Wild Things!

by Betsy Bird

  On the one hand, I don’t see any prima facie reason for a celebrity author not to write a picture book. If it’s a good book, why shouldn’t a person with more than one gift be able to express it? On the other hand, if it’s a piece of crap, you can’t help but wonder what there wasn’t room for on the list that season, because the publisher gave a big advance and a promotional budget to this garbage. On the third hand, books are so low on the retail totem pole that anything that might inspire someone to buy a book seems like a good thing. If it actually inspires them to read a book, even better. On the fourth hand, if the only books some people read are poorly written and succeed only by virtue of a celebrity author, then consumers are right in thinking that they ought to spend their money somewhere besides a bookstore. . . . I’m trying to not begrudge anyone’s success in the book world, but just be thankful that there are still discerning readers and that they do find the pearls among the garbage and put them into the hands of kids.

  THOSE WHO SPOIL THE CURVE . . .

  Is it too easy to scoff at the celebrity children’s book trend? Certainly, there are some talented authors out there who may also be entertainment hotshots. It’s not that, by definition, being a Hollywood heavyweight makes one a bad writer. There are, indeed, those books written by big-name celebrities from the field of show business and beyond that have been well-received by professional reviewers, have been met with open arms by the children’s literature community, are not filled with the types of mistakes amateur authors would make, manage to merge seamlessly with the illustrations on display, and are not painfully moralizing.

  Jamie Lee Curtis, whose first picture book was published in 1993 and who has consistently worked with illustrator Laura Cornell, is generally met with approbation by professional reviewers. She’s known for her ability to hone in on the sillier and more bumbling moments of childhood, giving them a positive spin and focusing on what can be learned from such awkward moments. Granted, they’re still message books, but you’d be hard-pressed to find a celebrity book that isn’t. John Lithgow had a successful picture-book debut in 2000 with The Remarkable Farkle McBride and has followed that book with a slew of playful and musically inspired picture books, which critics, parents, and children alike have largely welcomed with enthusiasm, even given his own contribution to the kookily named characters of children’s literature. (We’re lookin’ squarely at you, Farkle.) Comedian Michael Ian Black — whose first big break came in a television show called The State, created by the comedy group that included one of today’s most well-known children’s authors, Mo Willems — released his debut picture book, Chicken Cheeks, in 2009, a book embraced with acclaim from critics and readers. Since then, he has released a handful of entertaining and well-crafted picture books, including 2012’s very clever I’m Bored, illustrated by Debbie Ridpath Ohi. Perhaps the first celebrity picture-book author to have ever appeared on the New York Public Library’s century-old “100 Titles for Reading and Sharing” list, Black is one of the best out there.

  Julie Andrews wrote her first children’s novel in 1971, marking the beginning of the modern era of the celebrity children’s book. Mandy, as well as Julie’s second novel, The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles, were met with acclaim from critics and children alike. The publisher used a subtle approach by releasing them under her married name, Julie Edwards. And Fred Gwynne, most famous for his role as television’s Herman Munster, published a handful of picture books, beginning in 1970, which he both wrote and illustrated himself and to which, in our experience anyway, many die-hard children’s literature fans possess a great and abiding devotion.

  “Every once in a while, a celebrity comes along who can write,” says editor Stephen Roxburgh. “If you get the book right and the celebrity’s audience responds, you can make a great deal of money, more than compensating for the cost and trouble, but it’s a high-stakes game, not for the timid. I have no doubt that publishers will continue to play.”

  Julie Andrews certainly ushered in the very idea of a successful celebrity picture-book author and actress who could continue to get professional work, distinguishing her from our next subject.

