Quick-Fire Quips is a questionnaire where we get to know people who stand out in the State of Alabama! Today, Alabama Public Radio host Baillee Majors talks with the "moderately disturbed" editorial cartoonist and visual storyteller, JD Crowe.
Baillee: Hey JD, how are you?
JD: I'm pretty good there, Baillee. How are you? Happy to see you.
Baillee: I'm happy that you're joining the show today! For people who are unfamiliar with your work, can you just describe your job?
JD: Well, I'm a dorky cartoonist. I basically sit around and wait for somebody to do or say something stupid politically. I usually don't have to wait very long. So, then I address it in a cartoon.
Baillee: I feel like the politicians in the state and beyond probably make your job pretty easy.
JD: Well, I've got some of the best writers in the world with these goobers, that's for sure.
Baillee: Anything that you're currently working on that you can talk about?
JD: It's really a day-to-day thing. You know, Tuberville keeps me busy. I just did a couple of cartoons about Trump's visit here to Mobile, so I'm just waiting for the next thing... There's a few other projects—long-term projects that I'm working on, which involves more storytelling and less politics, because politics kind of drives me crazy.
Baillee: No, I can imagine! When do you feel like you do your best drawing? When do you feel the most inspired?
JD: Well, I'm always searching for the next idea. Even when I'm not working, sparks are flying here and there, and I get an idea for something, I'll jot it down. I got a little sketchbook, I kind of keep notes in it, and it just varies. Sometimes I feel like I'm in a drought and I will never have another idea, and then all of a sudden the floodwaters, you know, just come rushing through, and I can't draw fast enough.
In general, I'd say a typical day is I spend most of my time stewing and pondering, and I finally get an idea probably later in the day. And my drawing time is probably mostly more later in the day, more towards nighttime sometimes. So, then I kick on the music and start flying into it.
Baillee: Do you have any, I guess, ideal or perfect drawing conditions? You mentioned music. Any kind of playlist that you have on? Do you have to have snacks nearby? Any kind of like mood lighting?
JD: Yeah, like romantic drawing goobers... I've got lots of playlists. I love making playlists, and I've got my go-to music is, well, hard rock, but progressive stuff like Pink Floyd. Pink Floyd is perfect drawing music. If I just have a seamless Pink Floyd background, I can just keep going.
Baillee: They've got some bangers, for sure. Now the introductions are done, let's get you warmed up for the actual questionnaire. And to do that, I want you to say "Quick-Fire Quips" three times fast.
JD: Quick-Fire Quips three times fast. Quick-Fire Quips three times fast. Quick-Fire Quips. [tries and fails]
JD and Baillee laugh
Baillee: Great effort! Okay, here's the first question. What comes to mind when you hear Alabama?
JD: I have to go back to the Southern duality. It's beautiful. Beautiful state. And people are conflicted. A lot of people are conflicted. The state is conflicted on several things. We have wonderful hospitality on one end, and got some hostility on the other.
Baillee: What's your favorite spot on the Eastern Shore?
JD: Oh, I've got some good ones. I think my very favorite go-to spot—I go there almost every night—is down here at the American Legion Post 199 in Fairhope. We're on the bay. It's this beautiful spot on the bay. We've got a little tiki hut down there. There's a lovely pier, and that's where I take almost all my sunset photos.
I'd say another favorite place is Blakeley Forest, which was the scene of the very last battle of the Civil War. And it's not too far from here. It's in Spanish Fort, and I found that place when I first moved here. And it's just a great place. If you've got dogs or animals, a lot of people ride their horses there, and it's just a beautiful, beautiful spot full of history. And it's kind of sad history, but it's a beautiful spot.
Baillee: What is your favorite thing about living in Alabama?
JD: Well, considering what I do for a living, I think my favorite thing is just the bass-ackward goobers I get to draw.
JD and Baillee laugh
Baillee: Fair enough. What is something that you don't like about living in Alabama?
JD: The bass-ackward goobers that I have to draw.
JD and Baillee laugh more
Baillee: You started out drawing on grocery sacks. What do you use now?
JD: I use electronic grocery sacks now.
JD and Baillee laugh
JD: No, I draw on something called a Wacom tablet, and it's basically about the size of my sketchbook, and I draw with an electronic stylus... I started it when I came to Alabama for the Press-Register in the year 2000. Before that, I could never find exactly the right paper I liked or the right kind of pen, but it was mostly what's called a Rapidograph pen.
It takes a little bit of a learning curve, but not much, because you're not looking at the drawing, you're looking at what you're drawing on the screen. What I really liked about that at first, I would sometimes I'd draw left-handed just to get another viewpoint, because everything's a little bit out of control with your off hand. But the caricatures were great. Caricatures need to be a little bit warped anyways.
