Writing for Children Forum: Ian Falconer | The New School

Ian Falconer was born in in Ridgefield Connecticut he studied art history at NYU and painting at Parsons somebody is

here who teaches the Parsons right yeah at Parsons and at the Otis Art Institute Ian's done numerous covers for the New

Yorker magazine and he's designed sets and costumes for the New York City Ballet San Francisco Opera the Royal

Opera House in Covent Garden and among others he's also the author and illustrator of the Olivia book series up

until about a year ago Ian lived three short blocks from here on West ninth Street but sadly he deserted us to go live in the Hollywood Hills happily he's

agreed to be with us here today via livestream let's hope there aren't too many technical glitches Ian thanks so much for coming

like magic here and there he is hi in hey listen what we what what we

really want to know is what's the temperature out there

it's about 68 certainly I didn't leave you to go live in the Hollywood Hills my

apartment burned down and I couldn't afford to find the space that I needed in noir - now it's a real problem there

are no artists left in New York Stan you think that you really think they believe that in well we're really I miss you a lot myself and we all wish you were

closer but anyway this is great I have to tell you that the last week I've been revisiting your books and it's been a

total blast somehow along the way I'd missed Olivia forms a band but I went to books of wonder and pick that up

and so I I got to cover the whole olivia of over the last week and i have to say they were even better than I remembered

generally when somebody writes a really successful book and they start doing follow-ups the quality tends to trail off pretty quickly but I really found

that's not the case at all with your books in fact the last one Olivia and the fairy princesses seemed to me one of

the funniest you ever did and maybe more subversive than most of them I love the way you kind of skewered the whole

cloying genre of of fairy princess books but anyway could you let's go to the first book could you tell us something

about the genesis of your wonderful headstrong little pig I was started as a

my niece was the the first grandchild in our family and she she just captivated us all and she was a very funny very

vivacious Sophia I don't think probably that much out of the ordinary but because mothers all come up to me and

say my child is exactly like Olivia and you know kids are amazing things to watch growing and the first moment you have you it is the first grandchild this

is my first method niece and for ya the learning curve the watching them like hiccups definitely fast and so I started

doing drawings and for some reason it ended up like a pig's if she's deaf like she had like this turn deaf nose and the navicular and you know you know that that's a question I had further down the line but

you might as well answer it now I was gonna ask you why it was a pig is it really because of her turned up nose yes

and I liked it very intelligent she looked like a piglet

she doesn't matter I mean she's very pretty thing but go on about the genesis

of how you create so I spend actually about I was working on New Yorker stuff and I'd spent a couple of years working on this idea for a book I thought this could be better than just like some

little I was gonna do it as a Christmas present for Olivia my niece and Shh I thought it could be something more so

and I had a friend this is the early days of I guess 20 years ago it's the early days of computers and things so I had a friend who worked in advertising

and he helped me put it together on digitally using my drawings and then and I finally I thought this is pretty good

and I took it to a it was a woman that Oh who's the what's the talent agency we're here Mars was that were your Mars

movie William Morris and they just started a children's book division and as this woman I can't remember her name

but she said well it's not Eloise yet never gonna get published if you were just its first-time author you're never

gonna get published so I want to put you together with some somebody who's already established and you can illustrate their story and I know I actually have this idea for this

character like we think that what we do she and I put it in a drawer for about six months until I got a call from and

Schwartz at Simon Shuster and she had seen my New Yorker drawings and asked if I was training a book so I brought them

this book that I've had stuck away and they liked it and work with it so it was amazing I mean that doesn't happen yeah no it really

was amazing can we pause here for a second because sir I have a feeling you're gonna disappear for a minute but I had a feeling that some of the people most the

people in this audience are involved with the MFA Writing Program here at the new school and so most of them are slanted toward writing and I thought some of them might not know your New

