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Morning News

Cartoonist Discusses 'Venturaland'

Aired January 31, 2001 - 11:13 a.m. ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: A controversial new comic strip based on Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura has made its debut in the "St. Paul Pioneer Press."

The strip is called "Venturaland." It's not made the governor very happy. In fact, he has threatened a lawsuit over that.

We're going to go live now to Minneapolis to talk to the man behind the new comic strip. That would be cartoonist Kevin Lenagh.

Kevin, good morning. Thanks for joining us.

KEVIN LENAGH, CARTOONIST: Thanks for having me.

KAGAN: We're going to go ahead and talk to -- just want to give you a heads-up. We might be going to another political figure. That's the mayor of New York. He's having a news conference. If he does...

LENAGH: Yes.

KAGAN: ... we'll have you stand by, and we'll continue our conversation afterwards, OK?

LENAGH: OK.

KAGAN: All right, to the political figure that's on your mind. That would be the governor of your state of Minnesota.

How did you come up with the idea to do a comic strip based on him?

LENAGH: Actually, the "Pioneer Press" has been wanting to do something about him for a couple of year., And they approached a couple of people, and nobody really either had the ideas on how to tackle it, or the time.

And I met Ron Clark, the editor, through a friend back in October. And I pitched eight or 10 samples to him. And we decided that we can work together pretty well.

KAGAN: So I think we've set it up so that you can actually show us how you draw the governor.

LENAGH: I was doing a couple of big sketches here. So...

KAGAN: OK.

LENAGH: I was just kind of working on some things here.

KAGAN: Now, when you go to draw your Jesse Ventura, what are -- I mean, obviously the bald head is something that sticks out. What are some other features that you make sure to emphasize?

LENAGH: Well, really, my wife was the one who discovered that a lot of people have bald heads. It was the chin that really made it the governor.

KAGAN: Oh, OK.

And what's distinctive about his chin?

LENAGH: It's the Kirk Douglas dimple.

KAGAN: Got it.

Now, what do you do with this character in your strip? It -- do you make fun of him? Is he...

LENAGH: Well, we've only...

KAGAN: What does he do?

LENAGH: We -- we've only had one episode so far.

And it was -- it was kind of a comment on every time the governor takes a new job, people criticize him and think he should go back to whatever his previous profession was. When he got into acting, people thought he should have stuck with wrestling. When he got into government, they thought he should go back to acting.

So going into the commentary thing, the idea was...

KAGAN: You're talking about XFL, the new football league that he's been the commentator of, right?

LENAGH: The new -- the new football leagues, yes.

The idea behind the joke was maybe he should go back to being governor.

We're going to play with a whole bunch of different things with the strips. We're going to -- we're going to tackle his opinions about budget things. He just released his latest state budget. And there's a lot of people that aren't crazy about how he's divided up the pie here.

He's -- he's just -- he does a lot of fun things.

As an example, one of the samples that I had done for the "Pioneer Press" was right after he stayed at the White House with President Clinton.

KAGAN: Now, it's a little hard for us to see, so talk us through. We're zooming in right now on that first box.

LENAGH: Yes, the first box has the press asking him if he had to donate anything to the Democratic Party the same as everybody who stayed in the Lincoln bedroom.

And the second panel has President Clinton in Jesse's extremely fringy jacket that most people in Minnesota...

KAGAN: They would recognize that.

LENAGH: Yes, they recognize it. And it -- it's kind of -- it's very distinctive, I guess, is the nicest way to put it. A lot of people don't care for that jacket. So...

KAGAN: I would think that the challenge in trying to draw a strip around somebody as colorful as the governor would be -- it's kind of hard to -- life is kind of hard to top.

LENAGH: It is. I -- I've talked to a couple of other editorial cartoonists, and they say that it's -- it's hard to come up with a way to exaggerate this to where you are coming up with something that's more cartoony.

His daily antics provide just ample material. It's how to portray and put a fun editorial spin on it. That's really kind of the tricky part.

KAGAN: Have you heard from the governor?

LENAGH: Not personally.

KAGAN: Not personally. But I understand your newspaper has. And he's not exactly pleased.

LENAGH: He's -- he seems to get upset about a lot of things. But all the confrontation is really between he and the "Pioneer Press."

KAGAN: OK, we'll leave -- we'll leave it at that.

What about future plans for the strip?

LENAGH: I've got another couple of XFL ideas. There's just a whole bunch of things. It's really -- a lot of the things about the governor personally are going to be up to whatever he happens to do that seems to have a funny slant to it.

But there's also going to be a bunch of the other state legislators that come into it.

The name "Venturaland" actually came from a New York weatherman who called Minnesota Venturaland. So it wasn't even our idea. KAGAN: Well, that brings to mind, you know, Jesse Ventura is a national figure, not just in Minnesota. Do you think if this seems to get syndicated, do we need to get some deal together for you? Why not?

LENAGH: You know, it would be a nice idea. I haven't really considered anything that extreme right now.

The most that I've thought is, if national figures visit the state or interact with our governor, they are going to be fair game in the strip also.

KAGAN: Well, tell you what. You can have a national platform here. You come up with some funny ideas, call us here at MORNING NEWS, and we will share with the country what you come up with.

LENAGH: I will see what I can do for you.

KAGAN: OK, we'll let you get back to the drawing. Kevin Lenagh, with the "Venturaland" cartoon strip, thank you very much.

LENAGH: Thank you.

KAGAN: Well, we do want to mention that we did invite the governor, Jesse Ventura, to come on with us. He so far has not accepted that invitation.

But Governor, in case you are watching, you always have an open invitation to join us here on CNN's MORNING NEWS.

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