With a goatee and a leather jacket, Stan Berkowitz looked like another friendly face in the crowd of fans and fellow geeks that surrounded him. The Emmy Nominee, Award winner and Animation Writers Caucus Animation Award winner attended the BoroughCon at St. John’s University in Queens, NY where he connected with fans and promoted his latest work.
Berkowitz wasn’t always the big-name writer celebrity that he is today. Like some, it began as a hobby, “When I was a little kid…I had a friend, who loved movies. He tried filming his own versions of the movies he saw in life. He wanted me to help him out and it was fun.”
His love for the entertainment industry continued so Berkowitz attended college for film. Like most writers, he has experience in a variety of genres which allows for flexibility. Though he is known for work in fiction, his first published piece was for the college newspaper.
“At the time, I was writing film reviews, I was also a film major at UCLA. I figured I could write, I’ll do the reviews and also try to make movies at UCLA.”
Though journalism didn’t end for him in college, “I was an entertainment reporter. Basically, doing interviews with showbiz people from about 1978 to 1985 for Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Magazine, The New York Times, The Daily News, Esquire Magazine and a bunch of others.”
When comparing journalism to fiction, Berkowitz said, “I prefer fiction, I think I’m better at fiction. Journalism is pretty hard because in addition to telling a good story you have to make sure it’s accurate and truthful and represents everyone correctly.”
Throughout his career Berkowitz moved from journalism to comics and finally onto animation. It wasn’t always easy, “For me it’s much harder to write a comic book strip because my background is in action. Live action and animation, where you’re describing an action. Whereas with a comic book you’re describing a moment, a single moment. It’s very hard for me to envision one phrase that will convey the information we need in that moment. But eventually the more you do it, the easier it is.”
Once he joined Warner Bros., he began to receive awards for his skills as a writer.
“I never thought I’d win any awards, I never planned on it. The first Emmy was kind of a cool thing… We put it in the kitchen. It’s kind of a bare kitchen and suddenly this statue up there immediately calls attention to itself.”
Berkowitz is now part of a new project that has debuted called, Latifa. Saudi Prince, Fahad Al Saud, came up with the idea of Vigilante Middle Eastern Women who fight for what’s right.
“With Latifa, Fahad had this vision for a whole world and he brought in writers like me to help him kind of articulate it. It’s the closest I’ve ever been to something that been created fresh from the ground up…Working on Latifa, working for Fahad was great.”
Berkowitz was approachable as he attended the Q&A segment on Comics and as he stayed at his booth. There he autographed the first comic of the new series he helped create. He also spoke on his experience at St. John’s first comic convention, BoroughCon.
“I’m having a great time here at the convention. Some of the nicest people came here. Here it’s easier to talk to people and find out what fans are looking for, what they like and how your work affects them.”