Baillee: Yeah, I agree with that.
JD: The first time I went from paper to the Wacom tablet was on 9/11, when that horrible thing happened. And I saw the towers go down, and I was in a state of just manic stuff, drawing really fast because I was trying to draw fast, and I had all this anxiety and all this, you know, "What the hell is going on?" kind of thing. And I kept breaking my pen, I kept breaking my pen. I said, "I think I'll just start on this Wacom tablet, because I can't break that thing, right?" So it's a very smooth and natural way to draw. And that was my very first where I went straight to the Wacom tablet with the stylus was for my first drawing about response—my response to the 9/11 attacks.
Baillee: What's one misconception that you think people might have about drawing political cartoons?
JD: Oh, that they're all funny, and it's all fun and lighthearted. It's, "Oh, it won't take you two minutes to draw that."
When I first got started with it, I was in Texas, and I was tickled to death I had a job... It's a lot to go through to come up with a real good cartoon. But we had a little group of ladies that came to visit, a little field trip, and they came by and asked me what I do. I was really proud to say, "Well, I draw these editorial cartoons," and I gave them a few options, showed a few things to them, and they just nodded and said, "Oh, so you're just summer help, then?"
Baillee: Oh, wow. Okay.
JD: So, they didn't really take it seriously. Some people really get into them and they know that a lot of work goes into them and a lot of thought goes into it, but some people just probably think, "Oh, it's just a silly, goofy thing to do."
Baillee: You draw a lot about social issues and kind of addressing a lot of injustices. How do you balance doing your job and kind of keeping sane at the same time?
JD: I'm not sure I do.
JD and Baillee laugh
Baillee: Fair enough.
JD: I guess the best thing about it, I would be troubled by some of these issues anyway, but now I've got a platform, and it's as much a catharsis for me as it is anything. I guess that's the easy thing. Otherwise, I would just be in a mess without an outlet.
Baillee: Yeah, I can see that. Has anyone ever bribed you to not draw them?
JD: Not exactly, but I do put up with some a**-kissery from new politicians when they first get into the job, and they feel like they can butter me up and it's going to make a difference somehow.
But no, if I even have one of my best friends in office, which I have had a few times or I've become friends with, it's kind of like that coyote and the sheepdog cartoon... where the sheepdog is about to whip the coyote and then the whistle blows, the shift's over. So they're buddies again.
That's business. I got to draw what I got to draw... That's kind of my relationship with some politicians, I think.
Baillee: Would you ever want to run for office or hold office?
JD: Hell no. I'm more of a court jester. I don't want to be the king.
Baillee: If Fairhope ever did elect you mayor, you know, in the event that that ever happened, what would be the first thing that you would do?
JD: Well, I guess I would... I guess I would have to work on the caricature of myself. I'd probably try to get that out of the way, mm-hmm.
Baillee: Any ideas on how you might draw yourself?
JD: Oh, I've drawn myself a few times. The nose comes into existence here. If I'm laying down on the bed, I look like a shark under the covers there.
JD and Baillee laugh
Baillee: What has been your least favorite and your most favorite drawing that you've done?
JD: The two that come to mind: when the Space Shuttle Columbia went down, that was early when—it was 2003, I think. I brought my little girl to work. She was about four at the time, and I explained to her what happened, and there were seven astronauts that lost their lives with this explosion. And so we just fiddled around with ideas, and we decided they should be represented by stars.
So, I let her draw stars, and then we decided, "Let's put them in, because there are seven of them, so let's put them in the shape of a seven, all the stars." And then she drew the first group, and then from there I used that as the template and drew the seven stars.
It was just a black background, seven stars. And one of them, there was a fellow from Israel, and so I did the Star of David. One of the stars was the Star of David. That's all I had to say in that cartoon. And so that was kind of the Holy Grail of cartoons as far as, we look for something that you don't have to explain—one image tells the story... And it felt good to work with my little girl, and now she's 30 now, and we still have that bond, and it's kind of cool. She's a cool chick.
Baillee: Yeah, that's special.
JD: The other one that comes to mind is when President Obama was first elected, he was the 44th president, and I just kept thinking of him as Jackie Robinson, the Jackie Robinson of politics. And there's a famous photo of Jackie Robinson sliding into home. He's got the Dodgers uniform, and he's number 42. So I used that image, and drew President Obama and gave number 44 on his uniform number, because he was the 44th president. I just loved that. It was like one of those things, it just happened in front of me. I remember furiously sketching, and all of a sudden it was done. And so I love that. I love that drawing.
Here's the other part of this thing: I got a call once it went out. I got a call from the National Baseball Hall of Fame, and they wanted a print of that cartoon for the Hall of Fame. And I'm a huge baseball fan, so I was just thinking, "This is great. I'm going to be in the Hall of Fame before Pete Rose."
