Ed Subitzky

Subitzky's roughly 100 comic strips for the National Lampoon included “Saturday Night on Antarius! (The Planet with 12 Different Sexes)", “Two-way Comics!", "Eight Comics in One!”, and “Come Too Soon Comics!” Many of his comic strips ran to several pages, and featured numerous very small panels.

His approximately 100 articles and written pieces for National Lampoon included “How I Spent My Summer” in the Self-Indulgence issue (December 1973, Vol. 1, No. 45)[8] and "Stupidworld" in the Stupid issue (March 1974, Vol 1, No 48).[9]

Two of the many fumetti, also known as photo funnies, that Subitzky wrote were "The Perfect Date" and "Every Red-Blooded American Boy's Dream: Three Pretty Girls Doing Just What You Want So You Can Masturbate!"

In 1974, Subitzky wrote two sections of the infamous National Lampoon 1964 High School Yearbook Parody: the first piece in the yearbook, which is the Principal's letter, and "In Memorium" [sic], which is a parody of a student In Memoriam piece.

Also in 1974, Subitzky wrote numerous sections of the National Lampoon book,The Job of Sex, which was a parody of The Joy of Sex.

His writing and cartooning were reprinted in many National Lampoon anthologies.

Subitzky was a writer for and an occasional performer on The National Lampoon Radio Hour, which ran for just over a year in 1973 to 1974. He conceptualized and wrote all, or nearly all, of the “Public Disservice Announcements” (which were parodies of public service announcements), as well as a number of other pieces. Some selections from the Radio Hour work appeared on the CD album Gold Turkey.

Subitzky also conceived, wrote, and starred in a one-hour, two-episode radio play broadcast on The National Lampoon Radio Hour in 1974. The play was entitled The Sluts from Space and it was a spoof of popular science-fiction/horror dramas. The two half-hour episodes aired on May 25 and June 2. Subitzky voiced the part of the science-nerd hero, Timmy Johnson, who by clever control of the supply of deodorants, manages to save the world from alien invaders disguised as beautiful and seductive women. The Sluts from Space episodes of the show are listed in detail at: and .

In 1980, Subitzky wrote numerous pieces for a nationally syndicated series of five-minute horror stories, which were broadcast on radio. The series was entitled The Nightwatch. Some of these stories were also made available on an album by Clack, Inc., called Ten Horror Stories: For Radio.[10]

In 1980, Subitzky was hired as a comedy writer on The David Letterman Show (the morning show), where he helped create "The Imposter," a series of comedy sketches about a person who pretends to be celebrities in order to get on television. During the sketches, Letterman always completely accepts the fake identity that the Imposter has presented. Subitzky was soon asked to actually play the character of the Imposter, which he did four times on the morning show. He also reprised the role twelve more times on Late Night with David Letterman.[11]

For the sketches, in most cases Subitzky wore his own clothes, and there was usually no attempt to make him look like the person he was purporting to be. However, when he was claiming to be James Clavell, Subitzky wore a tuxedo, and when pretending to be Don Henley, he was dressed in a leather motorcycle jacket and a black sequined teeshirt. When Subitzky was announced as being the viewer Elizabeth Callahan, he appeared in full drag and makeup, however, his real-life moustache was clearly visible. As Santa Claus, Subitzky wore a full Santa costume, beard and hair, and, as the U.S. Airforce Academy Choir, he wore a chorister's robe.

At the end of the first three sketches that were made, Subitzky left the stage via the same entrance that he came in at, i.e. via the wings, however by the 4th sketch and for all the subsequent sketches, Subitzky left the stage by walking up the aisle through the audience, apologizing profusely to audience members as he went along.

For the first three sketches, Subitzky had claimed to be just one celebrity, but by sketch number four he claimed to be two people simultaneously. Late in the series of sketches he claimed to be an entire choir of children.

• The following four Imposter sketches ran on episodes of the morning show, The David Letterman Show (which ran from June 23 to October 24, 1980):
• July 2, 1980: Ed Subitzky as the singer Donna Summer
• July 18, 1980: Ed Subitzky as the actor Gary Coleman
• July 24, 1980: Ed Subitzky as the actress Suzanne Somers
• August 5, 1980: Ed Subitzky as actor Burt Reynolds and actress Sally Field (who were a couple at the time)

The morning show was cancelled in October 1980, after only 18 weeks on the air. And it was not until early in 1982 that the first Letterman evening show, Late Night with David Letterman, started airing.