Yorker covers so I was gonna you're gonna your face is gonna go away for a minute and I'm gonna show them a few of

your your covers just okay so you'll

still be connected but yes but I'm gonna

show you eight or nine of them I love that one I don't I don't know if it has a name it might be called the evolution of man but anyway I can't remember now

in now I'm showing you the one that they called art appreciation the little lady you know I can see what he's showing you

so I'm yeah this this is a this little woman in the Chanel suit has graced I don't know how many New Yorker covers

probably four four I personally love this one what is it it's oh sorry this is the one with the

theater marquee you have to go really close in to that each little I don't know if you can see but I went through

the Souris and found every word that ever and every neck every pejorative negative and that now I'm showing the

one that I think was called the competition it's the beauty queens and has miss New York

looking like Miss New York yeah yeah not exes at all as a skier I love this one

I've often felt too much like your wonderful little old lady surrounded by snowboarders she's sort of based on my

grandmother and somebody who goes out to the end of Long Island I love this one too oh is that the airplanes that's the

airplanes the great thing about the great thing about Ian's covers is that you don't really know need to know what they're about you can just look at them

and get it in one fell swoop teachers must be really hard to do come up with

these ideas come to you now I'm showing

the one edgy Vernie of the Americans now this one this one was I think a Valentine's Day cover which is

appropriate for this week and I think was they called it heart attack but it's it's it's cupid sitting up on the edge of a building all right and smoke

cigarettes and eats donuts and stuff yeah and this is a very recent one for I think last year's Fashion Week and

that's that's the little old lady again same same one I think they called this one stiff competition right are you doing one for this week I'm sorry you

doing one for a fashion week this week it's I think it's I hope it's two weeks away but no it's right now this is well I know but the cover is not because they're doing an Oscar cover first

though are they ours okay great great great anyway well that was a few of you New Yorker cover so I'll go we're going to come back to you now well magic well I was gonna ask you about your adventure and getting your

first book published but you sort of included that in the last answer I guess like that no and Schwartz was a

wonderful editor and she means she can used a lot of things but she really tightened it up into a very tight little parcel that first book was very economical

yeah no it's it's fabulous I wondered you had a lot more text originally and she pared it down a bit I had a few more drawings and some of them were just the

two it ously silly things that just she just you know they weren't necessary and a really good editors amazing thing to

have yeah it sure is yeah saves you from your own successes I was gonna ask you to tell us a little

bit about your niece that inspired her but you've sort of touched on that already is he is she particularly willful and headstrong and all that she is still yes she's actually a thoroughly

ordinary kid she's not she's not super intellectual or anything she's just a very she's smart but she's uh she's

she's not going to be Maria Callas well is her name Olivia I don't know Roosevelt but is her name Olivia yes

okay Oh real in the book there all the all the all my nephews and nieces and and the dog and cat at the same is the

nephew is there a nephew named Ian yes

named after you Justine story cuz my I have two younger sisters and the

youngest who was six years younger than me was had Olivia and my the one who's a year younger than me had not had any

children yet but but she'd always wanted to name her first boy because we were very close

growing up and my youngest sister

snagged it and the does the older of your sisters now have kids yeah she's got two boys and are you gonna do a book

for one of them well she wants me to and I had one that I was working on but it got all the all my computer at my computer and all the drawings had done

had got destroyed in the fire so I want to start that all over again that was that's really terrible I didn't realize you've lost a lot of

work in that far that well you know I've known you a long time and I always thought of you as a visual guy which you

are of course but yeah 35 years now yeah I know let's not go into this and you went to school with my cousin didn't you

yes but but you know I always thought of you as this visual guy and then when I read the first Olivia book I was completely blown away because you're

such a good writer and I wondered I'm really curious about this which do you enjoy more the writing or the drawing

well I get a general idea of the way the story is gonna go and then I draw it first to get it so that the page is turned visually of surprise it's coming

on the next page and and then I sort of it's pretty minimal text so it's not

it's not more in pieces but but I think it works better for children a picture book it should the the drawing should

draw you into it first because the kids can't read the text yet they're being read it and yeah you know well I was thinking about that I was remembering as

a kid my mom was always playing musicals musical comedies records and I'd always ask her you know be Rodgers and Hammerstein or thorn in law and I'd always ask her do they do

they write the music first a day write the words first and she could never answer that I subsequently learned that usually Oscar Hammerstein would write oh what a beautiful morning or the hills

