200 Words with Paul Dini #12 – FAME

I slumped into my local market one Saturday not long ago and was approached by an effusive animation fan. “You don’t remember me,” He began, “but I met you at the ‘Storyopolis’ event a couple years ago. I have to thank you again for all the great things you’ve done for animation.” My brain spun back to the Batman Animated book party held at that store more than just “a couple years ago,” but I couldn’t place him. “Well, speaking for the thousands of artists who actually create the animation, I thank you.” I said, trying hard not to sound like a pretentious dick. (Failed.) “Like you always say, it all starts with the story,” my admirer continued, “And your stories are the best.” I couldn’t recall exactly when I might have said that, but I thanked the fellow cordially and sauntered off feeling pretty good about the work I had done at Warner Bros. Animation. After all, outside of comic conventions, how many writer/cartoonists get that sort of “real world” affirmation? However the aura quickly vanished when I beheld my Toy Story aloha shirt reflected in the diary case door and realized: “Shit. He thought I was John Lasseter.”

Paul Dini is the Emmy and Eisner Award winning writer of Batman: The Animated Series, Superman: The Animated Series, Detective Comics, Countdown among many, many other things. You can find him online at either kingofbreakfast.livejournal.com or http://www.jinglebelle.com/.