• The following twelve Imposter sketches ran on Late Night with David Letterman (a show which ran from February 1, 1982, to June 25, 1993):
• March 25, 1982: Ed Subitzky as Martin Cruz Smith, author of the novel Gorky Park
• April 22, 1982: Ed Subitzky as Don Henley of The Eagles
• June 4, 1982,: Ed Subitzky as James Clavell, author of Noble House
• June 30, 1982, Ed Subitzky as "The Mattress Thief"
• July 9, 1982: Ed Subitzky as Santa Claus
• July 29, 1982: Ed Subitzky as viewer Elizabeth Callahan of Champion, Pennsylvania
• October 4, 1982: Ed Subitzky ask the comedian Bob Hope
• December 20, 1982: Ed Subitzky as the U.S. Airforce Academy Choir
• December 21, 1982: Ed Subitzky as the Brooke Shields doll (a doll altered to look like Subitzky)
• February 4, 1983: Ed Subitzky, in what is claimed to be the First Anniversary edition of the show, is announced as being the singer Bruce Springsteen, who is arriving in a limousine as one of many celebrities who will be attending the anniversary party.
• February 4, 1983: Also in the same show (The First Anniversary edition) clips are shown of problems that Letterman says had to be edited out of some of the previous shows. Letterman explains that the following clip was an example of "audience rowdiness". Subitzky is shown as having been fatally shot through the chest with an arrow by an audience member.
• February 4, 1984: A year later it is the Second Anniversary of the show, which is cause for another party. During the closing sequence, Subitzky is visible (mostly from behind) as a guest at that party.[12]

(When Letterman moved from NBC to CBS, the name of Letterman's show was changed to the Late Show with David Letterman, which ran from August 30, 1993, to May 20, 2015, when Letterman retired. However, Subitzky did not appear on that show.)

Two of Subitzky's cartoons ran in The New Yorker. One was a cartoon which The New Yorker bought from Subitzky in 1974, in order to hand it over to Charles Addams, so Addams could draw it up as if it had been his own idea (apparently this kind of thing was not uncommon in Addams's later years). That cartoon was published in the August 12, 1974, issue of The New Yorker. It shows an invisible man begging, with a hand-drawn sign that says, "BE THANKFUL YOU CAN BE SEEN, GOD BLESS YOU.

The other cartoon of Subitzky's that was in The New Yorker was run normally under Subitzky's own name. That one, "Cinema East Schedule", ran in the August 26, 1974, issue.

Subitzky's cartoons have appeared in several other magazines.

In 1992 and 1993, eleven of his cartoons ran in Tricycle: The Buddhist Review as follows:

• Zen Connect-the-Dots
• Zen Vacuum Cleaner (no attachments)
• "My Mantra or Yours?"
• Zen Street Sign
• "So Mr. Smithers, when did you first discover that your sense of self was just an illusion?"
• "...and thus, as my last will and testament, I leave all of my belongings to myself in my next life."
• New Trends in Buddhist Hairstyles -- the impermanent
• Men Women Zen masters
• Which came first... The drawing of the egg, The drawing of the chicken, The pencil
• Zen Ski Tracks
• Large Impermanent Sand Mandala

In 1993 and 1994, three of Subitzky's cartoons ran in Natural History:

• Linnaeus attempts to classify scientists, but decides that species would be easier
• The World's largest Venus flytrap species develops landing strip mimicry
• "Nice Camouflage!" "Thanks!"

During the 1990s, five written humor pieces of Subitzky's appeared in Cracked:

• In 1994, "What if Comic Strips...Guest Stars"
• In 1996, "What Really Happens When...",
• "Dirty Jokes from other Galaxies", and
• "Miranda Rights for Everyday Living"
• In 1998, "Paper Airplane"

Starting in 1997, but primarily since 2012, Subitzky has had over 20 letters, some humorous, and some serious, primarily about ideas in physics and cosmology, published in the international science magazine, New Scientist, and he has also had one letter published in Science News.

In 1991, Subitzky co-wrote a science humor piece for the science humor magazine Journal of Irreproducible Results entitled, “A Call For More Scientific Truth in Product Warning Labels”, by Susan Hewitt and Edward Subitzky. This piece was subsequently quoted by both New Scientist and Atlantic Monthly. More than 20 years after the piece was first published, it was still featured (both with and without its title, attribution, and introduction) on hundreds of websites, including versions translated into Dutch, French, German , Hungarian, and Spanish.

Subitzky at his drawing table in 2012, working on a JCS comic strip

From 2003 to 2016, Subitzky had nine drawn pieces and ten written pieces published in the Journal of Consciousness Studies. All the pieces made serious points, although some had a humorous perspective. The pieces included an essay, a visual essay, cartoons, comic strips, science-fiction short stories, a poem, and a fictional research paper. All of the pieces contain philosophical commentary on theories concerning the nature of consciousness.

