JEFF MARIOTTE

JEFF MARIOTTE
The following is an interview with JEFF MARIOTTE, who has worked as a writer and editor, as well as in management, at Wildstorm Productions, now part of DC Comics. This interview was conducted on October 25, 1999.
JOHN DALTON: What is your earliest comic book memory?
JEFF MARIOTTE: The first comics I can remember are some Roy Rogers comics I saw in a Russian barber's office in Paris, France. I never have learned to enjoy haircuts, but I still like Roy Rogers today.
JOHN DALTON: What, in your life, best prepared you to work in comics?
JEFF MARIOTTE: Probably growing up reading them. I subscribed to Detective Comics in the late 60s, about the same time the Adam West "Batman" series was on the air. I read pretty widely, DC and Marvel, and collected a lot. In my senior year of high school I went to a school on a military base in Germany, where there was a thrift shop where you could get used comics for a nickel. These weren't in collectible condition--they were folded and torn and rubber-stamped--but I was able to pick up lots of comics I otherwise never would have been able to afford, and I really got to read some of the best stuff out there.
JOHN DALTON: How did you get your first break in the comic book industry?
JEFF MARIOTTE: I had been doing some writing while working in another job, managing a bookstore. I wrote fiction, journalism, etc. Jim Lee's wife Angie had read some of my work, and worked for me at the store for a while. When he needed someone to write the trading card backs for the Topps "WildC.A.T.S" card set, my name came up and he called me.
JOHN DALTON: What are you most proud of that you've done in the industry?
JEFF MARIOTTE: The "Desperadoes" series. We've told some good stories, with what I believe is solid characterization and fine art and high production values. And we've done it all in a genre that a lot of poeple believed was dead, and I think helped reinvigorate the Western a bit. Joe Lansdale and John Ostrander are two other writers doing nice things with Westerns--check out John's "Blaze of Glory" from Marvel this December--but there aren't too many folks tilling that particular field these days.
JOHN DALTON: You have worked on both the business and the creative side of the comics industry. What are the rewards and pitfalls of wearing many different hats?
JEFF MARIOTTE: One definite pitfall I used to experience when I was VP of Marketing was that if a book that I wrote got any kind of attention in the press, some people believed that I was pushing my book harder than theirs. I would tell them that I didn't have any control over what the press chose to write about or review--I would do the same job for them as for me. To be frank, I usually did more to promote other books than my own because I was trying to avoid the perception of unfairness. But if someone wanted to review my book for one of the magazines, I wasn't about to stop them, even if I could.
JOHN DALTON: What do you see changing, for better or worse, as the comics medium enters the next century?
JEFF MARIOTTE: I think we've been looking for a long time at some major problems in the way comics are sold in this country. We've allowed them to be marginalized to the point that they're almost unseen by the bulk of the population. People know there used to be comic books when they were kids, but they couldn't tell you where to get one now even if they wanted to. If we're to see a real resurgence of interest, I think (and as owner of an independent bookstore, I hate to say this) we're going to need a national comic store chain with a big enough presence and budget to do some national advertising and promotion.