A Long Ghoulish Journey: An Interview David Dastmalchian!

Once in a while, something will come along and completely grab your attention and take notice. That’s what Count Crowley has done. In its short time on the shelves and being a mini-series, fans from all over have flocked to conventions and their LCS to get a glimpse at the Count. Please join us for a ghoulish discussion with David Dastmalchian, creator of Count Crowley: Reluctant Midnight Monster Hunter!

David Dastmalchian: The VERY first comic I ever bought was the Avengers #249. Demons-Storm Vs a pretty rad assemblage of Avengers including She-Hulk, Scarlet Witch, Vision, Wasp and some help from the Four and Thor. I remember obsessing over that cover art and trying to trace the image with some thin typing paper. This comic was reluctantly purchased for me off of a spinning rack by my parents at a convenience store but it led me to the discovery of my local comics shop, Clint’s Books in KC! I was a huge fan of DC villains and Marvel heroes so I used to make my own comics where I would pair up a DC villain and a Marvel hero. (I loved my Cheetah Vs. Tigra battles FYI).

CW: With your wide range of roles that you’ve done in both movies and television, did you find yourself drawing inspiration from roles past when starting Count Crowley?

DD: One of the things that has always added to the excitement and challenge of my work as an actor has been exploring the murkier, gray area of morality and ethics in human behavior. I have been so lucky to play so many wonderful characters who are racked with moral conundrums and complicated ethical dilemmas. I wanted Jerri to be a hero who is her own worst enemy, an individual that people can relate to and will hopefully cheer for even though she is a train wreck of destruction.

CW: Regarding the creative process between you, Lukas Ketner, and Lauren Affe…did you have a feeling of the direction you wanted to go in regards to getting that 70’s/80’s Monster magazine feel, or did Lukas and Lauren just take the wheel and just go?

DD: Before I knew that Dark Horse was going to make Count Crowley and long before my first meeting with editor, Megan Walker, I had created extensive “mood boards” and vision books for the way that I wanted Crowley to look and feel. I had assembled hundreds of images from the classic Creepy, EC, Ghost Castle, etc world and was envisioning a mash-up of the legendary iconography of artists like Bernie Wrightson or Al Feldstein with some artists I love like Cat Staggs, Joelle Jones and Carl Moline. Once I met Megan Walker and told her about my vision, she suggested Lukas. I was a huge fan of his work on Witch Doctor and was very excited by the prospect of his involvement. We sent him the script for Issue 1 and I was very nervous. Within about 24 hours, Lukas had responded with some initial sketches and a glowing, enthusiastic response to the idea. It’s no exaggeration that I had tears in my eyes when I opened that email and saw that renderings of Jerri that Lukas created. I had been imagining this character for 30 years and suddenly she was looking back at me. After Lukas got into the work and we developed a wonderful short-hand about the look and feel of the comic. Megan understood exactly the goal as my descriptions of both color and lettering were shared with the team. She introduced my to Lauren Affe who has brought such a dynamic and gorgeous palette to the book and Frank Cvetkovic who has made some really classic and specific choices with his letters. I’m a kid in a candy store.

CW: We are initially introduced to Jerri at her lowest and slowly learn her history about how she got to this place both physically and mentally. Was there a specific theme you had in mind when creating Jerri or was her progression as organic as the book made her out to be?

DD: I have been dreaming up and imagining the idea of Count Crowley for decades. I always had a specific vision about the classic feel of monsters with an upended mythology and the world of late-night Horror Hosts as a cover for monster hunting… but I never really had that THING that you need to write something that sticks. There has to be a kernel of exploration, questioning and compelling themes underneath that fun and magic of characters, set pieces and special powers. As I made my way through the world, it turned out that I had to battle and seek help for an insidious and near-fatal possession by the disease of addiction. I have struggled with mental health issues, as well, and I have always been able to find useful metaphors and connections between my love of monsters and my journey to recovery. I believe that there are “good” monsters who deserve a second chance and a chance for healing. Once I connected these ideas with Count Crowley, the character of Jerri came into razor-sharp focus. I remember when I first got clean and sober – I was having such a hard time gaining the trust and confidence of friends and family who I had let down or deceived when I was using. I want Jerri to struggle with this same issue as she’s uncovering the presence of monsters and her frustration that no one will take her seriously.

DD: I DID! I Love Sven and he’s become a close friend of mine over the years. When I was a kid in KC, my horror host hero was the great Crematia Mortem on KSHB-TV 41 back in the day. She was so cool, funny and she introduced me to so many of my favorite acting heroes (Karloff, Chaney, Lugosi) and so many of my favorite monster movies.

