Michael Kupperman

I'm interested in all the ways to tell a story, and this graphic novel does a nice job recounting both history and a life that might have been much more dry or plodding in traditional narration. I was not fully aware of the Quiz Kid phenomenon of the 1940s radio show days, so that was fascinating. The author then zeroes in on the ultimate Quiz Kid, Joel Kupperman, who happens to be his father. Now that his father is succumbing to dementia, Michael is trying desperately to get basic show more information about the whole experience from his Dad, as well as an understanding of why their whole family has been so emotionally stunted and why they've never really had a relationship. The show started in Chicago in 1940, and since the Kuppermans lived nearby and young Joel was already showing an amazing aptitude for numbers and a sharp memory for facts, his mother arranged a 'test' and by 1942, 8 year old Joel was a regular on the show. As the youngest, he quickly became the star of the show and his Jewish heritage was a bonus for good PR with the War effort in full swing. But the relentless pace of celebrity is a lot for a young child to handle - proven time and again in Hollywood. His mother was the driving force keeping him on the show until past the 'graduation' age of 16 (special circumstances allowed an extension for Joel) and the show even transitioned to TV, which didn't go well for anyone. The book was both an interesting look at a slice of history, and a exploration of the individual emotional impact on 2 generations. "Staring at history is like staring at any abstract painting, you start to see things." (210) Deft drawings of all sorts of artifacts from carefully kept scrapbooks allows the reader into the whole experience. show less

Michael Kupperman's comics are an acquired taste for sure, but if you've got the hunger, Snake 'n' Bacon's Cartoon Cabaret is the fix you need. Kupperman is not afraid of the absurd, and may even harbor a disdain for common sense and logical plot development. That's all to the good, since his unique universe gains its strength from pure absurdity and a very flexible internal logic. Kupperman can be hilarious when he wants to, and even when the jokes fall flat, the bizarre scenarios usually show more provide significant interest of their own. Besides, when it comes to comedy, bringing Mark Twain, Albert Einstein, and Roger Daltrey together just makes perfect sense - doesn't it? show less

The author gives a fascinating look into the life of his father, a child prodigy on a quiz show in the '40s and '50s, who spent a lifetime traumatized by the experience and now faces memory loss and dementia in his old age. As someone who values intellect highly, I was engrossed by this sad tale of one man's (boy's?) rise and fall and how it effected his relationship with his family for decades afterward. Highly recommended.

I was looking forward to this, as I imagined it would be, but what I actually got was disappointing.

The art is pretty basic, with lots of close-ups on the same image (which made me think of those memes where you zoom in on a photo until it's blurry), even though there's nothing new to see. Lots of sparse backgrounds and heavily drawn characters, with the text kept separate from the art.

While Kupperman's quest to understand his father and his history are admirable, and complicated by the show more fact that his father seems to have blacked out everything related to Quiz Kids and then developed dementia, there's not much substance in this novel. What little he does uncover is nothing that couldn't be discovered by a stranger.

What it's really about, of course, is Michael's relationship with his father. There's an incredibly effective and emotional scene where he asks his father why he didn't try to be more involved in his life, and his father says he simply didn't think to try.

A lot of memoirs fall into this trap, I think: a very personal story, with a lot of meaning for the author, that leaves everyone else a little cold. show less