Keith Williams

Keith Williams [00:00:00]:
Hi. I’m Keith Williams. I’ve worked on things like Web of Spider-Man and, gosh, Action Comics, She-Hulk, The Phantom. And you’re on — what are we on? Oh my god. I don’t believe this. Splash Pages. We’re on Splash Pages. Yes. Yes. I knew I’d do that very well. I knew.

Carrie [00:00:31]:
Yes. Hello, everybody. Oh — oh, my toes are beans again. Oh, my toes are beans again. Oh, no.

Drew [00:00:41]:
Hey, everybody. Welcome to Splash Pages. I’m Leo, the monkey behind the keyboard here. We got a great show for you. Got a lot of great guests, great news. But, you know, I don’t really think I’m Leo right now. So let’s see what’s going on with the other guy.

Carrie [00:00:57]:
Well, hey, everybody. Happy Tuesday. Welcome to Splash Pages. We are gonna go crazy tonight because Leo isn’t here — our artist. I gotta — somebody’s microphone is being very naughty. Okay. Actually, I think it’s Keith’s. Sorry. But hi, Tom Dog. Hi, Nikosie. Welcome to Splash Pages. We’re gonna have a great night tonight. Let’s go over and see how Mahanna is doing.

MJ [00:01:41]:
Hello, guys. Hello. Hello. Cheers — builder of things here. Just happy to be back on the show, and happy Tuesday.

Carrie [00:01:50]:
Alright. Drew Mallow.

Drew [00:01:54]:
Where? Oh, right. That’s me. Well, it’s Tuesday, and I’m still kind of trying to understand how, but time is weird. Very weird stuff. But, yes, we have a great guest here. I’ve never met him, but already, he sounds great. It’s kind of like when your friend talks about someone who’s, like, a really cool dad, and they just hype him up all the time, and you kinda want to meet him, but then you’re scared because they’ve been so hyped that you feel like you’re gonna embarrass yourself. And then you say the worst thing possible when you meet him, and you’re like, well, that nightmare became true. But that didn’t happen. So, he’s really chill. He’s got a career that’s absolutely fantastic — working with some of comics’ greats. You’ve seen him on Web of Spider-Man, Spectacular She-Hulk [NOTE: correct title is Sensational She-Hulk], Harlem Hellfighters. He did The Phantom for over — almost a decade, probably more. He’s done a lot, and he’s still a super nice guy. Our guest host can’t stop raving about him. Everybody — the one, the only, the smiling, Keith Williams.

Keith Williams [00:03:12]:
Hey, guys. How you doing? Hi. Thank you for inviting me to your show.

Drew [00:03:17]:
Thank you for coming on. We appreciate it, my man.

MJ [00:04:24]:
Yeah. So I believe the first time that we met was — may have been Rhode Island Comic Con or Terrificom. It was because I remember buying a few things from you. I bought Phantom — which, by the way, the person obviously loved it. Because I think he met George [Olesen]. He was the one who mentioned — after we saw each other on Saturday — that he’s old enough that he remembers when it was just a comic strip. And the fact that you’re able to keep, like, the same look — it looks like a change of clothes, different artists, but he really enjoyed that. And he’s correct. I really enjoyed the art style. It made the transition really well, and it ran for like a decade. It was a great read. And of course — in the era of video game movies. I really feel like a lot of the artwork you did — and you worked with — I know, because I’m like, dude, your career is so — everyone. You worked on, remember you worked on The Mask with John, yes?

Keith Williams [00:05:35]:
I did. I did work on The Mask — the regular series, the dark one also. Yeah.

Drew [00:05:40]:
Oh, wow.

MJ [00:05:42]:
Yeah. I remember that because that style — you have a really kind of unique — everyone felt that as their thing, you know. But I really like The Mask — as opposed to the movie — Jim Carrey was very dark, but you still might have the vibrant color, but still keeping that aura of, like, he’s not a great guy. As you can tell, you feel the weight of it. And that was not an easy thing to do in comics.

Keith Williams [00:06:07]:
No. That’s true. Yeah. Oh, wow. Big difference between the Jim Carrey version and The Mask in the comics. Oh, yeah. Definitely darker in the comics. Yeah. And people do die a lot in that. But I really enjoyed working with Doug Mahnke and — oh god — it was something. And Walter also.

