Anatomy of a Cartoon: Hair!

Cartoon critics Phil Witte and Rex Hesner look behind gags to debate what makes a cartoon tick. This week our intrepid critics take a look at hair.

Days run together when one is sheltering in place, so perhaps a more practical measure of time during this fraught period is length of hair. With many hair salons still closed, manes are becoming unruly, locks are frizzing, and tresses are billowing in the breeze. Now is a fine time to consider how cartoonists have focused on all manner of hair as a subject for humor.

Peter Kuper starts off with a timely cartoon featuring Rapunzel and her famously long hair. She’s a favorite character in cartoons—more than 200 of them are available in the CartoonStock portfolio—partly because she’s so easily identifiable. The setup is almost always the same: the damsel in the tower lowering her hair to her suitor below. The cartoonist’s challenge is to come up with a surprising and clever gag.

Alex Gregory does not take the easy path with his Rapunzel cartoon. None of the usual elements are depicted: no tower or suitor or long, straight tresses, thus the need to identify the woman. The image crackles with energy. Gregory’s thin, uniform line is quite effective here.

Here’s one more Rapunzel cartoon that takes into account our current sensibilities regarding gender identity. Liana Finck leaves it to us to imagine who is locked away in the tower.

Hairstyles can speak volumes about the culture from which they spring. Roz Chast, in a cartoon that reflects her New York-centered view of the world, imagines a fairy tale set in a strange land where a horrifyingly huge bouffant is the norm.

Many women are trying longer hairstyles due to lack of access to stylists. Who can deny that a lustrous mane can enhance one’s appearance? The woman in Carolita Johnson’s cartoon explains how the world works in this regard to her husband.

Men are often just as concerned as women about how the old hair follicles are holding up. Leo Cullum, in one of his many cartoons set in a bar, depicts a man with a full head of jet black hair amidst men with re-ceding hairlines. His hair is more than just hair; it has become his soul mate.

Fear of hair loss is the subject of this cartoon by Bob Mankoff, a cartoonist with an impressive head of gray hair. The title under the image is brilliant. “Five major warning signs” suggests that there are additional, minor warning signs, when obviously one tell-tale sign—lack of hair—is conclusive. The title also suggests that we may not notice impending baldness, which may even possibly be averted, unless we note these warning signs. The superfluous arrows add to the absurdity. Denial is not an option.

Bald or not, some men have given up shaving during the pandemic. Beards give an otherwise gentle face a manly look, and what more manly sport is there than ice hockey, where beards are de rigueur? Yes, women play hockey too, but can they greet their opponents the way these players do in Harry Bliss’s cartoon? The usual rule to keep captions brief can’t be applied here; indeed, the repetitions are essential to the gag.

From full beard, we move on to the goatee, a facial hair style that seems to come and go. Full beards may befit kings and gods, but a goatee is always a bit suspect. P.C. Vey offers a businessman who wears his badge of villainy proudly.

From goatee we move to the end of the road for facial hair—that little sprout of hair below the lower lip known as the soul patch. A few generations ago it was a sign of hipness, provided one played jazz sax, but any man today with that form of hair growth is probably a hipster poseur. Paul Noth takes aim at the soul patch phenomenon in this cartoon.

Coming full circle regarding fictional characters who would be unrecognizable without their hair, we have the Yuletide elf, not so jolly after he takes a razor to his luxurious white beard, in this Farley Katz cartoon. Perhaps Santa has so changed in appearance that the cartoonist felt it necessary to add a reindeer in his bathroom and a pole in the snow viewable from the window. Sometimes change is not good. Too late, alas.

Finally, a cartoon from the immortal Jack Ziegler. Only he could see a pompadour and imagine it as a wave ridden by a miniature surfer. The final panel of the wipe-out, surfer’s feet up with the board flying off to the side, is a little miracle of mirth.