MICHAEL CAVALLARO ON PARADE (WITH FIREWORKS)

[MattBrady]

by Chris Arrant

Debuting under the Shadowline imprint at Image Comics, Michael Cavallaro's Parade (With Fireworks) recounts an Italy torn apart after the first World War. Parade (With Fireworks) is told as a historical and personal story, with the inaugural issue featuring the story of a tight-knit community in the Italian countryside who pull together to protect someone they barely know. The stories, the people and the places are ones recounted to Michael Cavallaro as a child by his family in a tradition to recount history not just in words on the printed page but through spoken word passed down throughout the generations.

Newcomer Michael Cavallaro debuted what would become the first issue on the webcomics site ACT-I-VATE, and was quickly contacted by Kristen Simon at the Image imprint Shadowline in what will become a two issue series debuting this September.

NRAMA:. Michael, it's said that this 2-part miniseries, Parade (With Fireworks), focuses on "the personal side of an Italy torn apart after the first World War". Can you tell us more about it?

Michael Cavallaro: The first half of Parade focuses on one particular event that took place in the city of Maropati on January 6th, 1923. It was the Feast Of The Epiphany, an important holiday. After a day of celebration, the hired band sets out for home a few kilometers away. A group of prominent locals, who happen to be Socialist Party organizers, notice that the band is being trailed by a group of local Fascist Party members. The two groups know each other well, and there's no love lost between them. The Socialists tag along to make sure the band gets out of town safely, but an argument begins over what song the band should play while walking. Little by little, things heat up and finally explode.

That's the essence of the story.

Now, in terms of context and how it all relates to World War I, the Italian army saw some of the fiercest combat in the war, and you could say they did not fare well. It was a scarring and traumatizing experience for them, as it was for others the world over. Italy was left with deep divisions between the political left and right. Parade is set in 1923, only a few years after the end of the war, and one year after the establishment of Mussolini’s dictatorship. Although the Fascists had taken over the central government, the Socialist Party still had deep roots, especially in rural areas.

So at the time of the story, Italians were hardly marching to the beat of one drum.

I wanted to have all this in the background, as context, and just focus on the people and characters in the story, specifically Paolo. I wanted to look at how these world events can affect normal people’s lives. That’s the perspective that interests me: human interaction. Rather than write about the entangled politics directly, I tried to look at how it played out on street level, between a relatively small cast of characters.

NRAMA: You've said in other interviews that this story is based on stories you heard from your relatives growing up. Is this a wholly non-fiction tale, or a fictionalized one with these true stories in mind?

MC: It’s somewhere in between. The main beats of the story are absolutely true to the best of our knowledge. We know what happened, but of course we don’t really know what people said to each other that day there in the street. I looked at the events and the records and testimonies about what certain people did, and tried to understand why someone would do that. I tried to create dialogue that would stitch those moments of action together in a way that made sense.

In some cases, I combined characters, or changed the spelling of a name, or used just someone’s last name, for the sake of clarity. You would not believe how many “Vincenzos” are involved in this story, but I couldn’t have multiple characters with the same first name! No one would be able to follow it.

So I had to fill in a few blanks to construct a story that was both dramatic and readable around the events that I knew to be true and accurate.

NRAMA: Are any of the characters directly or indirectly your family members? If so, can you tell us how it is depicting them in this fictionalized account?

MC: Paolo, the main character, is my paternal grandfather. So, the relationships go from there; Vincenzo is my Great Uncle, Bettina (from part two) is my Great Aunt, etc.

We have a handful of photos from this side of the family. I didn’t go for any likenesses really. It just didn't seem relevant. I did base some of their characteristics on other family members that I’m more familiar with. It helped with some of the attitudes and expressions.
These were not people that I knew, but they were people that my mom and dad knew and cared about, and that did affect how I depicted certain moments.

It’s hard to describe, but I just tried to keep in mind that these were real people, somebody’s mom or dad, or brother or sister. Even when I was dealing with characters I might consider the “bad guys”, you have to remember that they're somebody's family member too, and I think that when you do, the characters become much more interesting, complex and real.

NRAMA: Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Parade (with Fireworks) part of a larger story entitled Seven Years Without The Sun?

MC: As I’ve said, I grew up with years and years of these stories. Parade is only one of them. It’s difficult in these times to contemplate doing a comic book without thinking about some kind of collected work. So yeah, a dream-come-true would be to put a few of these shorts together under that umbrella title.
Seven Years Without The Sun is also the working title for the next short story I’d like to do. So it would be like the “title track” of the collection.

