Life in comics may be hard for comic-book characters such as Captain America and Thor (both currently “dead,” both sure to return at some point). But as evidenced by the good health of Cap co-creator Joe Simon, 93 years old and still going very very strong, and the long lives of many other Golden Age greats, doing funnybooks keeps you going.

Pirate con in New Orleans.

For one thing, it seems that the city has already been raped and pillaged.

Thank God we won’t have to wait for another election!

Newsweak (cq) has a web-only interview with Gore Vidal, one of the last remaining great American writers of that generation.

How fitting that the only other survivor is his arch nemesis, Norman Mailer. (Philip Roth, who is still doing astonishing work and having a remarkable late-career revival, was born in the following decade.)

I know that Vidal would like to be remembered as a great writer. But he isn’t one. An entertaining figure? Certainly. An entertaining writer? Sure. It’s hard to remember why I read so many of his novels, once upon a time, except they were so much fun. But “great”? I don’t think so.

“Creation” is the novel he says he wants to be remembered by, and that is the one I intend to reread. I remember it as being epic, and although I don’t trust Vidal’s opinions (as when he came down on Aaron Burr’s side) I’d like to relive his origin of so much of our philosophy. Even if I don’t agree with the characterizations.

This seven-minute clip seems to be from a documentary I haven’t seen (yet).

Vonnegut’s mordant humor is well-served by his wry reading voice.

I really miss this guy.

Actually, I’m not sure that’s possible. You could imitate him, but not be him, nor would you want to. (Especially because he’s dead.)

But if you want some useful writing tips from Vonnegut himself, click here. I can’t guarantee your writing will come unstuck, though.

You will notice in reading his advice, by the way, that much of it is oriented toward helping the reader. I love him for that. (Just as playwrights who bore the audience infuriate me.)

Some things just make me smile.

This video is one of them.

Yes, TODAY is the deadline for early registration for the San Diego Comic Con. (After this, the prices keep going up.)

And if you haven’t already booked a hotel room — fuggedaboutit.

I’m producing this festival, put on by the graduate writing program I teach for at USC, and featuring four very very good new plays by playwrights in the program.

It’s at 8PM on May 1st and 2nd at East West Players’ David Henry Hwang Theatre in the beautiful Little Tokyo district downtown, and admission is free. And you’re invited to join us. (And if you’re a reader of this blog, please come up and say hi. When I don’t look like I’m frantically producing. And if you’re not a reader of this blog, how are you reading this?)

Click here for information on the plays.

Click here to make a reservation.

Hope to see you there for a great night of free theatre.

One person I never thought would be the new Imus is this guy: sauve singer Bryan Ferry. I have been a Ferry (and Roxy Music) fan for almost 30 years, since picking up cassettes of both his solo album “The Bride Stripped Bare” and a Roxy Music compilation album from a discount bin at Woolworth’s. I listened to them endlessly and without further investigation — it was a couple of years before I discovered that the same man was behind both.

Ferry is in hot water for praising the “beauty” of Nazi imagery. I understand what he meant — he wasn’t praising evil, but recognizing the potential attraction of its fashion — but it does come off like admiring the sleek flowing lines in a KKK robe. Ferry sounds abjectly mortified. Here’s the story, and his apology. Thanks to Paul Crist for sending this link.

For years I have joked to friends that I’ve been trying to get my plays protested — if only angry villagers would show up and condemn me, then I could hit it big. Lately I’m not so sure.