  Eloise: When the Books Overshadow the Celebrity

  It’s 1947. Comedienne, pianist, singer, arranger, choreographer, and actress Kay Thompson is performing some comedy routines at Ciro’s in Hollywood. A few months later, in January of 1948, Life magazine is to describe her rowdy burlesques as the stuff that creates an overnight sensation, applauding her sexy, funny nightclub act. One Variety critic describes her simply as “more than an act; she is an experience.” In 1972, Harper’s Bazaar wrote, “If you don’t know who Kay Thompson is, please turn the page. You just flunked pizzazz. Legend has it that she even invented the word.”

  First trying her hand at singing via radio, then arranging in the 1940s (for folks like Frank Sinatra, Gene Kelly, Lena Horne, and Judy Garland, who made her Liza Minnelli’s godmother), Kay Thompson — born Katherine L. Fink, the piano prodigy — eventually decided to try out Hollywood as an actress, going on to dance and sing in 1957 with Fred Astaire and Audrey Hepburn as Maggie Prescott in Funny Face.

  Cut to the present. What is Kay Thompson best known for? Her best-selling Eloise books. Published in the mid to late ’50s, they were a smash success with adults and children alike. The irrepressible protagonist of the books was conceived while Kay was on a nightclub tour. She was said to have taken on the character of a little girl named Eloise while entertaining her fellow performers.

  Did Thompson gracefully accept her new role as the beloved author of children everywhere? At first, yes. In the 1950s, you could go to the Plaza itself and pick up a telephone where Kay Thompson’s voice would speak to you as Eloise, spouting non sequiturs such as “Sometimes I comb my hair with a fork.” She launched an Eloise clothing line with Neiman Marcus and even purportedly lived rent-free in the Plaza itself for years on end.

  However, Thompson grew tired of her unique creation. She kept Eloise Takes a Bawth from print until her death, even pulling Eloise in Paris right before it was ready to go to press. At around the time the first book was celebrating its fortieth anniversary, the phone rang late one night at Books of Wonder in New York City. Kay Thompson was on the line. “What is the title of the book in the window?” Kay asked. “Well, it’s Eloise,” the bookseller responded. “That is incorrect! The title of the book is Kay Thompson’s Eloise,” she snapped.

  Thompson’s story is, no doubt, rare to see. She’s someone who dipped her toes in the waters of another profession and was so successful at it that many readers of Eloise are unaware that she was also once a successful entertainer.

  Speaking of Celebrities, Part 2

  That’s No Vulcan! That’s My Dad

  Richard Michelson is the rare combination of art-gallery owner/award-winning picture-book author. One day he might be dealing with the art of Dr. Seuss; the next, writing a book for kids on integration and busing. In the course of his gallery work, of course, Mr. Michelson has made friends and colleagues. One such friend is the actor-turned-photographer Leonard Nimoy. Rich represents Leonard’s art, but the two share more than just that. Says Rich:

  Before the new Trek movie, when Nimoy un-retired and was back in public view [Star Trek, 2009], I was sometimes mistaken for Nimoy himself. Because most youngsters knew Spock only through TV reruns when he was a young man (age thirty-one), they don’t grasp how much time has passed. They figure he is older, and I guess I look like a twenty-five-year-older version. Leonard and I were having dinner at a hotel restaurant in Alabama. . . and someone must have alerted the staff that Mr. Nimoy was staying in the hotel. A group of employees came over to our table and asked me for my autograph, so I signed and chatted while Nimoy finished his soup. They even told me I looked good and had aged much better than Shatner, who they still saw on TV all the time. As they left, our waiter pointed to Leonard and asked if he was my father. I admitted he was, so the waiter asked to shake Leonard’s hand, and said: “You mus
t be so proud of all your son’s accomplishments.” Dinner was on the house.

  Richard Michelson and Leonard Nimoy: no relation

  Image Credit 13

  CELEBRITIES VERSUS AUTHORS

  Imagine that you are an author or illustrator (or both), new to the field of children’s literature. You have sweated over your first book and are ready to submit it to the world, only to find out that the budget for the book’s publicity has been cut in the name of promoting a new celebrity book. This is a valid concern for many in the field: new authors may get passed over, while publishers bend over backwards to sell a new book from the latest star. In fact, Publishers Weekly wrote in November 2005 that picture-book sales were slipping, with the exception of celebrity books and books by established authors.

