You can Farquad right off

I worked on Shrek and what happens next will blow your mind! I mean, the Shocking truth about being mind blown! I mean, The secrets revealed! Ugh, I don’t think I’m very good at this clickbaiting.

Shreks-n-Effect

My art career has been less of a smooth road trip in a convertible Miata through the scenic Redwood Forest and more like a busted rollercoaster held together by duct tape, careening through a funhouse with rabid raccoons on meth screaming “Surprise Motherfucker”, no brakes and certain death. In other words: nonlinear.

The drawings of headless people with faces on their chests in medieval times represent a mythical race known as the Blemmyes. These beings were depicted in ancient manuscripts as headless humanoids with facial features situated on their chests. The concept of the Blemmyes dates back to classical antiquity and was perpetuated in medieval lore as part of the “monstrous races”.

I tell people I’ve worked for Shrek, Coca-Cola, Sony Animation, and The Wall Street Journal, among others (“others” being the clients I am too embarrassed to mention, like my cousin’s hairdresser’s friend’s racist uncle who offered me $15 to draw him as a southern Civil War hero, hated it, didn’t pay me, left a scathing online review saying I was a liberal elite, and then paid an immigrant 25 bucks to generate an AI version of himself with 36 fingers standing next to Donald Trump dressed as Rambo as his Racebook profile picture).

What? You want me to draw you as a jingoistic southerner representing the pride of the Rebels in the Civil War? FOR FREE? Well say hello to my version of you, as a “Blemmyes” Scarlette O’Hara, oh and I gave you a tiny wiener haha

Breakfast cakes

But back to the green guy. When I say, “I worked for Shrek,” I let people fill in the blanks themselves, which they usually do and think:

“Wow, you worked with DreamWorks on Shrek?! Like omg! I wasn’t even born when that came out! You must be 200 years old!!! I bet you got to hang out with Mike Myers and Eddie Murphy, drawing in an office that looks like a fairy tale treehouse, while wide hipped handmaidens brought you syrup-covered pancakes and Nickelback played live in the background.”

An accurate depiction of the Naked Griddle Cake Wench that would serve you flapjacks at your desk when I was drawing for the Green Guy

It…wasn’t exactly that. What happened was this: a friend who worked for a media studio was subcontracted by DreamWorks to create an interactive DVD trivia game for the release you would go rent at Blockbuster (and be thankful you don’t have to go through crap anymore of getting to the video store, realizing they are all out of the movie you wanted to rent, decide for a lesser movie that only you kinda want to see only to realize it has a giant scratch on the disc in the shape of a penis making the movie unwatchable and it’s too late to go back and get another one).

Sadly my version of Blemmyes Shrek and Donkey didn’t make it into the movie… BUT IT SHOULD HAVE!!!

I got off track… (a common theme), The media studio needed additional fairy tales, drawn in the Canterbury Tales style—like the book Shrek uses as toilet paper to wipe his green hairy tush in the first movie. You know, the scene right before the ultimate bro song by Smashsmouth kicks in. The studio knew I could draw in that style and thus I was hired by the “assistant to the assistant manager.”

Did I draw Dwight Schrute as a Blemmy? FACT: Yes I did. FACT: This is the best drawing you have ever seen of an assistant to the assistant manager. FACT

Up In The Club(s)

I flew out to L.A. for this swampy fairytale gig and stayed straight into Compton, where I had the best tacos of my life at a food stand at around 2 a.m. (decades before food trucks were even a mainstream thing). Each morning, I’d get lost on the subway trying to find the outsourced studio—which, by the way, was not DreamWorks but a small warehouse by the beach wedged between two strip bars that both offered lunch specials claiming they had “the breast wings in the world.” Classy.

“Oyez! Voulez-vous coucher with me, sweet lord?” In yon high tower, with silken cord.” Come hither, knight, the hour is late, Dame Marmelade doth seal thy fate!” - Doing a Canterbury tales riff of the song Lady Marmelade seemed funnier in my head.

In the outsourced studio, it was working under halogen lights sitting in lifeless square cubicles, the faint smell of life’s regrets wafted through the air all while the Muzak version of Smash Mouth’s “Hey now, you’re a rock star, get your game on, haaaaay” was pumping through tinny ceiling speakers, presumably for Dreamworks synergy and hype. Weeeee….