Drew [00:06:27]:
Arcudi?

Keith Williams [00:06:28]:
[Confirming writer.] Yes. Yes. He — I don’t know how he sleeps. Being like, what kind of nightmare footage — who has this stuff? He puts them out there on a page. It was great. I really enjoyed working with him on that. And Walter also.

Drew [00:06:45]:
The thing that was so funny about The Mask — which is funny because Arcudi wrote one or two episodes for the animated series, which you could always tell because the plots were insane — is like you said, a lot of people — I’ve told people, like, oh, it’s based on a comic book. People are like, really? What’s it like? And I’m like, it’s different. Stanley Ipkiss is in it, I can confirm that. But like you said, he’s such an antihero. No one is safe. But then again, whoever was wearing the mask always changed, which is always so funny because they only allude to that briefly in the film. Yeah. It was just such a different entity.

Drew [00:14:27]:
So my question was — in Sensational She-Hulk, you got to work with the great John Byrne, who I met once and I don’t very often fanboy. Carrie can attest to it. There are some moments where I’m cuckoo for cocoa puffs for a creator, and meeting John was — I’ve never been more terrified in my life. Because I’ve heard great stories, and then I’ve heard stories where he’s very specific. So the entire time, I’m thinking of all the things I don’t wanna say, and I’m just reviewing in my brain like — no, that’s stupid. No, that’s too fanboy. No, that’s illiterate. No, that’s way too sexual. All these things. And then later on, I just get up and say: “I’m a big fan of your work. Can you please sign these?” Thank you very much.

Keith Williams [00:14:22]:
Yeah. You sound just like me.

Keith Williams [00:14:35]:
I feel the same way when I go and meet people too. So I can understand how you could feel like that with John. I get it. You know? I get it.

Drew [00:14:47]:
Yeah. So what was it like working with John on Sensational She-Hulk? I mean, you guys were breaking the fourth wall before Deadpool made it a thing.

Keith Williams

[00:15:04]:
Yeah. That is true. She-Hulk was first. She’s totally aware of where she is and what’s going on. Maybe that’s why she has that kind of attitude that she has. But it was great working with John. I think it was actually Mark Gruenwald who got me in touch with him — with John — because he was looking for somebody. At first, before the She-Hulk stuff, to work as a background inker on Alpha Flight. And I guess I did a good job with that. But even before that, he actually introduced me to comic book fans as an assistant working with him on the book — he had my name, I got in the inside of the book — which totally blew my mind. And he carried that on to Incredible Hulk and then over to Action Comics, and then asked me if I was interested in doing Sensational She-Hulk. And I was definitely not gonna say no to the person that I’ve loved since 2001: A Space Odyssey — wait, no. [Laughs] Since ROM: 2000. [NOTE: likely a reference to ROM: Spaceknight or a Byrne-associated Marvel series —]

Drew [00:16:09]:
Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Carrie [00:16:10]:
[Shows a page from Sensational She-Hulk on screen.]

Keith Williams [00:16:13]:
But he — to me, he’s absolutely fantastic. You know, I know he could be a curmudgeon in some cases. And I think he gets a little upset with me because I’m always talking about the good parts of him, and I think he’d rather be the curmudgeon. But sorry, John — you did really good by me. So thank you. I really, really appreciate it.

Drew [00:16:45]:
Oh, yeah. I know. Absolutely. Getting to meet him and just having his autograph — I explained to people: “Yep. Met John Byrne.” They’re like, “What was that like?” I was like: “It’s something.” It’s something scary. But grateful I have a photo of him signing my Hellboy. Because I’m a huge Hellboy fan — and I had that, and Man of Steel.

Keith Williams [00:17:19]:
Yeah.

Drew [00:17:20]:
And it was so cool. And the work you guys did was just fantastic.

Keith Williams [00:17:38]:
Thank you. I was scared to death.

Carrie [00:17:45]:
People are probably wondering why I have this frozen, but you guys were talking about breaking the fourth wall, and this is right where She-Hulk is talking to the people as the panels cover her. Like, yes — this is the Code Approved book. You know?

Keith Williams [00:18:05]:
That one I have — this is great. Wow. I haven’t really looked at this for a while. It’s really something.