  Where, many people wonder, is the support for the newer folks? And if there is only so much money to spend on authors — not to mention only so much space on bookstore and library shelves — can’t we spend it on the more deserving authors, whose books are born from their talent as writers and are not based on celebrity alone? Or will publishers just have loose change left with which to market their books?

  As it turns out, one former publishing executive told us anonymously, celebrity books do, indeed, cost a company a lot of money — not only up front with regard to author advances, but also during the publishing process, when publicity for celebrity books often takes precedence over publicity for other books on the publisher’s list. “Normally,” she said, “advances to celebrity authors have to be high, which puts pressure on a publishing company to sell enough copies to earn back a very high advance. In my experience, most celebrity books had a 50 percent or higher return rate — that’s way above a book’s average return rate, and contending with these sorts of returns will work against a company earning back the high advances paid out for celebrity books.” She also noted that celebrity books put an enormous amount of pressure on editors, designers, and a publishing house’s marketing staff during the publishing process and that they are often put into production on an accelerated schedule, “which necessarily means that the risk of making small and large mistakes gets higher (rectifying mistakes can be extremely expensive depending upon where and when in the publishing process the mistake gets caught); such an accelerated schedule often necessitates the editor, designer, and marketer taking their attention off some books in order to focus on a celebrity book and therefore jeopardizing other books’ schedules, which can prove costly to a company.” Such ramped-up schedules, she added, often mean the printing has to be done in the United States, instead of in Asia or elsewhere. To be sure, this is a blow to outsourcing practices and the ever-growing trend of shifting production overseas, which is good news for U.S. manufacturing. But it’s much more costly for publishers.

  Some argue that celebrity books, what with their instant name recognition, bring in more money, so that publishers can hire new authors and illustrators to piggyback off that success. “This discussion,” said Roxburgh, “is a variation on the current mania for self-branding and network building. Celebrities have both, providing a platform for the publisher to launch the book.” The survival of publishing houses, he added, depends on their ability to generate bestsellers. Whether the author is someone who achieved celebrity status for his or her writing (Maurice Sendak, Roald Dahl, Judy Blume, et al.) or someone who achieved it as a basketball star, “all you have to do is let the world know that there’s a new book, and you have a bestseller.”

  Certainly during challenging economic times, publishers feel great pressure to sell blockbusters, drawing attention away from lesser-known authors and illustrators. There’s no doubt that publishing is driven by sales, and just the right celebrity book can bring in the big bucks. In today’s world, as Daniel Hade has pointed out, the corporations that control publishing look to new revenue streams brought about by the licensing of popular characters from children’s literature and are also more likely to turn to books authored by celebrities, series books, and books with tie-ins to television or movies. If celebrity books are moneymakers, “the question then becomes,” said the anonymous executive to whom we spoke, “what costs and risks are acceptable in the process of making fast money off celebrity books? Sometimes the high stakes pay off well; sometimes they don’t. You’ll notice, I believe, that the companies that publish celebrity books tend to publish many more than just one; publishing one isn’t usually worth the risk and costs, but publishing several (even though the costs are high throughout the process) gives a company a much greater chance that one of those celebrity books will hit it big — hopefully big enough to actually offset any misses of the other books. It’s a gamble — and gambling is always expensive, even with a win.”