are alive with the sadness and then Richard Rodgers would sit down and do the to the music but when I was reading your books this last week I kept wondering about that whether you do the pictures first

or the text first or does it flip-flop it does yeah it goes back and forth you have to have a some kind of story some kind of idea of what the story is going

to be and how it's gonna happen on the 32 pages self ended and then then you try and you get a blank like book you get all the pages going and then you

start cutting you know doing sketches and cutting them out and sticking them in roughly and getting it to the point where you can actually say this is where the text needs to be for this and this

is going to be a surprise you know a Bangor line at the end - but you really

actually do all the drawings first as a rule yeah oh I get them in place first I may not finish the drawings first but I get everything in place visually in

place first time for the book but we were talking about I'm talking about the actual process of creating these books

they're actually you know sitting down and doing them do you think in terms of the pictures or the words and I think you think more in terms of the words are

the pictures I guess yes like I do I try and keep the Texas minimal as possible but it's still I mean the text is great often I'm and

it's not easy to do that but do you ever get a visual idea that's so irresistible that you kind of build a whole book around it I was thinking about the one

about the circus and Olivia on the trampoline yes such a brilliant I don't know if any of you read I hope most of you have read that book but in fact

maybe I could show them wait a second

because I have to I have to say that

that was actually stolen from a short cartoon of defeat on a trampoline from

1940 what was it stolen from a Disney cartoon of goofy oh really that's but I guess my question is do you ever get

just this irresistible visual idea and then figure out a whole book around it

not really it's more their moments yeah I guess but it's not just one drawing

it's many moments that you thought of they tend to come first those big what do you call them set pieces or something

right right right right I read an article about you and it quoted an Schwartz is saying that you

instinctively get kids why do you think that is is it because you observe them really closely or yeah well it's a

resistance to growin up I think which many people have many artists have that

I think you're all grown up now but you

have child I've been allowed to maintain my irresponsible

yeah I know what you mean you're still

playing in the sandbox I'm sure a lot of people have commented on the sort of little adult touches near books like the

the Dagon and the Pollock and the first one and the wonderful poster of Eleanor Roosevelt in the second one and the

picture of Martha Graham in one of them and you have Olivia reading about Maria Callas and one she's dreaming about the

Supreme Court and one of them that kind of thing did you get any grief about that from your editor about these sophisticated touches no not really I

think they enjoyed that one of the things is that these parents generally have to read a picture that age picture books they have to read them over and over and over again so it's nice to have

something and also the kid doesn't know what that is so that the parent will explain it to them I'm sorry there was

something else I was going to say on this but I can't remember well I was thinking maybe you were sort of amusing yourself yours well that's that's I

think the key to making good art is amusing yourself if you have the confidence that you know what's good or what I mean these are self course means

being being very hard on yourself but it's yeah that's I fear that if it's if I think it's funny other people think

it's funny so maybe that's hubris but I think if Julie's well it seems to be

borne out it's at least organic that doesn't make no sense but yeah for the Venice book that was the other one I

hadn't read before this week actually I you've given me a copy but I never looked at it before this week but I was wondering and I really loved it but did you did you go to Venice and stay there

for a while a month oh it stayed there it was winter was offseason and it was water up to my

hips but it was it was nice to see it with no people there either beat you there with no people in there and so I the actual journey that they take

through week when they're going through the tent it's all illogical so ending up under the bridges sighs and all that and

I when I was there I there's a bookseller near the Opera that has a they sell antique books and photographs of Venice

and so I bought a lot of those and that that in I ended up using this hand tinted photographs for the backgrounds

of Venice yeah yeah you know I you know I had a bit of a kind of pristine moment when I was reading that book because at one point you I think it's the Rialto

Bridge you have a banner that says ta Polo on it yes is that the Rialto Bridge yeah there's always a banner that says - yep Aloha party or something they dig

exhibitions they yeah I don't know if you'll remember this but I'm going probably back to the 1980s and you and I were invited to an opening at the