Drew [00:18:30]:
Were you worried about the nostalgia goggles? You know — this was good then, and you’re like, oh…

Keith Williams [00:18:37]:
Oh, yeah. Yeah. I could see things I could have done better. Yeah.

Drew [00:18:46]:
And then another thing I wanted to bring up is — you worked quite a bit on Web of Spider-Man.

Keith Williams [00:18:53]:
Yes.

Drew [00:18:55]:
And the amount of different writers, artists, and whatnot you had during your time — that was crazy. What was it like working with, you know, where you’d have someone for a while and then it would shift?

Keith Williams [00:19:16]:
Well, you know, that’s the advantage of being an inker, I guess. Is that you’re not just on one book for a long period of time the way pencilers are. They have, like, a certain book that’s theirs, and people identify with that. With me being an inker, I could bounce around to different books when they need me.

It’s kinda hard at the beginning to work with a new person, because you’ve gotta figure out the rhythm. You’ve gotta figure out — if he’s more organic or more mechanical with his style, am I gonna use a coquille board? Am I gonna use a brush? For him, I’m gonna use both. And you’ve got — I guess I have to feel it out for, like, maybe the first few issues before I really get into a rhythm with the person I’m working with. I’m just hoping that they don’t fire me before that happens.

Carrie [00:20:20]:
But we were talking about Spider-Man here — I just grabbed the first one of the arc here — but the difference in how this was inked, and the shading on it, there’s just so much hatching and crosshatching done, very intricate line work, but not as many big brush strokes. Peter’s bag there is just insane that —

Keith Williams [00:20:50]:
Right. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Well, a lot of that — you could thank Alex [Saviuk] for that. It depends. With me, I was looking at a lot of different inkers at that time. This was my first book that I actually had as a regular gig. And I was still really trying to find my style. I still don’t think I have a real style, actually. But with this, it was either a Joe Sinnott style that I was trying to do, or I started to get into Tom Palmer and try to do that. I don’t know if I was driving Alex crazy with the way I was using things. I was also teaching myself how to use a brush on some of it, because brushes were really scary to me back at that time. Yeah. With Web of Spider-Man, I was very lucky to actually work with Alex [Saviuk] for, like, five years.

Carrie [00:21:59]:
This is kind of silly, but — I know this is the letterer’s job; I have an obsession with lettering — did you do the inking on the lettering stuff?

Keith Williams [00:22:10]:
The lettering? No. That was a separate person. And I think that was when it was still actually on the board, instead of being pasted on later, or done in the computer like they do now. So it could usually be, the letterer might have been Janice Chiang, or some of the other guys that would usually do it. We all do separate parts of the book, especially back then. The writer, the penciler, the inker, the letterer, the colorist.

Carrie [00:22:49]:
Yeah. I since I thought it was the older thing, I wasn’t sure if you did some of the stuff in the lettering after you inked, because I’m always interested in figuring stuff out.

Keith Williams [00:22:59]:
Right. Actually, later on, when it was done in the computer, they had us do the borders. It used to be the letterer who would do the borders and the lettering, and then I would do the inking on top of that. So the lettering would actually block off parts of the scenery that’s in the background, which made it easier for us. But then when the computers came, none of the lettering was on the artwork anymore. So we had to work on the whole thing because we didn’t know where the lettering was going to be placed.

Carrie [00:23:33]:
Because — great scene, and then suddenly “CRACK-A-BOOM” is written over the entire background.

Keith Williams [00:23:39]:
Right! Letterers are absolutely amazing. That’s an art all to itself. And for the people who still do it by hand, it’s absolutely incredible.

Drew [00:23:50]:
Absolutely. Oh, yeah.

Carrie [00:23:52]:
Speaking of — we had Rob Leigh on, and I just love him.

Drew [00:23:56]:
Yeah. And speaking of, Keith — we had Mark Morales on last week, and I remember asking: “Do you guys, like, have a secret chat? Do inkers have, like, a text line? You guys are sharing tips, showing pages — do you have, like, a little hidden meeting? Inkers unite, you know.”

Keith Williams [00:24:24]:
I don’t know how you found this out… and we might have to kill you.

Drew [00:24:28]:
I’ve seen things.

