SistersTalk Interviews Creator of Jane's World Comic
03.03.05 (2:52 am) posted by Genia
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She was a successful journalist who spent her days pining because all she really wanted to do was create comics. Today, Paige Braddock spends her time deciding what to do next with the quirky comic characters she's brought to life in Jane's World.
SistersTalk had the opportunity to ask Ms. Paddock a few questions about Jane, her time working with Charles Schulz (creator of Peanuts), and how she deals with gay and lesbian stereotypes through the humorous antics of her Jane's World characters.
ST: I've read in a few places that you were trained by Charles Schulz, the creator of Peanuts. Can you tell me a little about that experience?
PB: Unfortunately it was short lived. I only got to work with Mr. Schulz for about 6 months before he passed away. He was working with me so that I could revamp some Peanuts children's books based on the early animated specials. After he passed away, I took over as Creative Director. We manage all the art direction for licensed Peanuts products worldwide from this office -- to the tune of about 8,000 pieces a month.
ST: On your website you mentioned you created many comic strip concepts before creating Jane's World. Which of those concepts brings back the fondest memories and why?
PB: This one comic character that I did when I was in 6th grade: Captain Lightning. Very clumsy super hero. Like those cape scenes from the Incredibles he was always getting his cape caught on things.
ST: Will you tell me a little about how Jane came to exist?
PB: Jane started as a single panel titled "See Jane" and then over time, maybe a year or two, I realized I kept ending up with a set cast of characters so I changed the name to Jane's World and turned it into a story strip. A single panel format doesn't give you much creative room to build well rounded characters.
ST: I'm sure you've been asked this before, but I'll ask again: does fiction imitate life? How closely does Jane's life resemble her creator's life?
PB: Sometimes closer than others. I think I mix enough fiction in so that readers probably wonder sometimes how much is true and how much is made up. Of course, I've never been abducted by aliens or turned any of my friends into monkeys, but sometimes real life discussions do end up in the strip. Authentic dialogue is hard to fake.
ST: Of all the Jane's World characters, which was/is the most fun to develop?
PB: Probably Chelle. Although, there's a new character of late that I'm really having fun with: Jill. People keep emailing me to find out if she's based on a real person (I think they want her phone number) but she's not. She's completely fictional. But it makes me feel good that she seems so real to readers.
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She was a successful journalist who spent her days pining because all she really wanted to do was create comics. Today, Paige Braddock spends her time deciding what to do next with the quirky comic characters she's brought to life in