Metropolitan Museum and it was one of those ones where you walk up the great staircase and then they siphon you off to the left somewhere and it was just the two of us and I don't even remember

what the show was maybe you will but you you pulled me aside and took me into the European galleries and pointed up a little painting and it was a tea eppela

and you know I fancy myself as very good on Italian painting I went to I was in school in Florence for eight months and studied with the head of the Uffizi and whatnot but I'd never really looked

I'd always dismissed Chapel I was you know all these clouds and pootie and all that crap I thought it was just horrible and standing there with you looking at this one I suddenly sort of got it a bit

and it gave me this great respect for your eye the way you actually look at things instead of just taking them in the way a lot of people do but it was it really gave me you know a

little kind of free song remembering that far back do you remember that at all yeah well there is it at the top of the stairs there is a room with two yet Lizzie all right used to be a room of tea I was

it but I think they still got the big one up there but yeah yeah tea up alone I was 14 years old which I guess says gay gay gay

I love light art like like art it's not easy to do it's it's it's it's incredibly hard to do oh yes sure yeah since in some of your sets that I've

been looking at I've noticed a little there moments that Artie Apollo asked but anyway enough about to a blow but I really it really got to me the other

night when that when I was thinking about that to change the subject a little bit I was wondering were there

certain books you loved as a kid I mean I when I read first read your books I thought of Eloise immediately and so you must have liked Eloise but what were the

sort of like long I think should be cut in half but it's very good drawings I love his artwork Hilary Knight and and

there's too many Skippy doodles and CDs yeah I think the Kay Thompson text could use a bit of and Schwartz's cutting head

shoes but there's some other books you liked as a kid I'm sure there were yeah what I always remember well sir Festus Sylvester in the magic pebble I think is

a beautiful time yeah and Maurice Sendak's higgledy-piggledy poppies always it's beautifully drawn

and it's a wonderful sir bittersweet sad sad melancholy story it's very odd for children but it's it's beautiful to read and we loved it as kids because it's quite funny and you know it's more

Maurice isn't with us anymore he would love that you said that because that was his favorite of all the books he ever did include he liked it better than where the wild things are what's that he liked it better than where the wild things are he thought it was his

greatest book well I told him that once I just talking to him on the phone I told him that he said that's my favorite

to understand any other's favorite childhood books I did you know I'm very

fond of dr. Seuss I love his drawings I love the ridiculous those birds those headdresses that go

tiers up and mikela get spool and yes yeah it's one of the few people who could actually his own style you could

just do so many different things that 500 hats had Bartholomew Cubbins and I think they tried to animate that

but you can't do that it's not what you can't do do it with his drawing style in digital it doesn't translate into three

dimensions you could do it with if it was all if you were still doing cel

animation which is hand-drawn did you ever get to meet Theodor Geisel I'm sorry do you ever meet him no he died a while ago it was a while

back yeah it's funny you know I've been to Springfield Mass and La Jolla California and they both those towns claim him and have little sculpture gardens about him but I think he was

born Springfield and then ended up living in La Jolla but anyway they're bronzed have you been to the one in Springfield no no it's great it's great

they have a little it's a playground for kids but all the bronze sculptures are dr. Seuss figures speaking of your

childhood this a bit of a sidebar here but I heard that you I know you were born in Ridgefield but that did you spend part of your time growing up you

and your family on an island yeah we lived on an island in Long Island Sound or near-normal in Norwalk

Connecticut incredibly beautiful but it wasn't fancy it's a you know the whole

East Coast is from Washington two names now just jammed but it was very it wasn't expanded wasn't very expensive

but it was quite beautiful and grand and wild as well what else about was it was it was it isolated I mean did you feel

was but I was already that kind of person and so maybe that's fed into it I'm I'm still kind of a loner and

reclusive people's interesting I want to go visit at some time does your family still have a place there

yeah they live that side of my mother's side of the family all lived within this the Darien Norwalk Westport area they

all practically spitting distance from each other and they live about half a mile away from with that Island it's very pretty

it's very well I've been to those symbol islands but I don't think I've ever been to that one it's done it there amazing -

yeah you've twice collaborated with David Sedaris once a play the Santaland Diaries which I got to see and loved and

once this book which is up on the we have a table of your books by the way in front of where your images how how was it collaborating with David Sedaris he's