Keith Williams [00:24:30]:
You’re not supposed to know that we go and meet each other at a Burger King. Not supposed to know that. No. Actually — we only really get a chance to really talk to each other when we’re at comic book conventions.

Drew [00:24:52]:
Wow.

Keith Williams [00:24:54]:
That’s one of the few times we meet, and we get to see each other’s work and stuff like that. But it’s really funny — we really don’t talk too much about how we do our stuff. We’re talking about other things when we’re there. And the fact that we all live in our own places — with me, I’m usually in the dark with my lamp on, and I’m just drawing in there by myself. Totally isolated. The only times we do get to talk as a group would be at the conventions.

Drew [00:27:27]:
So my question was — in Sensational She-Hulk, you got to work with the great John Byrne… [Earlier exchange covered above]

MJ [00:26:38]:
I was gonna ask about your work with Mike Esposito.

Drew [00:26:41]:
Oh, go ahead.

Keith Williams [00:26:42]:
Mike Esposito. My gosh. Yeah. That was the first person that I actually worked with at Marvel. Don Perlin, who worked at Marvel at the time — he saw my stuff and was very happy with what he saw. And he called me up one night and asked me if I was interested in doing background inking, which I didn’t even know background inking was a thing. Didn’t know what it was. He said: “Yeah. It’s everything but the figure work — you do everything else.” And I said, “Yeah. Sure. I’d love to.” So he sent me up, and my first gig was with Jim Mooney and Mike Esposito as the inker. And for a few issues, that’s how it went. And then I guess Mooney left, and Ron Frenz took over as penciler. So I think that was actually his first Spider-Man stuff — when I was doing the backgrounds on his work. I had to make sure that whatever Mike did in the foregrounds, I made it look seamless.

MJ [00:27:58]:
Yeah. Because you want to be a part of a picture, not just —

Keith Williams [00:28:06]:
Yes. Exactly. Yeah. Just had to take care of all that. And that’s the way it went with me as a background inker — with Joe Sinnott, with John Byrne, and everybody else that I worked over the years.

MJ [00:28:20]:
There’s also — I know you worked for DC. And was there — was Moonstone in there?

Keith Williams [00:28:30]:
Moonstone Comics. Yes. Oh, gosh. That was Kolchak: The Night Stalker Chronicles, and Buckaroo Banzai. Yes.

MJ [00:28:46]:
I was gonna ask about that too. Oh my gosh. Buckaroo Banzai?

Keith Williams [00:28:49]:
Yes. Yes. That was great. I had a really, really good time on that. It was a continuation of the movie — like, what happened right after the movie? And the funny thing is, I also worked on a Buckaroo Banzai story that they did at Marvel, back when Mark Texeira was the penciler on that. And they asked me to do some background inking over his work. It’s really amazing — I was doing it back in the eighties and the nineties, and then I was doing it again in the 2000s.

Drew [00:29:32]:
Crazy.

Keith Williams [00:29:32]:
And plus, I also got to see the original movie, and I got to hold the main thing — which was the over-thruster. That Buckaroo Banzai used in the car that allowed him to go through the mountain.

Drew [00:29:48]:
That’s awesome.

Keith Williams [00:29:49]:
Yeah. Yeah. I thought that was pretty cool.

Drew [00:29:52]:
Next thing you know, you had a photo with Peter Weller. I would just be like — alright. I’ll be like, wow. We have something in common because we both have photos with Robocop. So there you go.

Keith Williams [00:30:04]:
With Doctor Peter Weller. Yes.

Drew [00:30:05]:
Right. That’s right. Everybody keep that up. Yeah. It’s true — I learned that when I met him years ago. It’s Doctor Peter Weller. Very — he studied.

Keith Williams [00:30:19]:
Yes. Yes. He did get his doctorate. So yeah.

Drew [00:31:02]:
And then — to switch gears — you worked on The Phantom for about a decade?

Keith Williams [00:31:14]:
That’s yes. About ten years.

Drew [00:31:18]:
So —

Keith Williams [00:31:19]:
Ninety-five to 2005.

Drew [00:31:21]:
Sheesh. Fantastic. Wow. I mean, I feel like that kind of longevity is a thing of comic book past — because I feel like something of that longevity — projects where people of the same creative team are there year after year after year — is so rare now. But, I mean, ten years, man. Did you, when you accepted the project, think ten years later you’d still be on it?

