Box Brown joins us today to talk about Andre The Giant: Life and Legend from First Second Books.
The biographical comic about one of the most legendary wrestlers of all time is sweet but honest about some of his shortcomings.
From the French countryside to The Princess Bride, André Roussimoff lived a full life, towering over his wrestling opponents literally and figuratively.
FOG!: Thanks for joining us today, Box! Andre The Giant and comics. What brings the two together? Obviously, wrestling and comics were formative to our generation. Why paint a biography of Andre in comic form?
Box Brown: I am a life-long fan of wrestling and was always kind of obsessed with it to a great extent. In the early 2000s I saw an A&E Biography about Andre so I had that background on Andre’s extraordinary life. I had an understanding of how tragic and compelling it was. Fast-forward to late 2010 I was reading about Andre online and read about how Samuel Beckett gave him a ride to school. I thought that would make a good comic and I just made it into a mini-comic. Then it just snowballed from there.
You touch upon the myth, and truly Andre was like that for us kids. Did he eat a guy? Was he a monster? He was superhuman, a real life superhero. It seemed like that was rough on him. During your research did you find how he dealt with it? Drinking?
Yes, I think drinking was one way he dealt with his issues. He was a person who I feel had trouble connecting to other people.
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