Norm Breyfogle discusses “Life With Archie: The Married Life”

The first issue of "Life With Archie: The Married Life."

Norm Breyfogle broke into comics in the early 1980s, and was a popular Batman artist for six years,  on “Detective Comics,” “Batman” and “Shadow of the Bat.”  Now, he’s drawing another iconic character — Archie Andrews, the most popular teen humor character in comic-book history.   Breyfogle is drawing the follow-up to the popular Archie “wedding” series, “Life With Archie: The Married Life,” in which Archie’s possible wedded future is

Norm Breyfogle

explored.  Half of the magazine’s comic stories look at Archie and Betty’s potential future; the other half, Archie and Veronica.    Breyfogle answered some questions for Nerdage about the new magazine; issue No. 1 is on sale now.

Matt Price: Norm, thanks for agreeing to do an interview.  I’ve enjoyed your work for years, and found the first issue of “LIFE WITH ARCHIE” to be a lot of fun!

Norm Breyfogle: Thanks, Matt. I’m enjoying the experience, too!

MP: The Archie wedding series was a monster hit – does that make it more exciting to come on and do the official continuation of the story?

Norm Breyfogle: Certainly! But then, I’d enjoy it, regardless; I just like to draw. Yes, the publicity revolving around the Archie wedding was definitely a good thing for sales, and it looks like that’s rubbing of on our series, too.

MP: How did Archie come to seek you out for this series?

Norm Breyfogle: After meeting Archie President Mike Pellerito at a New York convention in 2009 (or was it 2008?), I’d drawn one of their “New Look” stories and Victor Gorelick (Archie Comics co-president, Editor-in-Chief) afterward asked me if I’d like to do some Archie work in a more traditional drawing style. I was game, but first they requested I draw a few pages of a sample script they provided, which I did. They liked it, so here I am!

MP: You were known for action with your long association with Batman – do you expect Archie to be facing storylines that cause him to become a man of action?

Life with Archie issue 2

Norm Breyfogle: Haven’t thought much about that. Although I’ve suggested to Archie Comics some springboard ideas (not particularly “action-oriented,” by the way), I’m drawing whatever they want me to draw. I’m really enjoying the writing from Michael Uslan (he wrote a two-year outline and the first two scripts) and Paul Kupperberg (he’s writing all the scripts after the first two, based upon Michael’s outline).

MP: Tell me about bringing your artistic style to the well-known look of the Archie character, and melding both together.