Keith Williams

[00:32:07]:
I didn’t even think it was gonna be like a month. I had no idea. It was luck. That was a job that Danny Fingeroth got me in touch with. And he sent me to Jay Kennedy, who was at the time the guy who ran the comic strip part of King Features for the newspapers. And I got to meet him and show my artwork, my inking. And he said, “Oh, well, you’re gonna have to see Lee Falk. He’ll be the one to definitely okay you — if he wants you to do it or not.” The creator of The Phantom. I didn’t really know about The Phantom that much — I knew about it, but I wasn’t really into it except for Defenders of the Earth and all that stuff. But they sent me to Lee Falk, who lived at 80 West 86th Street, Central Park West. These are the cartoonists that made money. Okay?

So I go up to meet him in his sixth-floor apartment that only had an elevator that went just to his door — there was a little tiny alcove area and a picture of The Phantom in a different language on the wall, and there’s his door, and that’s it. He opens the door, and he’s wearing, like, a sort of smoking jacket. He lets me come in. He shows me into the living room, and you’re able to look out the window — this amazing view of Central Park, and the planetarium right below him. And it’s also the area where they blow up the balloons for the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. He got that every year. But he was such a nice guy, fortunately. I showed him my work and he said, “Okay. You got the job.”

Drew [00:34:18]:
Very cool.

Keith Williams [00:34:19]:
I just kept working, and I wanted to try and make sure it looked like it had the continuity to look like Sy Barry. I was coming in in the middle of a story he was doing, and he retired in ’95. The Phantom daily strip. So I had to make sure that it looked as close to Sy as possible. So all I was worried about was making sure it had good continuity and didn’t shake people up. And George Olesen — he was the penciler. And he also worked with Sy too. So I just had to make sure that it looked as close to Sy as possible.

Drew [00:34:58]:
I have to ask — when you guys, as comic creators, work on projects and then you see them be adapted to film, is that one of those where you’re like, yay — and then it’s like, oh, okay?

Keith Williams [00:35:19]:
Well, you know — okay. So The Phantom movie. I love Billy Zane in it. He was great. He was The Phantom. He must have read a lot of the strips and got the basic idea of how he’s a friend to his friends, and a serious enemy to his enemies. But I might have felt that it was still at a time when we were a little nervous about these adaptations — it was before Iron Man, before the Hulk movie, I think. They were still trying to figure out that comic books didn’t have to be treated like the word “comic” in them — more like the Batman ’66 kind of stuff. So they treated Treat Williams as a great actor and everything, but he really chewed up the scenery in that movie. The three-skull thing and all that — it was kind of interesting. But overall, the whole movie, I did enjoy it. I did know that a lot of people thought it could have been better. I got to go to the premiere, and I got to meet Billy Zane. So —

Drew [00:36:39]:
Oh, nice.

Keith Williams [00:36:40]:
Yeah. But I liked it. I liked it.

Drew [00:36:44]:
Okay. I mean, listen. I know.

Keith Williams [00:36:46]:
I wish there was another chance so that maybe they could’ve grown it a little bit more — try and get into it as an action-adventure thing more than a comic-booky comedy kind of thing. But it’s good.

Drew [00:37:05]:
I mean, the fact that you got to meet Billy Zane —

Keith Williams [00:37:18]:
Cool, man. Like, thanks. I get tongue-tied. So it was basically, “Hi. You do great work.” And this was before Titanic, I know. He was very nice to me. He was very patient for the few minutes that we got to talk together. Yeah.

Carrie [00:38:05]:
Yeah. I was looking into some of your original art and stuff that was on sale at different places — the prints and stuff you’ve made. But I was wondering — when you’re doing your own stuff and you don’t have to conform to anybody else’s style, what kind of inking do you prefer? What kinds of brushes or pens? What medium do you like to use?

Keith Williams [00:38:44]:
Well, when I have the time, I really like working with Focal pens. They’re fine. I started with those, and I can sometimes make it look like it could be brushwork also. I have more control with those than with any of the other tools.