marvelous he's very easy and laid-back and whatever you do he just likes well he didn't like the rabbit I did because he wanted he talked about the story

talks about a rabbit with pink eyes and love white rabbits are the only ones with pink eyes but he was thinking for these scratchy little rabbits that he would see around his house in France

the wild rabbits you know they're mean and mean looking like the fluffy pink

somebody read you that mean looking

laddie you've spent a lot that you spent a lot of time with the great English

artist David Hockney has he had any influence whatsoever on your

illustrating I suppose it one way that he tends to work like an illustrator what he paints in unlike traditional

painting where you get all the all the layers of dark and and lights in immediately he tends to work in pieces he will do a face and a body which is

unorthodox and it does have a distinctive look about it but they would call it some people would call an illustration or look well he he says that himself

I've heard him say that yeah yeah but I mean what I was wondering is there are certain things I think what I was thinking about himself yeah I've heard

David say that really yeah that was a long time ago many people maybe he's but I was wondering because you have this

way of getting a simple of simplifying your artwork so that you really have the focus on something and David sometimes does that too and I just wondered about

well that's one of the towers that you have as an artist is or you should use this an artist is telling people where to look you can do that non-verbally you

can tell them where to look yeah yeah but in our writer can do that too can't

it absolutely speaking of that you you're such a you you're so much humor in your work

EB White said that so what can you hear me EB White said that analyzing humor writing is like dissecting a frog it's like like dissecting a frog few

people are interested in the frog dies event you ever hear that quo know if you've ever told a joke and people sort of don't really get it and then you try

to explain and it just yeah yeah but I wondered nevertheless in spite of that is there some in analyzing humor is there you you're so funny and you're writing you have any little tips advice

for a writing humor that's a terrible thing to ask do you want me to retract

the question it's just that I think you are I think it's a they're more and more discovering that humor is a form of

madness that that you have to see you have to you have to have that sense of absurdity already in you to to because like they come up without you even

thinking about honestly you know in the conversation how it you come out with something that you haven't thought about it yet but it blurts out in your mouth that I'm that happens to me all the time

and sometimes very embarrassing I've been seen I think that's a really good answer to that question I think I think

you should you know add it to the list of questions you ask people to ask you you know speaking of humor I'm sure your books have been translated

into lots and lots of languages I'm just curious because you know the French for example have a totally different sense of humor from the English and Americans

and whatnot yeah absolutely where do your book sell the best what countries obviously America but I mean other than that she's liked them a lot

so speaking countries so South America and Mexico and Spain and and they've

been Portuguese Brazil and Portugal really interesting huh could you tell us some of the current

practitioners in picture books that you admire yeah I don't really read other people's books I hate to say it but I

don't well that's a good answer yeah but I think that's true for a lot of artists that it's not important to you and what you're doing it's not a futurist

necessarily it helps you somehow yeah yeah yeah I've been I'll steal a lot too that's a good answer

I understand I've never seen the Nickelodeon TV show of I just but I wondered what you thought of it and if

you had any input it was a terrible terrible thing I was brokenhearted by it I thought it was awful it started that

it was intended to be a film original and and then the economy collapsed and

they they went they they they were afraid they were fearful so then they changed it to a TV special and then they

changed it to a series and then they ice I remember they they they were asking

about who would you like to play Olivia and this is seven eight years ago no it's not that lonely because well it

wouldn't you it was 2007 or something

like that and I said I wanted a comedian

the things a female comedian Lily Tomlin I wanted her voice little child to just

turn all turning in on itself and and they took that I don't know why so I wanted her and maybe you know Jane Curtin to write it if it was going to be

a movie I thought it would be perfect it could be perfect for a living and so they took that as to mean I wanted the

lesbians like that was that's lesbian - right but but I mean

she really didn't edit or Minh they're just awful I finally got them to get another writing team but honestly I can't walk I can't I haven't sat through the whole

episode of Phyllis I can't there but that don't they'll fade away and do you think of all the things that well Hilary nights done symptoms you've done film

it's all it's really mostly a disappointment I think well that's too bad I never I don't know what time it's on has anyone in the audience seen it

