by Nathaniel R
After Claudio's article about Madeline Kahn in What's Up Doc? I was inspired to rewatch it (it had been a gazillion years). The movie was even better than I had vaguely remembered from childhood. And as great as Kahn was I was all about the incredibly sexy chaos/chemistry of Ryan O'Neal's stuffy geologist and Babs' over-educated troublemaker. Then on Streisand's birthday this week one of our favourite illustrators, Glen Hanson, posted some in progress What's Up Doc? (1972) drawings that are just super and also sang to Babs on his Instagram.
This all led to missing the departed "Curio" column so let's revive it to celebrate movie-inspired art each week. After the jump more art inspired by What's Up Doc...
Here's another of Hanson's sketches above. We're excited to see the finished product but until then, here are a few other artists' takes on this classic.
Here's David Wain drawing Babs "live"
Illustration by Brianna Ashby
Illustration by Alejandro Mogollo
Scoured the internet but couldn't find a single illustration of Madeline Kahn as "Eunice" *sniffle*
And finally two pieces from legendary artists who've since passed away...
Illustration by Richard Amsel (RIP)This one is by the late Amsel who tragically died of AIDS at the heighth of his career. This was, I believe, intended for use on the movie poster but they went with photographs instead.
by Al Hirschfeld
And the New York Times commissioned the legendary Al Hirschfeld for this last image above, presumably for a review.
It's a pity that modern artists tend to stick to mostly genre films (horror/superhero/sci-fi) for their fan art. If they loved movies from all eras and rediscovered this perfect screwball imagine the MANY cartoon-erotic illustrations of Ryan O'Neal in just a bowtie that would erupt on social media. And Madeline Kahn would definitely get some love with that helmet of flipped hair.