Brushes are good too. I did teach myself how to make really thin lines with the Winsor & Newton Series 7 number two brush. With the crow quills — those are usually number 102 Hunt nibs that you dip in ink and then draw on the page. Microns, which are markers — they come in different sizes. They took the place of Rapidographs, which were things you would fill up and were really hard to clean when they got clogged. I would take those things apart — such a nightmare trying to put them back together after you clean them. So thank goodness for Micron.

For coloring, I use Copic markers, or other kinds of alcohol-based markers. I’ve also used watercolors. I also use Clip Studio Paint for coloring when I’m turning my original artwork into a print. So I use that. I’ve got a whole mess of different tools. And I’m always learning. I’m continuously learning. It’s never boring for me. It’s always scary and fun and interesting at the same time. And when you learn a new thing, it’s like you’re accomplishing something. So it’s great.

Carrie [00:41:17]:
That is great that you’re so versatile and that you still love it. Because I know so many people that are just — you know — it’s become a job, and that’s all it is. And it’s like, no. If you don’t like it, quit doing it. Art requires passion. It’s not just getting paid.

Keith Williams

[00:41:36]:
That’s true. That is true. If you wanted to get your bills paid, you would develop a profession where you could get paid a lot better than being an artist. But I love doing this stuff. And this is something that I wanted to do since I was a kid.

In a strange way, I have to thank Photoshop for being created. Because if it wasn’t for that, I would still probably just be an inker. I was inking for most of the time that I was doing this — about thirty years at that point. But once Photoshop came and they learned how to darken pencils digitally, inkers weren’t needed as much. I said to myself: well, I’ve got to get back into doing what I really wanted to do first, which was penciling. And that’s how I had to relearn how to do everything all over again. I wasn’t able to correct other people’s pencils, but I had to learn to do it for myself. And that’s good too, because I haven’t really been penciling for a really long period of time. So like I said — it still interests me. It’s still scary and it’s fun.

Carrie [00:43:03]:
Okay. So you’re doing that in Photoshop and on tablets?

Keith Williams [00:43:12]:
I work on a Wacom tablet to do a lot of sketching and get an idea. And then after that, I would send it to my printer, have it printed out. And then — this is another step that makes it even longer than it should be — I use lead on the back of the paper and darken that, then turn it over and draw onto another piece of paper. So that would be a clean pencil line — not a blue line — it would be pencil line. So then after I do that, I can ink it and erase the pencils. You don’t see any kind of blue line or anything like that. It’s just the finished original piece of artwork. But I do a lot of steps.

Carrie [00:44:00]:
Gotcha. Shout out for that awesome job on Quantum and Woody.

Keith Williams [00:44:05]:
Yes. Absolutely. Quantum and Woody. Holy cow. Grace. Yeah.

Drew [00:44:10]:
Thank you, Mister Cooper. [NOTE: likely a shout-out to Justin Cooper, host/colorist associated with the show or the book]

Keith Williams [00:44:12]:
Hey, Coop. Yes. That was fun. Yeah.

Carrie [00:44:26]:
And so you’re still into comics too. Are you collecting, or are you still reading stuff?

Keith Williams [00:44:31]:
I used to collect a lot. But it’s become a little expensive. So I kinda wait — sometimes I wait for the trade paperbacks if I’m gonna pick up a story that sounds interesting. I’ll do that. But I used to — I still have thousands of comic books in boxes up in my loft area, from when I started collecting as a teenager all the way up until my late thirties.

Drew [00:45:25]:
So Keith — when you’re not creating works of art, what are you passionate about outside of doing comics? Or is there anything you geek out about? What is the story of Keith Williams outside of the studio?

Keith Williams [00:46:00]:
Having a normal time to relax and sit down with my wife — maybe watch a movie. Right now we’re watching Suits. You know, just that, and being able to go out and have dinner and take a walk. Things that don’t involve any of this. And, believe it or not, if I ever do get the chance — cleaning the house. I go wanting to clean my room, which is a mess right now. But I feel it’s like an accomplishment. Yeah. I’m always saying, “I need time.”

Carrie [00:59:09]:
So — you said when you were really young, you decided that comics is what you wanted to do. So what was your origin story for getting into comics?

