#PFAD4: I'm living a lie in Viz ... the world's funniest and filthiest comic!

I'm an occasional contributor to Britain's funniest comic, the wonderful Viz. But I travel incognito, gliding cat-like though the shadows, a man of mystery ... until now!

The world at large does not know that Clark Kent is Superman … Bruce Wayne is Batman … or that your hero, dear reader, is secretly the football artist known only to fans of Britain’s funniest and filthiest comic as Rapscallion.

It started a few years ago when I made the first of what would become regular appearances at The Lakes International Comic Art Festival in the U.K. I was delighted to finally meet Graham Dury and Simon Thorp, the two evil masterminds behind Viz, my favorite comic of all time … and thrilled to bits that we became fast friends.

With Simon and Jenny Thorp at The Lakes Festival, 2022

We’ve since collaborated at a few comedy shows at The Lakes and at National Cartoonists Society events here in the States, and it’s been an absolute joy! We even broke a totally fabricated world record together!

Knowing how much soccer stuff I’ve done over the years, Graham and Simon were keen to get me to contribute to Viz and hit upon the idea of spoofing one of the most iconic soccer comics of all time. Created by artist Paul Trevillion, “You Are The Ref” has been running in various U.K. publications, from Shoot! magazine to The Observer newspaper, since 1957. Basically, the strip poses three hypothetical and outlandish football scenarios and asks the reader to make the correct refereeing decision.

So the idea was to spoof the feature in typical Viz fashion, with me mimicking Trevillion’s style and using his old b&w format of yesteryear. I should say that I’ve always been an admirer of Paul Trevillion’s work. He’s two decades older than me and was a big inspiration when I was first starting out and trying to break into sports illustration in British newspapers and magazines. So I liked the idea of paying a little tongue-in-cheek homage to his seminal creation.

The first parody was, somewhat obviously, “HUGH Are The Ref,” in which film star Hugh Grant was cast as the man in the middle with the whistle:

A few issues later, professional atheist Richard Dawkins was the man in black … and so on and so forth! Father Christmas, Nigel Farage and more became grist to our mill.

Rather than sign my own name to these oddball comics, I thought it might be appropriate … and a bit of a laugh … to continue the Trevillion impersonation all the way down to the signature. So TREVILLION became … RAPSCALLION!

Now, one of the even cooler things about appearing in Viz is that my son, cartoonist Luke McGarry, is also a contributor! Here’s one of his pieces for the comic:

Luke and I are quite proud of the fact that we are the only father and son cartoonists to appear in the same issue of Viz … a feat we have also pulled off in issues of the iconic MAD magazine! Talk about keeping it in the family!

One footnote to this story is that back in the mid-1990s, I was simultaneously a contributor to both Shoot! and its little brother publication, Soccer Stars, which was aimed at slightly younger readers. I’m not sure what Trevillion was doing at that time – at one point, he had a cruise ship cabaret act where he would draw pop stars while his girlfriend sang cover songs, and I know he was based in the States for period – but I don’t recall seeing too much of his artwork around in the 1990s. So with Trevillion presumably out of commission, one of the features Soccer Stars had me illustrate was a version of “You Are The Ref” called “On The Whistle!”

Until next time,

Cheers!

Steve