….eeeeee

…eee

There’s only one thing worse than Joe Rogan, Elmo and Alex Jones, and that’s that fucking Smashmouth song sang by that asshole, Steve Harwell.

On my lunch breaks it was either Strip Club A or Strip Club B. I liked Strip Club B because the server/dancer there was named Anita Mann— she had one leg that was a little shorter than the other due to a complication at birth— so she sorta had to hopscotch over to you which I guess was kind of a dance. Sometimes while hopping out my order of buffalo chicken, a thigh would bounce off onto the floor and the gritty looking manager with a very pronounced mustache would grumble and comp me for the dropped piece of fried chicken. Except he wouldn’t refund your money, he’d just offer you an extra thigh the next time you came in. I feel this was just a selling tactic, but it did work as chicken wings were delicious… a lot better than Strip Club A’s wings as the Buffalo sauce just didn’t cut the mustard like it did at Strip Club B. Also you’d find a hair in your hot sauce more than I’d like at Strip Club A. Wing hair...

Don’t let Anita Mann’s wooden leg be a deterrent, the things she can do with that limb would amaze you.

Exposure and Credit

There were some perks at the outsourced studio, I got meet the Eddie Murphy voice double, Mervil. He was recording a few Donkey lines for the trivia game. Actually that was the only perk; the rest of the time I sat in that warehouse cubicle illustrating extra storybook scenes, wondering what subway I’d get lost on that night and if I should get the boneless wing plate for dinner at Strip Club B or go for the breast and thigh happy hour special. You really couldn’t go wrong with either.

When the project finally wrapped, I got paid and then waited eagerly for my name in the credits. Spoiler alert: it never showed up (a common theme in the freelance world). So, if you have Shrek on DVD and somehow get through the menu and stumble on the trivia game, just know that less than one of those fairy tales was drawn by a guy surviving on Anita’s “breast” wings special, nervous about getting lost going back to my hotel in Compton, where the 2am taco stand created something of magic for you to eat.

Tis a potrait of me, not getting into the credits…again.

People think art life is glamorous, and it can be at times, but most days it’s just strip clubs, chicken wings and being lost on the subway of life.

Citations

1. "Shrek" and DreamWorks association - Reference to the famous animated movie Shrek by DreamWorks, often nostalgically remembered for its characters voiced by Mike Myers and Eddie Murphy. See more about the film's production and cultural impact here: http://www.dreamworks.com/shrek

2. DreamWorks Animation - Brief history and notable projects by DreamWorks, one of the leading animation studios in Hollywood, known for Shrek, Madagascar, and Kung Fu Panda. http://www.dreamworks.com/about

3. Mike Myers and Eddie Murphy in Shrek - Overview of the main voice actors and their roles in Shrek, Mike Myers as Shrek and Eddie Murphy as Donkey, contributing to the film’s popularity. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0126029/

4. DVD Interactive Games - Context for DVD interactive games in the early 2000s, including trivia and other bonus features popular for enhancing user engagement with films like Shrek. http://www.digitaltrends.com/dvd-games-history/

5. Canterbury Tales Style - Explanation of the "Canterbury Tales" art style that was referenced for drawing the additional fairy tales. The Canterbury Tales, illustrated manuscript style, would inspire such storytelling. http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/onlineex/englit/canterbury/

6. Smash Mouth’s “All Star” in Shrek - Overview of Smash Mouth's "All Star," the song synonymous with Shrek, often associated with the film's opening scene. http://www.billboard.com/articles/smash-mouth-shrek-all-star

7. Blockbuster Video Rental Culture - The experience of video rental at Blockbuster, capturing the nostalgia and frustration of renting scratched DVDs in the 2000s. http://www.theatlantic.com/blockbuster-history

8. Interactive Shrek DVD Trivia - Look at the multimedia strategy for Shrek DVDs, which included trivia games. While no specific source exists for this trivia, general references to Shrek DVD features can be found at: http://www.avclub.com/shrek-dvd-extras

9. Outsourcing in Animation - Discusses the common practice of outsourcing parts of animation or multimedia projects to smaller studios, often for cost reasons, similar to the anecdote here. http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/outsourcing-animation-studios

10. Freelance Work in Animation - Overview of common challenges faced by freelancers in the animation industry, including lack of credit and instability, paralleling this experience.

    http://www.animationguild.org