  Could the trend be shifting a bit? “Celebs, unless they are the hottest of hot,” a former editor told us, “usually have a relatively hard time getting through acquisitions, because they are seen as money losers, hard to deal with, and kind of cheesy.” Not true, said a literary agent (who also wishes to remain anonymous): “I think being a money loser is something to consider, although sometimes publishers don’t mind losing a little money for a classy acquisition. But hard to deal with? I don’t think publishers should ever write themselves a pass on a book because the author is ‘difficult’ — celebrity or otherwise. If you want to be successful, you have to deal with demanding and otherwise difficult people sometimes. And cheesy? That sounds like snobbery to me. And the three together — risky, difficult, lowbrow — well, if you have the luxury of having a job where you never risk losing money, never have to work with someone difficult, and all of your projects are highfalutin, I salute you. But most successful agents and publishers I know aren’t afraid of these qualities.” Roxburgh agrees. All celebrity authors, whether they started out as authors or talk-show hosts, are resource-intensive, he said. The books are expensive to make, the authors may have immense egos, and all departments have to work hard to make the book succeed.

  Children’s book publishing has always been relatively sheltered, added the anonymous agent to whom we spoke, a bit leery about taking risks and leaving their comfort zones, but “the prospect of doing Jamie Lee Curtis’s or Madonna’s picture books proved too tempting, and when those books worked, publishers were quickly all in.” And, though most of them simply didn’t sell well anyway, he was quick to note, some of them genuinely worked and still do.

  And it seems that most of them certainly do sell well. In 2001, the Newbery winner, Richard Peck’s A Year Down Yonder, sold 149,000 copies. Maria Shriver published a children’s book that year, which sold 264,000 copies on her name alone. Most children’s authors would kill to sell that many books in a decade, much less a year’s time. In 2008, near the top of Publishers Weekly’s best-selling children’s books list, selling over 200,000 copies that year (in the hardcover category), were Paula Deen’s My First Cookbook, Jamie Lee Curtis’s Big Words for Little People, and Jeff Foxworthy’s Dirt on My Shirt.

  Speaking of Celebrities, Part 3

  The “Writer from Philadelphia”

  When Jerry Spinelli took a job as an editor at Chilton, a Philadelphia publisher of trade magazines and automotive manuals, he confidently told a coworker that he’d only be working there for about a year or two until his first book was published. More than a decade later, he was still waiting for that first book to hit bookstore shelves. By this point, he was married with a large family. Money was tight.

  One evening, as Spinelli and his wife, Eileen, watched an auction on their local public television station, an interesting item came up for bid: a night on the town with actor, editor, journalist, and author George Plimpton. Jerry spoke of how inspiring it would be to spend time with a famous published writer like Plimpton. Then he sighed and went to bed. That’s when Eileen got up, checked their meager savings account, and phoned in a bid. They ended up winning the auction.

  When George Plimpton learned that a Pennsylvania couple had won the auction, he thought he’d have them o
ver to play some pool, take them out to eat, see a Broadway show, and then send them on their way, back home to Philadelphia.

  The Spinellis arrived at Plimpton’s Upper East Side duplex on the appointed night, and after drinks, the two men played a game of pool while Mrs. Plimpton showed Eileen around the apartment. Later, while the Spinellis looked at some books in the library, Mrs. Plimpton pulled her husband into the hall and whispered that Jerry Spinelli was an aspiring writer and that Eileen had spent almost all their money on this evening — $425! — leaving only $5 in their savings account, just to keep it open. George Plimpton was mortified. He finally decided to make it “a literary evening” and arranged to take the couple to the well-known restaurant Elaine’s, a frequent haunt of New York City writers.

  In the taxi, Plimpton found himself muttering a prayer that literary folks of note would be at Elaine’s. But when they entered the restaurant, Plimpton gave a sigh of relief as it appeared, he noted, as if Madame Tussaud herself had arranged the perfect company for himself and the Spinellis. Table after table was filled with literary bigwigs: Kurt Vonnegut, Jill Krementz, Irwin Shaw, Peter Stone, Dan Jenkins. Plimpton guided Spinelli from table to table, introducing him as “the writer from Philadelphia.” And Mr. Spinelli was all smiles.

  Then Plimpton slowly approached Elaine’s most legendary table, the one usually occupied by the one and only Woody Allen and his friends.