nope no one in the audience has seen it so you're I guess we're all spared that I've heard that DreamWorks is doing may

be doing a movie of Olivia is that true yes we'll see I don't trust any of them

yeah I know everything I've done always it has been all me I mean as well I mean with an opera of course it's not all you but you are doing all the sets or all

the costumes or something like that and you have control over it and they allow you to do what you want but you get tons of money behind something people get

very afraid yeah I but that's their business is making money as much as entertaining

yeah I've had experience in that realm and it's usually pretty disappointing most the people here in this audience you know as I said before are oriented

toward writing but I think we'd love to hear a little bit about your set and costume designing how did you get into

that initially was that through David Hockney oh yeah when I was working with David he he asked me to help that he I

when I first met him he was doing pirata at the Met you know the triple Billa French French short offers and

with Stravinsky and Ravel and and then he did the all Stravinsky evening was three short Stravinsky pieces that was when I was first moved out here and he

was working on that in the studio and then he wanted then they asked him to do Turandot which is a big massive force

set costume extravaganza and he said I can't do this alone you gotta help me and so we did that and I loved working

with him love doing that and even now he was looking at this Nutcracker is it oh I know what you should do there I love oh but that move that down a bit

stay and help me but now he's doing painting on doesn't want to get back into theater the trollwood theaters that you do that these enormous productions they do several productions of it seven

performances of it and it's gone and there's no way to recapture it there's no way to capture the way it was onstage even by slumming it it doesn't doesn't

work even like that even the City Ballet stuff like I I saw your one which I loved send to ballet the Christopher

Wheeldon one don't they bring that back they they do more as because it was she was doing a ballet for the school with

lots of children he wanted to it was to showcase the kids so they usually do it over the Rose Theater the children would really wear the children's performances

which is slightly scaled down from the big stage but I did like I said it was a very very elaborate said but it was completely economical was just a

backdrop and that the bars wasn't yeah no it's a five year there's an illusion of a mirror in a Russian ballet Steve

you are there similarities to doing all that to creating a book or is it a totally different thing well actually

I've been trying to show Chris from four months some set design so I finally made us a model and

he model of this idea that I had for this illusion of this mirror and he he was doing that working on the children's on the ballet for the kids for the school

it's full of American Ballet and he changed the whole choreography because he liked the set so much so it wasn't it wasn't well actually that's the I did

the book Olivia before and then it's good to finish things and show it to somebody because if you try and explain things to somebody or try and show the notes or just even sketches they won't

see it most people are not very visual and it's much better for them to see it I found that at The New Yorker if like if I have an idea that I think is really

good do it all even if even if it gets rejected do it all because you're much more likely to to get it printed if I

send in sketches she goes oh so much like zi1 zi2 so and so did you know it's

not at all show me just finish it and I don't have the energy to do that anymore but I used to yeah listen when you're when you're doing sets for opera or

ballet do you listen to the music while you're doing it while you're working I'm just curious personally about that just yes I think there's something good about

slightly dividing your attention when you're working having almost like every a companion there so you don't feel

quite so alone and afraid yeah let me see what time it is now yeah it's getting would you tell us a bit about

your your current project which Iain was hired by Pacific Northwest Ballet which is run by a guy named Peter Paul who used to be a principal dancer here in

New York at New York City Ballet and they years ago maybe 20 years ago they a lot of my family's from Seattle so I kind of know about Pacific Northwest

Ballet they did a production of the Nutcracker with sets by Maurice Sendak and now how long ago was that in justice

and acts that's word I think are now 30 years old 30 years old yeah so they've been around a really long time and they've asked Ian to replace them now

that send backs dead terrifying this is a beloved production that generations of children and their parents grew up with

but Peter wants to revive it wants to do it with the Balanchine choreography which is you don't know there was not the Nutcracker was performed for

something like two or three years in st.