CW: From movies to comics, you are certainly a multitalented creator. What are some of the differences with creative preparedness from acting, writing movies, and of course, writing comics. Do you find any similarities or are they night and day?

Dd: There are so many similarities between the different processes of storytelling and mediums. At the end of the day, it’s all about that good old fashioned Joseph Campbell ideology – STORY, STORY, STORY. What’s it all about? What do we need these characters to experience? How will they grow, what do they learn? I have been reading and writing screenplays for a while now and have been luckily able to see several of my films brought to cinemas (“Animals” and “All Creatures Here Below”), and there is a strong similarity between the screenwriting process and the comic book writing process. Dark Horse prefers a template that feels very much like a

screenplay and I was able to use Final Draft for my writing process. The biggest difference that I experienced is that I’m called upon to describe my set-ups in a more specific way than I feel comfortable doing in screenwriting. I am able to thoroughly describe a setting, blocking, etc in a comic script. At the same time, I know that Lukas can take those suggestions and change them if he has a stronger idea about the physical layout of the scene.

CW: One of the things we at Comic Watch loved about the book was how easy it was to attach ourselves to the characters in their world, which kept us wanting more of them. Can you tell us a little about the process of creating the environment of County Crowley and the characters in a way that keeps the audiences clinging on to them and wanting more?

Dd: I wanted to set the story in a small-to-midsize city in the American Midwest. I created Beloit, Missouri with the hopes that it would feel like the places I lived or spent time as a kid: Lenexa, Overland Park (KS), Kansas City and Columbia (MO). I created a map and fake “Wiki” kind of page for myself and my team. I wanted a specific landscape that felt familiar to the horror films and the kind of place where a small market affiliate news station would have their own horror host and local “celebrities”. I needed to set this in the 1980’s because there is a massive plot development (if I’m lucky enough to keep going) which revolves around the birth of cable television.

CW: What was your biggest inspiration for Count Crowley, and about how long were you working on the book before the first issue released on October 23rd in 2019?

Dd: My biggest inspirations for Count Crowley were Crematia Mortem, Svengoolie, Vampira, the canon of classic Universal and Hammer horror films, Eerie comics, Tales from the Crypt, “The Howling”, the film “Network”, Vault of Horror, Tomb of Dracula, Hellboy, Route 666 and Frankenstein Mobster. Oh yeah – and Werewolf by Night!!! AND Morbius! Haha! I began dreaming up the ideas that shape the world of Count Crowley back in the 1980’s when I was watching the Creature Feature and spending hours and hours lost in the worlds created by James Whale, Terrence Fischer, John Carpenter and William Castle. It’s been about thirty years of dreaming, writing and planning that led to Issue #1 of Count Crowley. You can probably imagine the emotions that my wife and I felt when we walked into my childhood comics shop, Clint’s Comics in KC, for my first big signing event and saw hundreds of Issue #1 lined up for the signing. I was actually in Wilmington, NC, at Memory Lane Comics the first time I held a #1 in my hands since I was doing a signing the day before we released. I’ll never forget those moments.

CW: Finally, when doing the Count Crowley tour as the series was releasing, are there any stories you can share with us that stick out or experiences that you had that really resonate with you?

Dd: There have been so many incredible experiences that stood out to me during my time traveling around the U.S. and sharing Count Crowley. I have been able to revisit some of the shops that were very important to me over the years. I got to do a signing at Graham Crackers comics in Chicago which was where I would shop for comics in the years after I got clean and was spending all of my extra money on comics and toys instead of drugs! (man, what a better use of my money!) Probably the most emotional and unforgettable experience of them all was when we did our event at Clint’s Comics. Over the years I always loved going back to Clint’s when I’d visit KC and the owner, Jim Cavanaugh, would tell me how proud he was that one of his “Clint’s Kids” had made a career working in comic book movies. He would always load my kids up with cool stuff and he loved giving away comics and toys to kids as a way to show them the magic of comics. We celebrated 50 years of Clint’s Comics a few years ago and sadly Jim was killed during a robbery at the shop just a few days after I saw him. When the time came for Crowley to come out, it was bittersweet for me because I wanted Jim to get to see MY comic on the shelf in his shop. His amazing wife, Sharon, has taken over running the shop and gets a lot of help from fellow “Clint’s Kids”. When she set up my signing for Crowley, I felt like Jim was there with us, watching over the festivities. People came who I hadn’t seen in twenty years and there were a lot of tears and laughter. It was a beautiful day… I will never forget it. It’s been a wild ride, man. I still can’t believe it’s happening.