'In The Bleachers' (10 October 2021).
Ben Zaehringer is an American animator and cartoonist, known for his black comedy webcomic 'Berkeley Mews' (2009- ). Since July 2018, he has also been continuing the sports-themed newspaper cartoon series 'In the Bleachers'. Zaehringer is additionally a gag writer for Hilary Price's 'Rhymes with Orange'.
Early life and career
Ben Zaehringer was born in 1988 in Glendale, California. As a boy, he and his childhood friend Kevin Garvey would come home every day after school, drawing comics and folding them into little books. At that age, Zaehringer mostly made spoofs of popular anime shows like Akira Toriyama's 'Dragonball Z' and Satoishi Tajiri's ‘Pokémon'. Zaehringer studied basic anatomy and drawing from life in high school. Among Zaehringer's main graphic influences were Charles M. Schulz, Bill Amend, Gary Larson and Gahan Wilson. He has also expressed admiration for Seo Kim, Ida Eva Neverdahl, Alex Norris, Mike Organisciak and Gina Wynbrandt.
At the University of Berkeley, California, Zaehringer graduated in 2009 with a degree in Film Studies. In the early 2010s, Ben Zaehringer worked as an animator for DreamWorks, with credits on the films 'Megamind' (2010), 'Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted' (2012) and 'Mr. Peabody & Sherman' (2014). In 2015, Zaehringer was artist-in-residence for the Charles M. Schulz Museum and Research Center in Santa Rosa, California. He has also illustrated the food-themed card game 'Hangry Thief' (2018), designed by Trent Ellingsen.
'Berkeley Mews', spoofing a famous scene from Tom Cruise's film 'Mission Impossible'.
Berkeley Mews
In 2009, Zaehringer launched a web comic titled 'Berkeley Mews', named after the song of the same name by The Kinks, in itself named after a London street. In the early years, Zaehringer only occasionally made a couple of new episodes. Starting on 10 August 2011, 'Berkeley Mews' appeared on a regular basis.
Zaehringer uses a minimalistic style, with simple dot-eyed characters, only a few panels and as little dialogue as possible. 'Berkeley Mews' features seemingly innocent situations, which are then given a disturbing punchline. Interviewed on the website Bored Panda, he self-described 'Berkeley Mews' as a "dark humor comic series that exposes the seedy underbelly of everything wholesome and pure: it takes fairy tales and Disney movies and fond remembrances of childhood and turns them into horrible nightmares - but, like, in a fun way." He deliberately tries to give fun subjects like Christmas, Valentine's Day and innocent children's media a cynical twist. A recurring theme in his cartoons are characters arriving in Heaven, but not experiencing eternal bliss. Several 'Berkeley Mews' gags also poke fun at pop culture media, though Zaehringer tries to focus on things that achieved a certain durability, so he pokes fun at Bible stories, Greek mythology, classic fairy tales, Disney movies, novels ('Harry Potter'), TV shows ('Sesame Street', 'Transformers') and video games ('Super Mario'), rather than whatever is trendy at the moment.
Berkeley Mews' has been posted on websites such as BuzzFeed, Savage Dragon and Reddit. Compilations of 'Berkeley Mews' have been made available in the books 'Sorry, I Ruined Your Childhood: Berkeley Mews Comics' (2019) and 'How Not To Get Into Heaven' (2021), published by Andrews McMeel Publishing.
'Berkeley Mews'.
Syndicated cartoons
In July 2018, Zaehringer became the new artist of the long-running sports cartoon feature 'In the Bleachers', originally created in 1985 by Steve Moore - a cousin of Zaehringer's mother - and syndicated to newspapers by Andrews McNeel Syndication. Most episodes are one-panel cartoons, but some make use of comic strip sequences. Gags can revolve around professional sportspeople, but also regular people playing games. In 2022, to celebrate what would have been the 100th birthday of Charles M. Schulz, hundreds of newspaper cartoonists made a special tribute comic. Zaehringer's 'In the Bleachers' also paid homage with a drawing of Schroeder from 'Peanuts' playing background music in a stadium.
In addition, Zaehringer has been a gag writer for Hilary Price's newspaper comic 'Rhymes With Orange', which is distributed by King Features Syndicate.
'In The Bleachers' (7 November 2021).