Petersburg in 1897 and it wasn't them ever a big success and balancing revived it in 1957 virtually for the doing it

for the first time since it had to choreograph except for once in 1938 the Royal Ballet did did a thing that

fizzled miserably but anyway he did this he did this in 1957 and he soon realized

there was a great moneymaker for the company and it's a beautiful production that dancing is beautiful the choreography is amazing and

unfortunately the Sendak production just isn't that good the choreography isn't that good it's not it's the the the the

balancing was a wheel Imperial Russian Christmas card it's a wonderful young thing so I have to but I can't improve

on I think a little bit of Rubin care arcanine sets which I don't think they had all that much money when they first did it they're also looking a little

shabby yeah yeah well I'm gonna show if you you're going to disappear again for a second I'm going to show a few of your set mock-ups that you sent me

the other day maybe I'll get you to comment on them hang on a second I'm showing them the one it must be the

first act it's the the big family room yeah there's a little girl in there that

has a sort of red striped dress looks very familiar like Ian Falconer Peter asked for it for some hint of Olivia in

the character so it's really beautiful I love the settee in the back Peter mark yeah why is there a ceiling molding on the floor

he wanted a ground cloth and a ground cloth is really hard to change quickly in between accents it's a huge huge huge

point seventy by 60 feet cloth that gets rolled down and painted on top so it had to be something that would go through at

all acts and the ceiling molding goes with the ceiling but it could be also a plug I might put a an oval around over line around it just to make it more rug

like oh okay great yeah and but then it also works as a snowflake in the snow scene it's a snow candy-ass no patter and and then whatever in the third act but they sort

of goes with all three acts if I'd put an oriental carpet there or an open song it would look really silly in the snow scene yeah yeah and you have the clock for drosselmeier like in the balance you

get up there in great flap his wings now I'm sure I moved to this must be like the Candy Land one in the second act

yeah that's really gonna be fun that's animation you can see there are three three ceiling moldings on the floor as

yeah yeah and it's the first one is the stage and behind that our projections repeating the stage

which we will do with moving videotapes so that people can go across on the back of the stage waiters holding big cakes on trays and things like that with a

feeling of depth because what you the one thing on stage which is really hard to do is to get it you can't do with just a painting this you have to have

some movement back there and I did this in Paris of this operetta that I did Veronique which we used and we actually

filmed on a river in this tributary of the same people rowing and willow trees blowing gently in the wind you can see movement and the leaves and stuff and it

went beautifully with a set of this outdoor garden restaurant but you really like air coming in there was amazing effects I'm trying to get that here too

Wow yeah I heard Veronique was real success now I'm showing the little girl with the red and white striped dress yes that's a close-up of me because he ins

doing both the costumes and the sets for this Nutcracker there was another one of her and there's her with some of the

grown-ups and the out the window you can see the winter scene beautiful yeah this

is early stages here so yeah great anyway we're gonna bring you back so

maybe you know it's getting near the end of our time Ian I think maybe I'll bet you some of these people have questions for you I'm gonna open this up to the

audience is there anybody out there we'd like to have a question for you yeah you

have to use a microphone so Ian can hear

you hi thanks for answering questions I love to the very first book that came out as soon as I found out about it saw

a few pictures on TV or something went out read it got it loved it and still have it I have no kids and I'm wondering do you have a lot of people who love

your books buy your books and have no kids not even maybe not even I have nieces and nephews but maybe not even nieces and nephews they just get them

for their own pure enjoyment yes I have had people come up I've know all your books but I don't have any kids myself

but I just love them I even if had a couple of people who collect cakes thank

you hi I do have a kid and I've read to her a couple of your stories I guess this is more of a comment but I'll try and make it into a question one of the spreads

that I really love and the first one is where she's figuring out what to wear and there's this whole grid of her trying on all these different outfits and it's so revealing to her character

but in it I always find myself in reading it you know I don't remember if there's words in the page but I really want to draw attention to each the energy in each and every outfit that's

there so I have to kind of make up sound effects for each one like you know so I was wondering if you think yeah yeah I

feel like I've obliged to like you know figure out the outfit so I don't know if you thought about that when you are making them because it's very different than if you're just looking at the

static image or if you're just reading the text that's there so I don't know I mean it's kind of a weird question but if you think about sound as an element

because she's such a lively character because that sound isn't it sound like if it's really just a visual and there isn't text driving that if you yourself

