House of Parlance Blog

I have posted below the entire interview with House of Parlance conducted by email with David Doub @ Mangapunk.com. The interview came about due to the intense interest aroused when Random House/Del Rey annouced that they were publishing Make5Wishes.

There was a lot of confusion regarding how the book came to be and the relationship between Avril Lavigne and Random House/Del Rey and our part in the whole deal.

Hopefully the interview provides people with some insight into the process of getting Camilla and Joshua together and the creation of the book.

Check mangapunk.com for other interviews with Camilla D’Errico, Joshua Dysart and even a brief word from Terry McBride.

For the full text interview click below.

Interview with House of Parlance - Producer of Make5Wishes
News David Doub - Friday, February 9, 2007 - 23:57

1. What is House of Parlance? Is it a comic company? A multimedia company? How in the entertainment world does House of Parlance fit in?

House of Parlance Media Inc is a small indie publishing and new media company owned by 2 Canadian women. We have a tiny office in Vancouver staffed by great people with a single phone that we pass around whenever a call comes in.

We love books, storytelling and the independent creative spirit that our artists & writers embody. We’re down with comix, graffiti & street art, manga and Asian design magazines. Actually, there’s a crazy number of influences coming together in the House of Parlance offices. Including slam poetry. 2 years ago we published a book called Visiting Hours by Shane Koyczan. He’s an incredible poet and performer and he’ll slay a room when he steps to the mic. We’re also working with other award winning performance poets on future projects.

We want the work that we produce to reach the greatest number of people while hopefully being original and challenging. The creative potential that digital technology brings to us, our artists and the audience is astounding.

Check our website for updates coming soon.

2. Why would a publisher go to House of Parlance? What could they get from House of Parlance that they couldn’t do say in-house?

A book publisher might work with us for a lot of reasons. There are advantages to working with a small & adaptable operation with an innovative new media component. Many great artists and writers like working with a small house–there is a lot of freedom attached to that. Our artists and writers are the lifeblood of our organization. We work with some amazingly talented people every day and it’s really inspiring.

Also, the people at Del Rey have been completely supportive and amazingly cool throughout the process of getting Make5Wishes to print. We’re really happy to be working with them.

3. How did you get involved with Avril Lavigne? Is it because you’re all in Canada?

That’s got something to do with it… and we also enjoy the edge that she brings to everything that she does.

4. What interested your company in a project with Avril Lavigne? Are you guys fans of her? Fans of her marketing potential?

For starters, Avril Lavigne’s management at Nettwerk Music Group are true visionaries. They’ve been jaw-droppingly inspiring to work with since we met them.

You can check out what they are doing at Save the Music Fan. They are in full defense of the rights of the music fan to download and share music. They stand for the crazy idea of NOT litigating against music fans and they’re showing their support by paying the legal fees of a family in Texas who are being sued by the recording industry for downloading music. They’re not only innovators but also great people. Nettwerk’s people are all about the magic of music and making creativity accessible to everyone. We are pretty stoked to work with them on a project like this.

We’ve heard the new Avril Lavigne album and it’s a seriously rocking piece of work. It’s going to be blasting from a million stereos this summer. It’ll be the good time soundtrack to a lot of people’s lives.

5. Could you walk us through the pitch process for the manga? Was there something that Avril Lavigne and/or House of Parlance was looking for in a pitch? Or would you know the right pitch when you saw it?

Avril Lavigne is hugely popular in Japan and Korea–and she wanted to give a shout out to her fans there. The North American market was not really in her sights at the time this was first conceived. The idea was to recognize Asian culture and how it has influenced the west, as western music has influenced them. House of Parlance Media was asked to create this, and we engaged Camilla d’Errico and Joshua Dysart to develop potential story lines and art for it.

The one absolute was that Avril had to love and believe in the story–it was all her choice. We pitched with a number of different directions and traditions in the manga style, including several stories with different points of view. Avril chose the story with the richest plot and character potential. Character is really important in this one.

There was no formula, and no number crunching executives hovered in the background managing this. Avril and her team did something really great–they put their faith in a creative team that loves and honors the manga form, and trusted them to produce something cool.

Everybody involved wanted a plot and characters that went well beyond a celebrity branding exercise. Which is why we were so fortunate to work with Joshua Dysart and Camilla d’Errico on this. We can’t say enough about their impact and how fantastic they were to work with. They gave their all to this.

6. How much was Avril Lavigne involve in the whole process? How reflective of Avril Lavign is this manga?

Avril Lavigne approved the writer, made the central choice of plot, and had approval on the artist and the art.

We can’t answer your second question, because it would give away some of the plot. And we’ve gotta keep that cat in the bag!

7. What’s your opinion on some of the negative response that this is a corporate comic? Do you think there is a conflict between pure artistic expression and commerical profit?

The skeptical response is pretty normal, and also really healthy, don’t you think? There is a real and powerful tension between pure artistic expression and commercial interest. Fortunately, tension is one of the best creative spurs, and part of what made this book so interesting. Celebrity plays a fascinating role in modern culture–we’re all steeped in it. So rather than avoid it, we encouraged our team to go right there and work with it. Celebrity itself links so closely with loneliness, desire, and identity. These are the themes that Dysart and d’Errico explored in Make 5 Wishes.

8. Do you have any upcomming projects that you wish to mention or hype? Do you plan to work on more comic projects that involve celebrities?

We have other manga projects in the works–ones for now that are much lighter and just plain fun. And on the poetry side, we have two awesome spoken word poets, Shane Koyczan and Anis Mojgani (both of them winners of the US Poetry Slam) who each have major book of graphic poetry in the works. Check out Shane’s myspace page and listen to Atlantis here.

9. How could a comic creator work with you? What are your tips for getting into the industry?

We found Camilla d’Errico in a small Vancouver Comic Con, so you never can tell when, where or how things are going to work. We were on the lookout for an artist with a distinctive look and emotional depth. Camilla’s got both in spades.

As far as breaking into the business, we’ll certainly stand by what Joshua mentioned in his responses to this same question: do what you do - write, draw, strum, dance, whatever - every day. Do it till is hurts. And always look beyond your own comfort zone.

The “industry” is only as good as the people who are creating and recreating it. Be active, be persistent and believe in yourself.

10. Speaking of “corporate comics”, what do think of Princess Ai from Tokyopop that’s based on Courtney Love? Actually what do you think of the trend of celebrities using their name to promote product and content?

Manga is the all-purpose graphic medium and it has a long tradition of functioning as a springboard for other commercial ventures. It is certainly a part of many cross-promotional trends in many different media today.

When celebrities enter the marketplace they spark interest and draw a whole new audience to the genre as a whole. Manga is a rich and deep storytelling form. Because of its adaptability and the strength of the creators working within it manga is attracting the widest possible audience. But celebrity can only do so much–if a work is bland and uninspired, it’s going to show. We worked very hard to create a book that stands on its own, and we hope readers will agree.