Uslan and DeSanto Catch the Spirit (PW.com)

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By Douglas Wolk

Publishers Weekly

12/15/2008

From February through April, DC's The Spirit series will have a guest writing team: Michael Uslan and F.J. DeSanto, the producers of the Frank Miller-directed Spirit movie that's opening this month. Uslan hasn't written many comics since he became the producer of the Batman movies (aside from the Batman graphic novel Detective No. 27 a few years ago), but he wrote stories for The Shadow, Beowulf, Detective Comics and other series back in the early '70s, when, as he put it at a recent interview in New York, "I was a Junior Woodchuck at DC Comics. They didn't have the term 'intern' then, but it was me and that skinny kid—what was his name?—Paul... Levitz! Levitz! I don't know what happened to him, but he was a Woodchuck too."

The difficulty with creating new Spirit comics, DeSanto noted, is that the character is so closely identified with Eisner: "It's not like Batman, where you have 70 years of Batman stories by so many different creators that you can do The Dark Knight or you can do the Brave and the Bold cartoon—it's Eisner, and that's it." So, before they started writing, he and Uslan made a list of elements of Eisner's work they had to incorporate into every Spirit story.

"They had to have cinematic storytelling, influenced heavily by Hitchcock," Uslan said. "In terms of the heart of the story, they had to be influenced by Frank Capra. There had to be humanity in these stories. They had to be character-driven. Eisner's humor had to be there. Eisner's violence quotient had to be there. Eisner's over-the-top villains had to be there, and Eisner's femme fatales"—the three issues Uslan and DeSanto have written are built around Plaster of Paris, Silken Floss and Lorelei, all of whom also appear in the movie, and they're connected by a plot involving Eisner's foremost villain, the Octopus. Drawn by the former Shadowpact team of Justiniano and Walden Wong, they're full of other little nods to Eisner's work; the first page of their first issue echoes the first page of the classic Spirit story "Ten Minutes."

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Michael Uslan, THE DARK KNIGHT, THE SPIRIT executive producer: Mr. Media Audio Interview

Kids, if you want to grow up to be a successful executive producer of movies like Michael Uslan ("YOU-slin") did, the key is education – and patience. Lots and lots of patience.

Uslan secured the rights to make Batman movies years before Tim Burton, Michael Keaton, and Jack Nicholson dreamed of working together.

And he couldn’t give away the rights to Will Eisner’s The Spirit.

But his patience and determination paid off. This year, the sixth Batman movie – The Dark Knight – and first Spirit movie will come to a multiplex near you, joining previous Uslan productions such as Batman, Batman Returns, Batman Forever, Batman and Robin, Batman Begins, Catwoman, Constantine, National Treasure, Swamp Thing – well, you get the idea.

And he’s not one to rest on his laurels, either. Uslan’s current projects in development include Shazam!, The Shadow, and Constantine 2.

If you love comic books, and especially movies made from comic books, please welcome Michael Uslan to Mr. Media.

You can LISTEN to this interview by clicking the BlogTalkRadio.com audio player below!

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© 2008 by Bob Andelman. All rights reserved.

Note to Frank Miller from Horvendile

"My city screams. She is my lover. And I am her Spirit." = "I am the Goddamn Batman."

"My city is Central. Ellen Dolan keeps trying to kiss me. And she is the daughter of Commissioner Dolan." = Will Eisner's Spirit.

-- From the blog "A Likely Story," posted April 15, 2008

Raging Debate Over Frank Miller's "Interpretation" of Will Eisner's The Spirit

We hear a lot of whispering about Frank Miller's upcoming cinematic take on Will Eisner's "The Spirit." And with the first trailer due to be released in just a few days at New York Comic-Con, the whispering is picking up steam, especially as the first green screen images were leaked to the fan press a few days ago.

Of course, if you're old enough to remember the brouhaha about Michael Keaton as "Batman," you know it's too early to accurately judge.

On the other hand Brandon Routh as "Superman"? Terribly miscast, poor guy.

Anyway, if you'd like to keep up with the debate - or participate in the conversation - check out this message board over at The Comics Journal. You can also see green screen shots there of Gabriel Macht as The Spirit, Samuel L. Jackson as The Octopus, and several more, including a hot shot of Eva Mendes.