My WSJ Hedcuts from "Monsters, Inc."

I always get pretty excited when a new film from Pixar is released so I won't be surprised if "Monsters University" becomes part of my plans this weekend.

Amazingly, "Monsters, Inc." is already a dozen years old! When it was released in 2001, Joe Morgenstern said I could choose either of the film's leading "men" for the hedcut I'd draw to accompany his film review that week. I always thought it was neat to apply the Journal's iconic stipple technique to cartoon characters. I decided that Sulley, the big blue hairy guy voiced by John Goodman, would be more conducive to the Wall StreetJournal's traditional dot drawings. Besides...I wasn't sure how I could fit the round, one-eyed Mike in my allotted one-column space.

Several months later, a few of my original pen & ink WSJ hedcuts were featured in a group exhibit at a Los Angeles art gallery, and a Pixar enthusiast purchased my portrait of Sulley. He then commissioned me to create a separate portrait of Mike so that they could hang together as a pair...after all, the characters are best friends. So, I got the opportunity to squeeze the cartoon cyclops into the odd vertical frame, after all.