Byline: TIM KNAUSS
How to become a successful cartoonist in your spare time, by Steve Moore, author of ``In the Bleachers'':
STEP ONE (Getting Ideas):
``On Friday morning, all I do is wake up in bed and stare at the wall until I have enough ideas for the week.''
STEP TWO (How Long to Stare at the Wall):
``I have to put out six of those suckers (cartoons) a week, so it can take a few hours.''
STEP THREE (Don't Strain Yourself):
``For the rest of Friday, I just sort of take it easy.''
STEP FOUR (Get Back to Work):
``On Saturday, I try to draw them all. It kind of eats into my spare time.''
There you have it, fans, probably the first ever how-to manual for cartoonists.
For that you can thank Steve Moore, a 33-year-old Los Angeles Times news editor who spends his off days writing the sports-oriented panel, ``In the Bleachers.''
Moore has been writing the cartoon for almost three years, so he has the necessary experience to give this sort of advice.
Back in his day, though, there were no how-to manuals for the inexperienced. In those days, you learned as you drew, and if you didn't know how to draw something -- a nose, for example -- then you just sort of borrowed one from another cartoonist.
``I borrowed a hand from one cartoonist, a nose from another. That's how I learned,'' Moore said.
That was back in the late 1970s, when Moore was drawing editorial cartoons for his college newspaper at Oregon State University. He graduated in 1978 with a bachelor's degree in journalism.
In his earliest political cartoons, Moore borrowed visual techniques from such dark-side artists as B. Kliban and Charles Addams. More recently, Moore has learned from Gary Larson's ``The Far Side.''
At this point, though, Moore is a cartoon professional -- ``In the Bleachers'' is distributed to about 100 newspapers. So of course his work is completely -- almost -- original.
``I'm still not happy with it, because I think it looks too much like bits and pieces of Gary Larson,'' he said.
``I think every cartoonist is guilty of looking like someone else early in his career. As long as you're aware of that, you can work on it and your own style can creep in.''
In Moore's case, he only works on it two days a week.
What stands between Moore and the ``great scam'' of being a full-time cartoonist -- that is, being able to stay in bed and think up cartoons all week long -- is his real job.
``I'm a news editor first. The cartoon is all on my spare time,'' he said.
Sunday through Thursday, Moore works at one of the most solemn, least humorous newspapers in America -- the Los Angeles Times.
``It's sort of like working for your grandfather,'' Moore said in a telephone interview from his office last week. ``There's not a lot of receptiveness to doing something new.''
Moore's off-the-wall cartoon does not run in the L.A. Times, although the paper's sports department recently tried it out for a few weeks.
``The word I got was, it didn't fit our readers,'' Moore said.
So who does it fit?
Judging from some of Moore's recent panels, readers of ``In the Bleachers'' are ordinary sports fans who wonder about not-so-ordinary things like:
- How mothers at home react when football players wave to them on TV (``OK, OK. Hello, already. Geez, mellow out . . .'')
- What happens when a 300-pound lineman accidentally sits on the place kicker (``Listen, Bubba, you'd better go rinse your uniform if you don't want a permanent stain.'')
- What hockey players do when they're alone (``Dave was alone in the rink practicing slap shots when, inevitably, push came to shove and a fight broke out.'')
The cartoon is aimed at ``people who have outgrown Mad magazine but who still like unconventional humor,'' said Moore.
Moore created ``In the Bleachers'' in 1984 when he was sports editor at the Maui News, a daily newspaper in Hawaii. At the time, he was looking for a cartoon for the paper's sports page, but couldn't find one he thought would interest general readers.
``So I just took two weeks off and sat on the beach and came up with six weeks' worth of cartoons,'' he said.
Moore has some experience as an athlete. He played baseball in high school and college until injuring his knee. Now he prefers softball and ocean sports, including fishing.
But most of his cartoon material comes from being ``in the bleachers.'' In particular, Moore's experience as a sports editor introduced him to the bottomless pit of sports cliches, which he often gleefully perverts in the cartoon.
In Moore's world, when a basketball team suddenly ``explodes'' in the fourth quarter, it's not a pretty sight.
Someday, Moore may graduate to full-time cartoonist. But that would mean turning his back on a lot of academic training (including a 1983 master's in journalism) and a good job at the L.A. Times.
``I think it would be a great scam to sit home and do that.
