Yesterday morning I saw in the paper the ad for the new Bond movie “Die Another Day.” (see ad). Believe it or not this is very close to the cover concept I have been working on for the next issue. To prove it, I’ve also scanned my Franklin daytimer entry for November 20 (three days before the Bond campaign began). How could this happen? I believe it’s creative combustion. We are all reacting to the same news, headlines and atmospheric conditions. So there is bound to be some duplication of ideas when creative minds get to turning (add to that the copying and stealing and you've got a tidal wave). Either way, it’s a strong concept and I want to get some finished art cranked out this weekend.
Strong day in office (Friday). Totally redesigned the Dalton Classic Gunfights piece, moving images around and writing cutlines to fit, shoehorning in all of the fascinating tidbits. For example, the town hero, John Kloehr, was a modest man and for days after the Coffeyville fight strangers would come up to him and ask his name and he would often say “Jim Spears,” so he wouldn’t have to keep repeating the story. One of the strangers who asked turned out to be a Winchester Arms rep, and so the company sent Kloehr a beautiful rifle with a hand-scrolled inscription to Jim Spears.
Went to lunch with Carole, Robert, Gus and Sue at Tuscan Cafe ($6.36 cash). Talked about the new reader’s poll stats that Carole extracted. According to a large percentage of our reader’s comments, they want more Native American stories. This is at odds with our newsstand stats, where Native American covers have consistently been our weakest sellers. What does this mean? Someone offered that perhaps it simply means they want articles about Native Americans in the mix of the magazine, just don’t put it on the cover. Hmmmm.
Ted talked to Tom Selleck’s office. He got the mags, was quite impressed and is going to be out of the country for two weeks, but when he gets back we will talk. All the females here are ready for that.
Spit In The Sky And It Comes Back Dept.:One of our former employees tried to get a job at a competing national magazine. We heard they passed because of “inconsistencies in the resume.” Call me petty and immature, but this makes me very happy.
Wrote up Emmett Dalton’s bio, utilizing the hed: Life After Death Alley. Worked until around six. Got tons of reference for the cover illustration, loaded up and came home.
“You can use all the quantitative data you can get, but you still have to distrust it and use your own intelligence and judgment.”
—Alvin Toffler