Baillee: Oh, those are awesome stories. Do you have a favorite comic strip? I kind of feel like you'd be a little bit into Calvin and Hobbes and maybe a little bit more darker humor.
JD: Oh, I love Calvin and Hobbes. Absolutely. Calvin and Hobbes, Bloom County, with Opus and all that, and a little bit of The Far Side, obviously. Those are easily my three favorites.
One of my favorite inspirations is a guy named B. Kliban, he's a great cartoonist. He did a lot of stuff for Playboy, but I didn't know that at first. But he's got these little goofy books, these little, just silly drawings, completely silly drawings.
I had a professor in college, she handed me one of his books and just a funny little silly book... I have one here, "Never Eat Anything Bigger Than Your Head & Other Drawings."
They're just completely silly, goofy. And that lit that little fire, and I just said, "Oh, I can do that! People can get paid for drawing just nonsensical stuff." So I just started drawing crazy, silly drawings and getting them published in the school, the campus newspaper. And that was just, so I loved that too. So I still do that kind of thing.
Baillee: Which is more terrifying: having to meet a very tight deadline or stand-up comedy?
JD: Well, they're both kind of a rush, that's for sure. Yeah. I can't do anything if I don't have a deadline, so I need the deadline to get anything done. Stand-up comedy can be a lot of fun, especially when it goes well, and when it doesn't, it's pretty awkward.
I can really appreciate being in a really awkward moment. I think that's hilarious, even if it sucks at the time. I said, "Oh, this is going to be a great story." It probably is not a fun story right now. I love the awkward.
Baillee: You know what I appreciate in this interview? You seem very kind of like deadpan and very dry humor, which I'm a big fan of. And I feel like people sometimes don't get that or they can't kind of relate to it. But I am just envisioning you doing a punchline and nothing landing, and you're like, "Alright, anyways," and just moving along.
JD: Yeah. That's actually pretty funny in itself that nobody's laughing at that.
Baillee: If you had to survive a 24-hour lockdown, would you rather be trapped in a room with five furious politicians that you just drew, or five bombing comedians who will not stop testing their material on you?
JD: Oh, good Lord. That's a no-brainer. Do you know which way I want to go with this?
Baillee: I'm going to go with the politicians.
JD: I would rather be around five politicians that I've just nailed. That'd be a good awkward moment for sure. If I was stuck with them for a while, we would work through our differences, as has been the case so many times. Yeah, the bombing comedians, now that's something else. That'd be hellish. I wouldn't want to be in that.
Baillee: Some miscellaneous questions. I think you'll like this one: If there is an alien invasion, what three albums would you give them to represent our music?
JD: Oh, boy. Okay. Dark Side of the Moon, obviously. Obviously, the aliens will be eating that stuff up. Wish You Were Here. Yep. Yep. Also Pink Floyd. And then I'm going to go with another one of my favorite albums: Paranoid by Black Sabbath.
Baillee: Very cool. Do you have any superstitions or irrational fears?
JD: Yeah, I really am afraid that I'm not as paranoid as I should be.
Baillee: I can relate to that. What about guilty pleasures?
JD: This is kind of lame, but when I'm on a road trip, I pull over to the gas station. I have to get M&Ms. Almond M&Ms are my favorite.
Baillee: What is a piece of advice that someone gave you that you still think about?
JD: I'm going to take this from a Doctor Seuss thing: Be the truest you you can be.
Baillee: Good advice. What do you want to be remembered for?
JD: The stories. I think the real reason we're all here is the stories we tell, the stories we found. Just remember my stories.
Baillee: Okay, here's the last question: What does Alabama need?
JD: A reset... Well, I'll tell you what one of my editors told me one time when I first moved to Alabama and I was trying to figure out the lay of the land, and I started drawing these pictures. I think it was Frances Coleman, editorial page editor at the time. She said, "Yeah, Mobile in general, we just need a few more funerals before we can get to where we need to be."
Baillee: Those are all the questions that I have. Is there anything that you want to add before we wrap up?
JD: One really cool thing we're doing here in Fairhope is the Story Slam... every three months or so. It's just a fun event. The people that come out are amazing. They're a very generous audience. Nobody's there to heckle or anything. It's just a very good listening group, and they take everything to heart and are very supportive of people who are getting up for the first time. It's an amazing thing. I would encourage people who live in the area to come out and support Story Slam in Fairhope at The Book Cellar.
Baillee: That's it for today's Quick-Fire Quips, a questionnaire where we get to know people who stand out in the state of Alabama. That was editorial cartoonist JD Crowe. Find us at APR.org for more Quick-Fire Quips!
