Leonard Starr

Leonard Starr (b. October 28 1925) is a Golden Age comic book artist, an advertising artist and award-winning cartoonist, notable for creating the newspaper strip "On Stage" and reviving "Little Orphan Annie".

Biography

After graduation from New York's High School of Music and Art, Starr studied at Pratt Institute. [http://www.bailsprojects.com/(S(bvo2xq24z2afwj3x5uwubai5))/bio.aspx?Name=STARR%2c+LEONARD The "Bails Project" "Who's Who": Leonard Starr] . Accessed July 9, 2008]

While attending Pratt during 1942 and 1943, he worked for the Harry "A" Chesler and the Funnies, Inc. studios, contributing to the early comic book features produced at these studios. For Funnies, Inc., he began as a background artist, eventually inking Bob Oksner's pencils. He graduated to drawing for early Timely/Marvel Comics titles, including the Human Torch and the Sub-mariner.

Throughout the 1940s, Starr worked for a plethora of publishers of both comic books and pulps, including Better Publications, Consolidated Book, Croyden Publications, E. R. Ross Publishing, Fawcett Comics (doing "Don Winslow of the Navy", 1944-46), Hillman Periodicals and M. C. Combs. He worked with Joe Simon and Jack Kirby on their earler romance comics titles, in particular the Crestwood/Prize title "Young Romance".Howell, Richard, "Introduction" to "Real Love - The Best of the Simon and Kirby Romance Comics" 1940s-1950s" (Eclipse Books, 1988)]

In the late 1940s, he drew for EC Comics, including "War Against Crime", before working both as an advertising artist and producing a large amount of work for both the American Comics Group and DC Comics titles during the early to mid-1950s. His DC work spanned a large number of covers, and work on titles as diverse as "Doctor 13", "House of Mystery", "Gang Busters", "Pow-Wow Smith, Indian Lawman" and "Star-Spangled War Stories", mainly prior to 1957. For ACG, he worked on "Adventures into the Unknown", "Operation Peril" and "Soldiers of Fortune" among other titles. [ [http://web.archive.org/web/20060809212646/www.leonardstarr.com/comics/index.htm Leonard Starr's Comics Work 1945-50; 1951-55 - "archived at Archive.org"] . Accessed July 9, 2008] In 1955-56, he moved from comic books to comic strips with uncredited work on King Features' "Flash Gordon".

Mary Perkins, On Stage

In 1957, Starr created the comic strip "On Stage", later titled "Mary Perkins, On Stage" for the Chicago-Tribune-New York News Syndicate. Characterized by a mix of soap opera, adventure and humor, the strip featured tight, realistic graphics and, from the beginning, a strong layouts, design and storytelling. He received the National Cartoonist Society's Story Comic Strip Award for "On Stage" in 1960 and 1963, and their Reuben Award in 1965. He continued producing "Mary Perkins, On Stage" until 1979.

Other work

Starr returned to comic books very briefly during the 1970s and 1980s, working on "Morbius" for Marvel in 1975, and providing art for DC's "Who's Who in the DC Universe" (1986) and for "Superman" and "Lois Lane" (c. 1988). He also wrote a series of graphic novels featuring a sexy and capable female action heroine named Kelly Green, which were illustrated by Starr's friend, Stan Drake, who did "The Heart of Juliet Jones" strip.

Starr found time during the mid-1980s to co-create and serve as head writer on the Rankin Bass animated series "Thundercats" (1985-87). He also worked on the Rankin-Bass series "Ghost Warrior" (1985).

Little Orphan Annie

In 1979 he revived the comic strip "Little Orphan Annie". The strip had been in reprints since 1974 after creator Harold Gray's 1968 death, but Starr's close attention to line and strong design sense made the revival a success. Retitled "Annie", it received the National Cartoonist Society's Story Comic Strip Award for it in 1983 and 1984. Starr continued it until his retirement in 2000.

Later life

Beginning in 2006, Starr produced new artwork for the covers to the ongoing series of "On Stage" reprint volumes published by Classic Comics Press.

References

* [http://www.leonardstarr.com/ Leonard Starr official site]
* [http://www.reuben.org/ncs/awards.asp NCS Awards]
* [http://web.archive.org/web/20060809212646/www.leonardstarr.com/comics/index.htm Leonard Starr's Comics Work]