Greenpoint’s Neil Numberman didn’t want the characters in “Joey Fly Private Eye 2: Big Hairy Drama” to freeze their thoraxes off.
There’s a cold snap hitting the big city in this second installment of the Mickey Spillane-inspired noir spoof. Joey Fly and his scorpion sidekick, Sammy Stingtail, go slogging through the snow as they try to solve the disappearance of leading lady Greta Divawing.
Numberman went out onto the streets of Brooklyn and took shots of people bundled up in hats and scarves to reference when he drew the kids’ graphic novel. So if there’s a pair of red thigh-high boots on a praying mantis that look familiar, maybe they were yours.
Numberman and writer Aaron Reynolds first Joey Fly book, “Creepy Crawly Crime” was nominated for an Edgar Allan Poe Mystery Award in the juvenile category.
In this whodunit, which is currently out through Macmillan imprint Henry Holt, Numberman brings a bit of Brooklyn alongside more fun, more bugs and a hornets nest of suspects.
Brooklyn Family: What are Joey and Sammy up to in the sequel?
Neil Numberman: They are approached by a gigantic, hairy tarantula, Harry. Harry is the owner and director at the famous Scarab Beetle Theatre. His lead actress has gone missing, and he’s convinced Joey Fly is the only one that can find her in time for opening night. So Joey and Sammy are back on the case. There are quite a few suspects: a villainous stinkbug who’s dedicated to the craft of acting, a lovesick gypsy moth who’s making eyes at Sammy, a geriatric mosquito janitor and even the giant mustachioed tarantula.
BF: How did you improve over the first book, art-wise?
NN: I was really uptight with the first book, because I had never worked on anything that big before. It was 96 pages; the most I had done up until then was three pages. I’m still happy with it, but it’s got nothing on the second Joey Fly, art-wise. Between the two books, I’ve made a lot more comics and I loosened up considerably. The panels are a lot more fun and all over the place, [and] the word balloons are dynamic when they need to be.
BF: How do you take Aaron Reynolds’s script and make it better/funnier/funner?
NN: I try to pack each page with plenty of hidden jokes and hints, so folks can take a look at it more than once. I also like to slip in some of my own stories, told entirely through the drawings. It’s partly a way for the readers to have fun, and partly so I have fun making it.
BF: What did you mean when you said you were “born to draw this book?”
NN: Aaron wrote a great story with weird and compelling characters, that also happen to be insects and arachnids. It’s the type of book I would have loved to get on Christmas morning and run up to my room and sit by the heater in my new slippers and devour. So, when I say I was born to draw this book, I mean any quality story that can be read again and again, with characters that I’m fascinated with and that inspire the imagination. I’ve been drawing animals and people and monsters since I was 3, maybe since I was 2 (according to my mother), and I’ve never stopped. So in that respect, I feel like I’m doing what I was born to do.
BF: You mentioned that you took photos of Brooklynites walking on the street to use as inspiration. Where did you go to take the shots and how did this help?
NN: My studio at the time was right on the river in Williamsburg, and I caught people going to work up Bedford Avenue. Fabiane’s on Fifth had a great breakfast, and a nice place to sit and snap pictures where I could keep warm, but see all the folks on their way to work. (Bedford is quite hopping at 9 am) Even though I was in hipster central, and I needed ’30s era clothes references, winter clothes tend to be a bit more ambiguous. So after a couple mornings there, I got a hundred or so shots. They were useful for a lot of the theatre scenes toward the end of the book.
BF: How did a nice kid from Jersey who studied illustration at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia end up in Brooklyn?
NN: I needed to set my sights a little higher than Philadelphia. So I applied to the School of Visual Arts’s graduate illustration program, as much for the extra education as a reason to move up here. I knew an acceptance letter would light a fire under me, and when I got mine from SVA, it was all the reason I needed to move to New York. I lived in Manhattan for awhile, but after school, I needed an art studio. I mentioned this at a party in Brooklyn, met a guy that had one with extra space in Williamsburg, and I had my spot. I shared a 100-square-foot room with another illustrator and friend, S.Y. Choi, but we outgrew it last year.
BF: What is your workspace like now?
NN: I work out of home. It’s a perfect little set-up for me. My studio’s in a pretty big room next to my bedroom. I miss working around other friends, because I can always bounce ideas off them, but the upside is I have a workspace and an apartment that’s all my own. My desk looks like a space station, with two computer monitors and a television, which I love. The more screen space in front of me, the better.
For more information about Neil Numberman, visit www.neilnumberman.com.
