{"id":7387,"date":"2018-08-24T22:58:27","date_gmt":"2018-08-25T01:58:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/paulopedott.com\/paulo\/?p=7387"},"modified":"2018-08-24T22:58:27","modified_gmt":"2018-08-25T01:58:27","slug":"mad-de-cara-nova","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/paulopedott.com\/paulo\/?p=7387","title":{"rendered":"MAD de cara “nova”"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Por:\u00a0Steven Heller<\/a><\/span><\/span>\u00a0|\u00a0
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Notice anything different? No, it\u2019s not that $5.99 is no longer \u201ccheap!\u201d Even the hilariously venerable\u00a0MAD<\/em>\u00a0Magazine\u2014<\/em>the magazine that influenced my own so-called wit and humor\u2014begins a new era today with its new logo design.\u00a0The magazine\u2019s newly published \u201canother issue #1\u201d that comes out NOW,\u00a0April 17th (again, if you already forgot, that\u2019s today)<\/span><\/span>,\u00a0<\/b>includes the new logo and layout, an evolution that has occurred over the past 60+ years. I spoke to Bill Morrison, executive editor,\u00a0Doug Thomson,\u00a0MAD<\/em>\u00a0design director and Suzy Hutchinson,\u00a0MAD<\/em>\u00a0art director about this new incarnation of probably the oldest American humor and parody magazine.<\/p>\n

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After all these decades of\u00a0MAD<\/em>\u00a0as is, why the change now?<\/strong>
\nBill Morrison:\u00a0<\/strong>We felt it was time for a change. Starting with a new team in Burbank, California, and a new issue #1, it gave us the perfect opportunity to break some long-standing rules, take some chances and freshen things up.<\/p>\n

It appears to return somewhat to the original Kurtzman logo. Is that the intent?\u00a0<\/strong>
\nDoug Thomson:<\/strong>\u00a0Absolutely. I worked at\u00a0MAD<\/em>\u00a0for over 10 years in New York, so I know the history, and how special and important\u00a0MAD<\/em>\u00a0is to so many people. Changing the logo after a 63-year run was daunting, and I knew we had to get it right. I also knew that the change had to have a purpose, a reason for being. Also, when\u00a0MAD<\/em>\u00a0began it was a comic book, and we\u2019re now featuring a comic book section within the magazine. Returning to the original Kurtzman logo\u2014even a modern, updated version\u2014works on several levels. We\u2019re relaunching with a new #1, and it was Kurtzman\u2019s logo that started it all back in 1952.<\/p>\n

I think fans have been relieved to see that the new logo references\u00a0MAD<\/em>\u2019s history and honors it. Plus, it just looks cool.
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Who reads\u00a0MAD<\/em>\u00a0now? Will this redesign jar them?<\/strong>
\nBill Morrison<\/strong>:\u00a0MAD<\/em>\u00a0has a loyal legion of readers; ages range from around 11 to 65. We believe there are six things that are essential to\u00a0MAD<\/em>: the movie and TV parodies, \u201cSpy vs Spy,\u201d \u201cA MAD Look At\u2026(topic of the issue),\u201d the Marginal Drawings, the Fold-In and, of course, Alfred E. Neuman. These are important to\u00a0MAD<\/em>\u00a0fans and will remain in the magazine. We felt that with these pillars of the magazine intact,\u00a0MAD<\/em>\u00a0fans would be willing to accept a different look for the magazine. So far, we\u2019ve been proven right.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m old enough to remember the first shift. Which was actually a changeable logo. How many iterations did you do?
\nDoug Thomson:<\/strong>\u00a0Before I began working with the new staff in Burbank, I created several mock-ups of cover ideas, all featuring an oversized, cartoonish logo very reminiscent of Kurtzman\u2019s original. The idea was there from the beginning. I brainstormed logos for several months with Suzy. Together we produced a few dozen options. But it was the Kurtzman version that always felt right, the one we kept going back to.<\/p>\n

To create the final version, I actually traced Harvey\u2019s logo in Illustrator and began modifying it. His \u2018M\u2019 is completely crooked\u2014the center points don\u2019t line up. Some fans have noticed the other anomalies that I intentionally added\u2014the hole in the \u2018A\u2019 is wider than it should be, the hole in the \u2018D\u2019 is too low. This is all on purpose (to make sense of that darn \u2018M\u2019), and I think it lends an oddness to the whole thing.<\/p>\n