Keith Williams [00:59:28]:
Well, my grandma gave me my really first comic to have, which was a Batman comic. And every weekend when she would come over to the house, she’d drop off some more comic books. But they were basically DC Comics at the time, so I didn’t know anything about Marvel. After a while, I discovered the Marvel stuff, which was very different from what DC was doing. And then I got hold of that too. But I wanted to do my own stuff — for some strange reason. I wanted to create my own characters. I wanted to do my own stories. And I had a friend who was also interested in doing the same thing. We both lived in the projects together, and we would hang out in the hallway and just be drawing and creating comic book characters on the floor of our hallway.

I kept going with it. He didn’t. And it seemed like in high school that it really clicked — because I was still thinking of possibly being an astronaut. But I had a really great guidance counselor who saw my stuff. I won an award for some kind of air-pollution thing. And she said: “You should really take this up. See where it takes you.” And I was in the major art classes in high school, and that’s basically what I wanted to do. All the assignments they gave me, I turned into something that looked like a comic book thing.

When I went into college, I picked the School of Visual Arts because Will Eisner was there — he created The Spirit comic strip. His stuff was absolutely incredible, storytelling-wise and drawing-wise. I wanted to meet him. I did get into his class, though it took a little bit of time. I had him sign my A Contract with God book, which is like one of the first graphic novels. And he’s signing it, and as he’s signing he says, “You see? This is how you get into my class.” So after that point, I was enrolled the next term and I stayed in it till I graduated.

Carrie [01:02:38]:
And you ended up just working with him, didn’t you, right after that?

Keith Williams [01:02:41]:
I wish I did. No — he did hire some of the people from the class, but I wasn’t ready at that point. My art was not the best, which is why I was so happy that I actually got into being an inker. So I got in sort of a roundabout way of what I really wanted to do.

And while I was working at Marvel, as a background inker, I got into working with John Romita Sr. as a Romita Raider — doing art corrections. I was the first one to be part of that group, because I overheard them talking about it and I said: “I gotta do this.” And I was able to do that for a while.

And then what happened was — while I was doing that work — Jim Owsley was promoted as editor of Spider-Man. Jim Owsley is Christopher Priest, who went on to do things like Black Panther and stuff like that. He came up to me and asked if I was interested in being his assistant editor. And I said yes. And we became the first all-Black editorial team at Marvel. And we were working on the flagship book.

MJ [01:04:25]:
Yeah. I — yes.

Keith Williams [01:04:26]:
I watched Spider-Man when I was a kid back in the sixties, and all that stuff. And I always loved the character, but I never thought I was actually going to be working on him — having him do things. And we were there around the time of Secret Wars. So we were also there when he changed from his red-and-blue costume into the black costume. So that was a pretty cool period of time. But I couldn’t stay there — I wanted to do inking. So I had to leave after a bit.

And then I started doing backgrounds again. But then I finally got my chance doing inking — for Sectaurs. That was the first thing I did, and then Transformers. And then I got Web of Spider-Man, which was pretty lucky. I was still working on Spider-Man. So yeah.

Drew [01:05:34]:
Amazing.

Carrie [01:05:34]:
Yeah. That’s so cool.

Keith Williams [01:05:36]:
Yeah. Besides all the other different books that I worked on at Marvel — the Atlantis Attacks crossover, Quasar, Silver Surfer, Warlock and the Warlock Chronicles, stuff like that.

Carrie [01:06:08]:
So is there anything that you’ve really wanted to work on that you haven’t had a chance to yet?

Keith Williams [01:06:08]:
There’s a lot of stuff. I can never say any of it wouldn’t happen. There’s a lot of people coming back and doing stuff. I mean, I would have loved to work on Batman for a bit. You know, that would be great. And I’d like to do some stuff for DC. But whatever happens, happens. Right now, I’m doing a lot of independent stuff — covers and things like that. Keeping busy.

Carrie [01:06:58]:
There’s a lot of new creator-owned stuff coming out — with, like, Distillery and Ghost Machine and just tons of different — is that how you think that’s working with the comic book industry? Is that good for the creators?

Keith Williams [01:07:21]:
I think — at this moment in time — the more the merrier. Not all of them will reach the levels of Image or Dark Horse when they broke through. But everybody is trying. I think it’s fine. You get out there, and hopefully it’ll give some of the new guys coming up now some place to go to work unless they’re thinking of doing their own thing. It’s probably hard to make a hit. You gotta be lucky, and I hope enough people get to see it to be able to do something like that. But go for it.

