The Troubled Troubadour

Back in the olden days of the Underground Comix scene in San Francisco, Barry Siegel & Bruce Simon were a creative comix team (not to be confused with Siegel and Shuster or Simon and Kirby, or Simon and Schuster, for that matter) who created comic books such as People Are Phony, Savage Humor and Party Comics.

Barry Siegel was also a budding filmmaker, or at a least film student, at the time and decided to make a film short—in the spirit of a 1930’s musical comedy-- employing a mostly cartoonist cast. The result was The Troubadour starring Leslie Cabarga with a supporting cast including Trina Robbins, Bruce Simon, Kim Deitch, Sharon Rudahl, Billy Boop and me among others.

This item was shown here and there. I recall seeing it premiered at some comic con (Bay Con? San Diego? I don’t recall which). But otherwise in the pre-internet, pre-DVD, pre everything-digital era The Troubled Troubadour seemed to disappear for about 3 decades…

And now it’s on Youtube.

I’ve contemplated posting this a number of times with more than a few reservations but what the hey. It’s a piece of history now....