I couldn\u2019t have arrived at the final version without our art director, Suzy Hutchinson. She helped me tweak it to perfection, pulling out a corner here and there, determining the heights of the letters (the \u2018M\u2019 and \u2018A\u2019 are taller than the \u2018D\u2019), getting the spacing just right. It was her brilliant idea to lower the hole in the \u2018D\u2019. I spent hours laboring over every detail, then she said, \u201cLower your \u2018D\u2019-hole,\u201d and immediately improved it by 1,000%. We make a great team.<\/p>\n

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Are you pleased? Would you have done anything else?
\n<\/strong>Suzy Hutchinson:\u00a0<\/strong>We\u2019re super happy with the look of everything, the logo, the general graphic design of the magazine \u2026 I don\u2019t think there\u2019s anything we would have done differently, but we also want the design to continue to evolve. The beauty of working on a periodical is that we create a new issue every two months; if we decide something needs a tweak or two, we can always do that.<\/p>\n

Are the changes inside, too?
\nDoug Thomson:<\/strong>\u00a0From a design standpoint, there are several changes. I had always wanted to expand the table of contents to a two-page \u201cwow\u201d moment. The first issue\u2019s two-page contents spread features a fantastic photo of\u00a0MAD<\/em>founder Bill Gaines, paired with artwork from Harvey Kurtzman\u2019s cover for the original\u00a0MAD<\/em>\u00a0#1. I wanted to inject new life into the magazine, making it cooler and hipper, but still honoring its past. It was Suzy who suggested making Gaines\u2019 glasses pink and green, once again elevating it to the next level.<\/p>\n

We moved \u201cShorts & Briefs\u201d (formerly known as \u201cThe Fundalini Pages\u201d) and letters to the back of the magazine. Now readers get to the meatier, iconic content sooner. The letters pages have been completely redesigned. I\u2019m a typography nerd, so this was a real opportunity to have fun and try new things.<\/p>\n

There is no fixed color palette for the new\u00a0MAD<\/em>. As a designer, I can get bored repeating the same thing, so I wanted to build in versatility from the get-go. Our first issue is primarily black, with pops of hot pink and acid green. But issue #2 is in the works with all-new colors. (They\u2019re a secret.) The contents pages up front and the recurring features in the back of the magazine use the same colors, creating bookends to each issue, adding cohesion.<\/p>\n

The logo can be presented four different ways as well\u2014a solid fill with contrasting stroke, no stroke, stroke and fill the same color and an outline only\u2014so there again is the versatility that I like. I\u2019ve insisted on a moratorium on the use of \u201cMAD Red,\u201d as we call it. Red is the classic\u00a0MAD<\/em>\u00a0color, the color historically used in our logo most often. But to distinguish ourselves as something different, something new, we\u2019re giving red a rest. (Of course, it will come back someday in a big, spectacular way.)<\/p>\n

There are several design changes. The team created a fun, beautiful, interesting hybrid that fans will love. It feels like\u00a0MAD<\/em>, it sounds like\u00a0MAD<\/em>. It looks great, too\u2014we\u2019ve increased our paper quality. The first issue is a real knockout. I\u2019m proud to have been a part of it. Now go buy a copy. Buy two!\u00a0\u2013<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Mr. Neuman is not touched, or is he?
\nSuzy Hutchinson:\u00a0<\/strong>No, but before our first issue came out we had some fun with our fans and made them believe we had given Alfred a makeover. We asked regular\u00a0MAD<\/em>\u00a0cover artist Mark Fredrickson to play plastic surgeon and paint an image of Alfred with his teeth fixed, his eyes evened up, his ears pushed back, etc. He even gave him a stylish haircut and a cool suit. He looked a bit like Rick Astley! Fans saw the image on the Internet, and many were outraged that we would dare to change him. It was a prank, of course, and we never had any intention of changing him. But it was fun to see the reaction.\u00a0MAD<\/em>\u00a0fans are very passionate!<\/p>\n

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