deadline: in the newspaper world, there was no margin of error, no acceptable excuse. You had to bring in the comic book’s camera-ready pages by a very specific time, week after week, month after month. Henry Martin had seen Hawks of the Seas and needed no further convincing of Eisner’s talent. What he needed was absolute assurance that this talented artist (who at twenty-two was barely more than a kid) was up to the grind ahead. Busy Arnold assured Martin that Eisner was as reliable as they got.
Negotiations—Eisner’s favorite part of business, then and always—commenced. The agreement would be an equal two-way partnership between Arnold and Eisner. Besides producing the weekly newspaper supplement, Arnold required Eisner to contribute the entire contents for two new, as yet to be determined comic books for newsstand sales. For the weekly comic, Arnold and Martin wanted costumed heroes, the type that had come into favor with Superman and Bat-Man. These serial characters would provide continuity in pulling readers from issue to issue. Eisner would have to find a way to accomplish all this without the services of the Eisner & Iger shop—or at least without it as it was currently structured. Arnold and Martin both loathed Jerry Iger, so he was out. Eisner would have to either buy Iger out or sever ties with his company.
Eisner agreed to these provisions, although, ever his practical mother’s son, he winced at the thought of totally abandoning the security of an established, successful company for the uncertainty of a project that had never been attempted.
The negotiations hit a snag when Eisner insisted on keeping the copyrights to the characters and content of his work in his name—a demand that the other two flatly rejected. By industry standards, the publisher or syndicate held the copyrights. The practice had been established to protect publishers from greedy or temperamental artists who might be inclined to pack up and leave if, say, they wanted more pay or had other serious issues with an editor or publisher or if they proved to be unreliable and publishers wanted to replace them.
Eisner refused to budge. The practice may have been the industry standard, but he couldn’t abide them, as an artist or businessman. Many of the artists working in comics didn’t mind the work-for-hire method of operations; they were content to turn in their work and pick up their payment. Every time they endorsed a paycheck, they were reminded, by agreements stamped on the back of their checks, that their signatures constituted a contractual agreement granting all rights to the publisher. To artists who viewed comics as hackwork, signing away rights was no big deal. But to Eisner and other artists who took pride in their work in comics, it was a very big deal indeed.
“That kind of rubbed me the wrong way,” said Al Jaffee, who worked for Eisner before eventually moving on to make his name at Mad magazine. “Bill Gaines had a contract on the back of every check. I wouldn’t have minded if he came to me and said, ‘Well, you have to sign a contract if you want to work for me, and I got all the rights.’ I would think about it and then I’d say, ‘Okay, I’ll sign the contract because I want to work.’ But I’ve already done the job and I’ve got a check in my hand, and the check says I have to sell all my rights. What am I going to do, tear the check up? I’ve done the work. So, you know, you’re caught between a rock and a hard place.”
Eisner the artist bristled at the idea of anyone claiming ownership of his creative work—as far as he was concerned, publishers were paying him for permission to print it—but Eisner the businessman hated the arrangement even more. He’d watched how National Comics, now calling itself DC Comics, had raked in a fortune on Superman, with no end in sight. The way it was set up, the publisher could—and, in the case of DC, eventually did—cut creators such as Jerry Siegel and
Negotiations—Eisner’s favorite part of business, then and always—commenced. The agreement would be an equal two-way partnership between Arnold and Eisner. Besides producing the weekly newspaper supplement, Arnold required Eisner to contribute the entire contents for two new, as yet to be determined comic books for newsstand sales. For the weekly comic, Arnold and Martin wanted costumed heroes, the type that had come into favor with Superman and Bat-Man. These serial characters would provide continuity in pulling readers from issue to issue. Eisner would have to find a way to accomplish all this without the services of the Eisner & Iger shop—or at least without it as it was currently structured. Arnold and Martin both loathed Jerry Iger, so he was out. Eisner would have to either buy Iger out or sever ties with his company.
Eisner agreed to these provisions, although, ever his practical mother’s son, he winced at the thought of totally abandoning the security of an established, successful company for the uncertainty of a project that had never been attempted.
The negotiations hit a snag when Eisner insisted on keeping the copyrights to the characters and content of his work in his name—a demand that the other two flatly rejected. By industry standards, the publisher or syndicate held the copyrights. The practice had been established to protect publishers from greedy or temperamental artists who might be inclined to pack up and leave if, say, they wanted more pay or had other serious issues with an editor or publisher or if they proved to be unreliable and publishers wanted to replace them.
Eisner refused to budge. The practice may have been the industry standard, but he couldn’t abide them, as an artist or businessman. Many of the artists working in comics didn’t mind the work-for-hire method of operations; they were content to turn in their work and pick up their payment. Every time they endorsed a paycheck, they were reminded, by agreements stamped on the back of their checks, that their signatures constituted a contractual agreement granting all rights to the publisher. To artists who viewed comics as hackwork, signing away rights was no big deal. But to Eisner and other artists who took pride in their work in comics, it was a very big deal indeed.
“That kind of rubbed me the wrong way,” said Al Jaffee, who worked for Eisner before eventually moving on to make his name at Mad magazine. “Bill Gaines had a contract on the back of every check. I wouldn’t have minded if he came to me and said, ‘Well, you have to sign a contract if you want to work for me, and I got all the rights.’ I would think about it and then I’d say, ‘Okay, I’ll sign the contract because I want to work.’ But I’ve already done the job and I’ve got a check in my hand, and the check says I have to sell all my rights. What am I going to do, tear the check up? I’ve done the work. So, you know, you’re caught between a rock and a hard place.”
Eisner the artist bristled at the idea of anyone claiming ownership of his creative work—as far as he was concerned, publishers were paying him for permission to print it—but Eisner the businessman hated the arrangement even more. He’d watched how National Comics, now calling itself DC Comics, had raked in a fortune on Superman, with no end in sight. The way it was set up, the publisher could—and, in the case of DC, eventually did—cut creators such as Jerry Siegel and
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