That ‘70s Vibe

Gratuitously tweaking Southern California is fine by us--we’re nothing if not self-deprecating. Still, it’s . . .distressing when “Annie Hall”-era L.A.-isms are passed off as winking contemporary commentary. Although this New Yorker cartoon ran in March, it could have appeared the week Kate Jackson was cast in “Charlie’s Angels.” We asked the cartoonist, Bernard Schoenbaum, about the piece’s deep retro touches--the mustaches, the tinted aviator shades, the wild-and-crazy-guy lapels and vests, the whole ‘70s-hot-tubbish fin-de-siecle that, apparently, will live forever as the Eastern standard image of L.A.

Q: The guys in the cartoon don’t look like contemporary L.A. guys.

A: I didn’t investigate it too much, but I would not think that that was too far off.

The tinted aviators threw some people.

I know the circular shades are in now . . .I don’t always go for the very recent type of design. You take artistic license, is what I’m saying . . . You live there--what would they look like?

They’d probably be wearing a lot of black.

Black is in now, but who wants that much black in a drawing? My style is on the light side. Too much black wouldn’t work.

What exactly does that mean, “My mind is based in L.A.”

[Laughs] Use your imagination.

Last visited L.A. February, 1996