Master in horror genre is home for Comic-Con

When Baltimore native Bernie Wrightson, Archbishop Curley class of 1966, began illustrating comic books in the late 1960s, horror stories were just beginning to come back into vogue after more than a decade of being banned for the "danger" they posed to impressionable youngsters. It didn't take long for Wrightson to become known as a master of the genre.

Along with such other artists as Neal Adams, Gray Morrow, Mike Kaluta and Alex Toth (many influenced by the great Frank Frazetta), Wrightson revived the genre, re-introducing comics readers to the delights of being freaked out by stories of vampires, werewolves and other creatures that went bump in the night. In 1971, working with writer Len Wein, he created Swamp Thing, a creature of the Louisiana bayou that, for a brief time, outsold even Superman.

Never exactly prolific, Wrightson pretty much retired from comics after about a decade; his books remain coveted collectors' items. Since then, he has drawn and painted, produced an illustrated version of Frankenstein that is widely regarded as nothing short of a masterpiece, and has worked as a conceptual artist for the movies, taking ideas from artists and directors, and giving them form.

This weekend, Wrightson, 59, will be returning to his hometown for the 9th annual Baltimore Comic-Con, which ends its two-day run at the Convention Center today. We caught up with the artist at his Los Angeles home.

As a kid, were you a doodler? Did you have early artistic talent?

I always drew, just like all kids. I always loved monsters. My earliest drawings were dinosaurs. I would get the library books, and I would trace the pictures of the dinosaurs on wax paper, like you would use for sandwiches. My mother got very angry at me for using all that wax paper. I always drew, and I just never really grew out of it.

When did you first begin to think that there might actually be a career in this for you?

I was in my teens. I can't remember exactly, maybe 11, 12, 13. somewhere around there. I was cocky as hell. I would sit there and stay up late after school. ...I had a little drawing table in the basement of my parents' house. I would sit there and draw, and I was very impressed with myself. I was like, "Frazetta, watch out."

Were your parents always supportive of your artistic bent?

I think they were marginally supportive. My mom always wanted me to paint landscapes, or paint pictures of flowers. I actually did a few for her, just to show her that I could do that. She thought I was wasting my God-given talent on drawing Frankenstein and the Wolfman.

How did you get started drawing comic books?

I had gone to this convention in New York City, the World Science Fiction Convention, because I wanted to meet Frazetta. And there were some guys from DC Comics there. DC was interested in starting a sword-and sorcery comic book - and that was the stuff I was drawing, because that's what Frazetta did. And so they just met this kid at a show who was doing sword and sorcery stuff. And they were like, "It doesn't matter if it's good or not, this is what he does."

When did you realize that horror comics would be your specialty?

I always loved comic books as a kid, and during the 1950s, my favorites were the E.C. horror comics - they were the cream of the crop, there was nothing better. I was lucky enough, when I came along at DC, horror comics were beginning to come back, in a very diluted way. You couldn't even use the word 'horror' in a comic book title, and you had to be careful how often you used it inside the comic book.

There were a lot of very strict rules. Joe Orlando, who was one of the EC artists, he was now an editor at DC, he was editing House of Mystery. His idea was, "If we can't have horror comic-book content, we can make it look as creepy as possible." I was literally just in the right place at the right time. I was this kid. and I could draw creepy-looking stuff.

Is there a comic character or book or story of which you are the most proud?

That's hard to say. I hate to pick and choose from my work. It's like picking my favorite child. But I'm very well-remembered for Swamp Thing. We had the advantage of being first; we were the first with a monster for a hero.

You were pretty much out of comics by the end of the '70s, right?

Yeah, I found other things. I was doing prints and posters for a while, because that was a big trend; those things were pretty hot for a while.

For the past 20 years or so, I've been doing whatever I can to make ends meet. One of the reasons that I moved to Los Angeles was to get more movie work. The first movie job I ever had was for Ghostbusters. ...I've worked on Spider-Man and Galaxy Quest, most recently The Mist. A lot of pictures that I can't remember, and even more that never even got made. That's just the nature of the business, you do a lot of conceptual stuff to pitch the movie, but it never gets picked up.

The past few years, I've gotten back into comics. A couple of years ago, I did a story for "Bart Simpson's Treehouse of Horror." I worked with Len Wein on that. We redid the Swamp Thing story, but with Homer as the monster.

How does it feel to be back in comics?

I am not bothered about what I'm doing when I'm doing comics, as much as I'm bothered doing anything else. I have no art director, or anybody standing over my shoulder, editing me as I go. Sometimes I'll work very closely with the writer, sometimes I'll just get a script and hit the ground running. But it's mostly up to me. I can just sit here quietly. I can listen to recorded books, or put old monster movies in the DVD player, and just work all day.