In chronological order, Subitzky's JCS pieces were:

• 2003: * "I am a conscious essay", an essay, Volume 10, No. 12, December, pp. 64–66
• 2004: A single-panel untitled cartoon (man enclosed in his own thought balloon) was used as a frontispiece for the journal, Volume 11, No. 9, September, frontispiece
• 2005: In 2005, the same untitled cartoon about consciousness (man enclosed in his own thought balloon) was used as cover art for What does it all mean? A humanistic account of human experience by William A. Adams, 2005, 250 pages, published by Imprint Academic; "Inkland", a 4-page comic strip, Volume 12, No. 12, December, pp. 80–83
• 2006: "The Voyage", a science fiction short story, Volume 13 No. 9, October, pp. 87–89
• 2008: "The Experiment", another science fiction short story, Volume 15, No. 4, April, pp. 83–85
• 2009: "Mirage", a poem, Volume 15, No. 12, December
• 2010: A single-panel cartoon on the subject of the Turing test was used as the cover art for a double issue of JCS, and a more complete version was printed inside: Untitled cover art ("A man gives himself the Turing test ... and passes"), Volume 17, No. 1–2, January–February, cover and p. 228 , "Consciousness Puzzle Page" (part 1) cartoon page, Volume 17, No. 9-10, September–October, p. 229 , , "Consciousness Puzzle Page" (part 2) cartoon page, Volume 17, No. 11-12, November–December, p. 180
• 2011: "Consciousness Puzzle Page" (part 3) cartoon page, Volume 18, No. 3-4, March/April, p. 234
• 2012: "The Big Question", a single-panel cartoon, Volume 19, No. 3–4, March–April, p. 244, "A Man of Letters", a two-page comic strip, Volume 19, No. 9–10, September–October, pp. 237–238
• 2013: "Consciousness Puzzle Page" (part 4) cartoon page, Volume 20, No. 1–2, January–February, p. 226, "Report from the Future", an imaginary research paper entitled, "An examination of conscigenesis in an artificially created quantum mechanical universe: a physical perspective" by Kranz Tullen, Bvorn Ellin & Shan Tavid, Volume 20, No. 3–4, pp. 230–232, "Where am I?" a two-page visual essay, Volume 20, No. 9-10, September–October, pp. 206–207
• 2014: "Th-ink", a two-page comic strip, Volume 21, No. 5-6, June–July, pp. 218–219, Marooned, a three-page science fiction story, volume 21 No. 11-12, pp. 155–57
• 2016: "The Reader", a two page comic strip, Volume 23, No. 3–4, pp. 264–265, "Word Play", a two-page comic strip, Volume 23, No. 9–10, pp. 254–255

• Michel Choquette (Editor), November 2011, The Someday Funnies, Abrams Books, ISBN 0-8109-9618-9 / 978-0810996182
• Rick Meyerowitz, 2010, Abrams, Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead: The Writers and Artists Who Made the National Lampoon Insanely Great, ISBN 978-0-8109-8848-4, pages 208–213
• Josh Karp, 2004 Chicago Review Press, A Futile and Stupid Gesture: How Doug Kenney and National Lampoon Changed Comedy Forever, Chicago Review Press, 2006, ISBN 1-55652-602-4, ISBN 978-1-55652-602-2
• Matty Simmons, 1994, Barricade Books, If You Don't Buy This Book We'll Kill This Dog: Life, Laughs, Love and Death at the National Lampoon ISBN 1-56980-002-2; ISBN 978-1-56980-002-7
• Tony Hendra, 1987, Dolphin Doubleday, Going Too Far: the Rise and Demise of Sick, Gross, Black, Sophomoric, Weirdo, Pinko, Anarchist, Underground, Anti-establishment Humor ISBN 0-385-23223-3; ISBN 978-0-385-23223-4

• LEVIN, Bob, August 2009, The Comics Journal, No. 299, p. 30-81, How Michel Choquette (Almost) Assembled the Most Stupendous Comic Book in the World, Starring: Harvey Kurtzman, Jack Kirby, Federico Fellini, Art Spiegelman, Wally Wood, Bill Griffith, Don Martin, Vaughn Bodé, William Burroughs, Michael O'Donoghue, Roy Thomas, Sergio Aragones, Jann Wenner, Gahan Wilson, C.C. Beck, R.O. Blechman, Eugène Ionesco, Barry Windsor-Smith, Guido Crepax, Ralph Steadman, Steve Englehart, Salvador Dalí, Arnold Roth, Archie Goodwin, Shary Flenniken, Evert Geradts, Moebius, Denny O'Neil, Tom Wolfe, Will Eisner, Frank Zappa and many more
• COOKE, Jon B., April 2003, Comic Book Artist, 24, "Ed Subitzky Interview: A mind for mirth, the nicest cartoonist in comic book history off the top of his head"
• BUTCHER, Susan, & WOOD, Carol, 2006, POX (Australia), # 6, page 26, "Itsy-Bitsy Comics! by Izzy Bitzky"