Orlando documented at the GCD. Amazing World of DC Comics #6, 1975 Comic Book Artist #1 Spring 1998 Comics Buyer's Guide Jan. 29, 1999 obituary Comics Forum [U.K.] #20, Aut., 1999 obituary Creepy #12, 1966 [Warren Publications] E.C. Lives! 1972 Unexpected #201 Unknown Soldier #242 [DC Profiles] 1980 World Encyclopedia of Comics, 1976/99 Patrick Ford: Most likely suspect inn that group would be the E.C.LIVES book from 1972. Patrick Ford: BTW it was also Dan Best who posted this quote from Wood which was not sourced until I found it was from Mark's interview with Wally Wood which Mark posted on Kirby-L. "Stan was the scripter, but I was coming up with most of the ideas. It finally got to the point where I told him that if he was the writer, he’d have to come up with the plots. So, we just sat across the desk from one another in silence." Patrick Ford: BTW. It's also not from Jon Cooke's interview with Orlando in CBA #1. J David Spurlock: Aug 3, 2009 MarvelMasterworksFansite, Mark Evanier: "Some artists asked to work 'Marvel method' found that they just couldn't do it. Others didn't like doing the extra work without making extra money. Joe Orlando was especially bothered by the amount of redraws he was asked to do on every job he did that way. He'd draw whatever he was given in the way of a plot and then Stan would look at the pencil art and say, 'Well, you should have had the characters doing other things here...redraw these three pages.' Joe said he wouldn't have minded the redraws if he'd been paid for them but he wasn't. So he was basically being paid because Stan wouldn't tell him what to draw and made him guess...and then he was penalized for having guessed wrong." Patrick Ford: Anyone have the 1972 publication E.C. LIVES ? J David Spurlock: Aug 26, 2009 MarvelMasterworksFansite: STERLING: Were there any artists that told Marvel to either pay them more for doing the writing end or do the writing themselves? EVANIER: Wally Wood sure did. Alex Toth, to some extent did...and you could say that Kirby and Ditko did, though their problems with the company ran a little deeper than that. The bigger problem for some artists was not that they were expected to contribute to the writing but that Stan would insist they redraw whole pages (sometimes, a lot of them) if he didn't like the way they'd taken the story. Joe Orlando and Bob Powell were two who had a lot of problems in this area. Orlando said that on the Daredevil issues he did, he had to draw 25-30 pages to get 20 that Stan would accept, and the page rate wasn't that wonderful for 20 in the first place. He finally refused to do redraws on a Giant-Man story without additional pay because, as he put it, "I drew what Stan told me to draw and then he demanded I erase half of it and draw something else." That was his last Marvel job, and Stan wound up having Ditko do the redraws, then published it with Ditko credited as sole penciller. Patrick Ford: Those are all at the link I provided. They aren't exact quotes, bit rather Mark paraphrasing his interview with Orlando. Mark tells me the direct quote from Orlando which was first posted by Dan Best is not from Mark's interview with Orlando. J David Spurlock: They are the best we have and are best if the date and source are listed as I am doing J David Spurlock: Jul 3, 2010 MarvelMasterworksFansite: MARK EVANIER: At Marvel in the sixties, Stan Lee sometimes didn't have anyone on staff who could do [art changes] and he'd grab Kirby or Ditko when they visited the office and have them do a redraw on someone else's work...without pay. There were a number of cases where he had pencilers redraw whole pages because he didn't like the way they'd plotted a sequence. There was no pay for this and it became a sore spot with some artists. Joe Orlando, for example, stopped working for Marvel because Stan, he said, kept making him redraw whole pages to change the story. At one point, he refused to make major changes in a Giant-Man story and so he never worked for Marvel again, and Stan had Steve Ditko do the necessary redraws. Kirby had a number of fights over this kind of thing. Stan would sometimes insist on story changes and Jack would have to redraw pages and he usually did not agree with the alterations. Since he was not paid for the rejected pages, they should have been returned to him but they rarely were.

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