NRAMA: Parade (With Fireworks) first came to people's attention after you began serializing the first issue at ACT-I-VATE. What led you to releasing it online before looking for a print publisher?

MC: I have no idea. It was spontaneous, somehow. I’ve pitched comic books before, and tried and tried, and got lots of rejections, but for some reason it never occurred to me to pitch Parade to anybody. I just started doing it. Kristen Simon at Image/Shadowline contacted me when I was already around page 20, and expressed an interest in talking to me about it. I was like, “…oh yeah. Publishers!”

As for ACT-I-VATE, I had been slowly dabbling with the story for a while, doing sketches, page layouts, dialogue, etc. Parade was something I had on the backburner while I continued my self-published series 66 Thousand Miles Per Hour, and freelanced for clients like DC Comics, VH1 and Cartoon Network.

Tim Hamilton is another Brooklyn-based comic artist and had founded ACT-I-VATE with Dean Haspiel and others. Tim was, I think, really intrigued by my descriptions of this story, and was encouraging me to get to work on it. Finally, he gave me his spot in AIV for two months to get the story going. They made me a permanent member shortly thereafter, and I finished out what was to become the first Shadowline issue.

The feedback and encouragement I got through ACT-I-VATE really became part of the energy of the story itself. It was indispensable in getting 26 pages done so efficiently.

[steven_eks]

This book looks stunning--I cannot wait to buy this.

My Father is half-Italian--I think he's going to love this book. Congrats on the move to print.

Steve

[JimmyKitty]

I know I'm slow on the uptake. I should have been following this online, but now that's it's coming to print I'm all over this like lice on a hippy. Lovely art, deep felt subject, perfect packaging (no excuse to wait on the trade).

This is what creator-owned properties are all about.
My only question is what's next for Michael Cavallero?

[Blackbeard]

Excellent interview, Michael and Chris!

I cannot wait to pick this up!

[JimmyKitty]

Bah! Blackbeard's ghost! Speak of the devil.... your work is yet another title I should have followed online from the start.
But once again, I'm happy as a peach to get the full package of Edgar Allan Poo in print. Hmm.... in a way it's like trade waiting. I guess it's called, Paper Waiting. Y'know... like paper weight? Get it? Wait..? heh... hee....


Okay, I'll shut up now.

[Blackbeard]

Originally Posted by JimmyKitty

Bah! Blackbeard's ghost! Speak of the devil.... your work is yet another title I should have followed online from the start.
But once again, I'm happy as a peach to get the full package of Edgar Allan Poo in print. Hmm.... in a way it's like trade waiting. I guess it's called, Paper Waiting. Y'know... like paper weight? Get it? Wait..? heh... hee....


Okay, I'll shut up now.

No, no! Don't let me stop you.

Yeah, it's ironic that instead of asking readers to pick up singles, I'm asking them to wait for the trade. Life's funny--innit?

[Tim Hamilton]

It took a lot of ass kicking, but I'm glad Mike finally put this story together.
All of us at Studio 6 have enjoyed watching it come to life.


Tim Hamilton
http://community.livejournal.com/studiodeep6/

[BlueThunderArmy]

This looks absolutely fantastic. I'm not familiar with the online version but, now that it's so close, I'll just wait for the printed book.

I really like books, comics, etc, that look at less-than-obvious points of history, from less-than-obvious perspectives. Really, really looking forward to this.

[gazoo]

Bravo Michael, Italia & little Italy's around the world have been waiting for something as special as Parade (with fireworks).
I've put this on my pull list, much success and many more to come, ciao.

[Kris Simon]

Jim and I could not be more proud of this title. It's truly stunning! Mike is a great guy and a phenomenal artist/storyteller. No one should miss out on this series! It's very compelling, even if you aren't Italian!

[RAd]

This kind of comic really appeals to me more than the superhero stuff. I'll be getting this one for sure (regardless of publisher) and I wish the book and also Mike the best.

[Varrus]

I fell in love with Parade as soon as I looked at the first few pages on Mike's ComicSpace. I cannot wait for this book!

[MCavallaro]

Thanks everyone for the interest and compliments, and especially to Chris Arrant for the great article.

Just dropping by to mention the new video profiling some of the ideas behind PARADE courtesy of Brad Hatfield at The Comic Collective.

Follow the link to check it out:
http://thecomiccollective.com/Comic_...Videos/Parade/

[jeferreyra]

this comic just sounds and looks stunning and beatiful.

the art is so clean, soft, amazing colors, cant wait to see on paper!