Mike Curtis | |
---|---|
Born | 1953 (age 63–64) Tennessee |
Nationality | American |
Area(s) | Writer, editor, publisher, television host |
Notable works
|
Dick Tracy Shanda the Panda |
Awards | Harvey Award 2013, 2014, 2015 |
Spouse(s) | Carole Curtis |
Mike Curtis (b. 1953) is an American writer who scripts the Dick Tracy comic strip, with Joe Staton as artist. He has been working professionally in comic books as a writer since the mid-1980s. He has also been a newspaper editor, deputy sheriff, comic book publisher, movie theater manager, TV horror movie host, Santa Claus for 39 years in the family tradition, and is a Baptist minister.
Curtis is currently best known for Dick Tracy, but he is also the third largest collector of Superman memorabilia in the United States. He has been exhibiting and writing about Superman since 1973.
Curtis grew up in Tennessee.
In the early 1970s Curtis and his best friend and cousin Wally Hall formed a comedy team called "Curtis and Hall". The duo was very active on local TV with their show "Curtis and Hall's Cosmic Banana Revue", in addition to performing weekly on college TV. Before the duo split amicably, they considered attending the tryouts for Hee Haw in nearby Nashville. One of their most frequent sketches were original routines with themselves as the Marx Brothers (with Hall portraying Chico and Curtis as Groucho). Curtis and Hall considered their best work a sketch called "Dinosaur Boogie," featuring plastic dinosaurs on wire hangers. Curtis refers to "Boogie" as “the ultimate cheap dinosaur movie”.
In the 1970s, Curtis was a horror movie TV host on Channel 6 in Jackson, Tennessee, as Count Basil on Shock Theater. He brought back the character in 2010 as horror host guest at the Sivads of March event in Memphis, Tennessee honoring that city's horror host.
In the 1980s, Curtis entered the comic book field by writing Richie Rich, Casper The Friendly Ghost, and New Kids on the Block for Harvey Comics. While there, he also designed the Harvey Enchanted Forest map (based on Irish Bayou in Louisiana) and scripted several pilots for Casper TV series and specials.