Keith Williams [01:08:30]:
[Re: Moonstone’s Domino Lady] Domino Lady. That was Moonstone. Yeah. There we go.

Keith Williams [01:08:43]:
I really enjoyed inking that. It had a nice 1940s feel to it. But yeah, Moonstone was really great with giving me different stuff to work on. I said, Kolchak, and oh, oh — besides Buckaroo Banzai, I think there was actually a Phantom / Captain Action crossover thing for them too, which was really cool.

Another place I worked was Avatar Press. For them I did Lady Death covers. I was in Lady Death. I was also doing another book called CROSS — where people who get infected by this virus end up getting a rash in the shape of a cross on their face. And it would turn them into maniacal, sociopathic psychopaths. So it was frightening. The things that they would do. Still gives me nightmares. Especially the covers — totally insane. The guy who did the penciling for it — I don’t know how he sleeps at night, but he was absolutely amazing. He’d put so much into a cover that you’d have to keep looking at it to see everything. Insane. Everything from decapitations to — you know, you had this Mad Max kinda thing going on, with a body strapped onto the front, screaming. Oh my god.

Besides Harlem Hellfighters, which is great — that was another one from Avatar. That was the story about World War I African American soldiers fighting for The United States, and all the troubles and problems that they had doing that. And how they survived through the war — surviving the Germans and surviving Americans. Yeah.

And there was another book — Über, that I did. That was a World War II story. Ken — and Caanan White did the pencils. It was about the super soldier formula getting into the hands of everybody — all the different people who were fighting each other in World War II, and how they were using these super-powered soldiers to fight their war for them.

Drew [01:11:56]:
Oh, okay. That does sound really cool.

Drew [01:13:27]:
So Keith, thank you so much for joining us, man. This is absolutely great. Are you going to any conventions this spring and summer? And what’s the best way for people to interact with you on social media?

Keith Williams [01:13:38]:
Okay. Well, next — this weekend coming up — I kind of got something for the next bunch of weeks. But I have CT Gamacon, that’s in Connecticut. And Super Retro Fest — that’s in Massachusetts. And I have a Long Island Comic Expo thing that I believe is at a Dave & Buster’s somewhere there. And I have Little Giant Comics — that’s in April — the fifth, Lehigh Valley. That’s the twelfth, Super Jersey Comic Expo — that’s April 26. So I got a whole bunch of things. Last year I must have done like thirty.

Drew [01:15:04]:
Impressive.

Drew [01:15:04]:
Is there a chance we’ll see you at Terrificom this year?

Keith Williams [01:15:06]:
Yes. You will.

Drew [01:15:08]:
Oh, yes.

Keith Williams [01:15:10]:
Yes. Terrificom. Oh, I love Terrificom.

Carrie [01:15:19]:
And how do you keep yourself hydrated at cons? What do you have on your con booth — like, this is how I survive my day?

Keith Williams [01:15:30]:
Water. You know, when I first started doing this stuff, I was just busy drawing, and I wasn’t really thinking about hydrating. So I would be wrecked by the time the show would be closing. I’ve learned how to do that now — I’d have some sugar-free snacks, and, God help me, convention food.

Carrie [01:16:06]:
We’ll have a Splash Pages hydration station set up for all of our friends of the show at Terrificom. So we’ll make sure we keep you going. You can swing by the booth.

Keith Williams [01:16:17]:
Yep. Great. Thank you.

Drew [01:16:18]:
Yeah. Keith, our booth is usually near the entrance, so you can’t miss it. But we also walk through and ask, “Do you need something?” — like we were keeping Mark Waid eternally supplied with Diet Cokes.

Keith Williams [01:16:38]:
Oh, Diet Cokes. And he was —

MJ [01:16:40]:
He wants water.

Drew [01:16:42]:
He was eternally grateful. There’s nothing quite like Mark Waid giving you shade about not having a fresh Diet Coke —

Drew [01:17:56]:
Guys, do you have any other questions?

MJ [01:18:01]:
[Wrapping up.]

Keith Williams [01:18:01]:
Thank you.

Transcript processed: 2026-04-08 | Source: EP107_2025_03_11_Keith_Williams_Castmagic.txt