kind of imagined and I don't know looking at some of your set design it seems very theatrical no no it's a like you know watching the ballet that I

think I gesture and stuff can suggest Sam but I wouldn't I don't think about it in my head I don't I don't think it's

more like a pantomime yeah maybe you should do a test to see if people makeup sounds on that one spread because it seems to really encourage that

oh really hard to figure out you know okay I'm doing this grid of all these different outfits and I've run out of

that two thirds of the way through your latest they're all it's all with just read write read and Wyatt you know the first one he has read that why didn't black

and I slowly add color each look hi Deann thank you so much for bringing your work into the world I think your picture books elevated what picture

books you know are trying to still do today but I have a question about how you work when you're developing your storyline and whether or not you share that with people do you do you share

with your editor do you have readers do you just sort of trust your own judgment in terms of writing your story pretty much trust my own judgment I mean sometimes I'll say I've got this great

idea for this what do you think but most I trust my judgment and I try and get done before I show it to the editor because again like showing New Yorker stuff to people when it's not finished

they they'll they'll start to needle and quick you know quibble that so why don't you just change no this is the latest by

the way I want it this is the way it should be it's not answer hi I wanted to

go back to your restrain palette was that your idea from the start to do a very restrained palette with just a few colors and was that a hard sell for the publisher yes it was I when I was

thinking about turning into a real book instead of just this little thing for my niece I went and looked around the went to the bookstores and looked around the

children's book sections and so many of them are screaming for your attention by throwing all these colors that you and all this busyness of all this detail and all this stuff and that's not what you

want if you want to really express enough you know get the if you want the face to express stuff you can't be distracted by all the stuff other stuff

you want some really delicate expressions and the face that should show you what she's thinking and also I

thought they were ugly always change I think it's really lovely so this is a

question along the lines of publishing what do you think in terms of e-books and what's what's your take on that since you have so many out physical do

you think there's a new wave in terms of ebooks do you think that future publishers of writers for children books should be concerned with that do you

think that we should be thinking in terms of these physical books and kind of the beauty about them or really just kind of moving forward into the e-book

world it's gonna happen whether you want it to or not or I want on the one hand

it begs a whole lot of stuff available you know instantly it's the format is very small on a Kindle or yeah iPad it's

not as good as and if you want to me don't some you can get them on Kindle isn't in color but they but on the iPad you can get right

it's and Olivia books in color but if the two-page spread they have to turn it sideways which reduces the page by half the solid page size by half right and

it's not not that great yeah I don't think so it cut them in half well the book sales drop by it

yeah definitely in Kindle and iPad came up right that was also the economy but

it's really upset the publishing business and if a book is being sold

this is good getting so say Olivia is Amazon for 1295 in the bookstore for

1795 or something and you get a dollar a book when the book is reduced to $2.99 on Kindle we're going to get a dollar

right so do you think that you're thinking now in terms of the integrity of your book and and the pages and the color and just the beauty about the physical book and now having to kind of

translate that into something that's completely just technological I it

certainly is better I better for a parent to weep a physical book absolutely and to be able to go back the page and then and and stare at it for a

long time and to get chocolate all over it so you think we should move forward and still continue to try for our books for our physical books is so at least

sometimes these things are temporary distractions like the write a book but as sometimes they exit a real change that it will never go back I don't know

what's that going to happen lots of watch thank you so much but you know it's not the same business it was ten years ago

thank you any other questions I have one last question for you in I'm gonna make

you disappear for a second okay do you mind disappearing for a second okay I'm

showing an image of Europe this really makes me jealous because as a kid I was a nerdy stamp collector I'm showing an

image of your Olivia stamp how is that how is that when you know when the stamp came out that must be so cool to have a stamp come as it has you're careful so it was a really nice they did it really

nicely yeah just like the book no border nothing is it's I'm a little one in the frame yeah the only thing that could be

better is it should be a forever stamp since I think Olivia probably lasts forever

but on that note we all want to thank you very much for taking the time to be back in your old neighborhood

oh and you it was really fun and thank

you in so now you can go back to work on your sets

thanks you never see Rhett