Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, February 20, 1995 TAG: 9502220007
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BETH MACY AND DAVID M. POOLE STAFF WRITERS
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Instead, they pick up ``Elvira: Mistress of the Dark'' comic books, featuring cleavage, camp and a letters-to-the-editor section called ``Yours Cruelly.''
In his own words, 40-year-old editor-in-chief Edward Via summarizes one issue's plot: ``Elvira faces the type of menace(s) that have toppled mighty political hacks, crooked televangelists, untalented network programmers, and even entire financially-compromised nations!!
``What are we talking about? Heck, buy it and find out!''
So why is Marion Via's younger son spending most of his time publishing cartoons of Elvira (real-life actress Cassandra Peterson), the character he describes as ``television's maven of movie macabre''?
What is one of Roanoke's richest men doing dabbling in comics?
Exactly what he wants.
``It's his adolescent fantasy come to life,'' an old family friend says.
A comic-book collector since he was 10, Via premiered Claypool Comics - named for his mother's Dean Road home, where he now lives - in June 1993, five months after his mother's death. In addition to the Elvira series, Claypool publishes ``Soulsearchers and Company,'' ``The Phantom of Fear City'' and ``Deadbeats.''
``Ed Via is a patron of the arts in his own way,'' says Richard Howell, editor of Claypool Comics, based in Leonia, N.J.
Via is both publisher and editor-in-chief of the comic books. The financial manager is his wife, Sandra, whom he married for the second time in 1994 after divorcing her in 1988. Their first marriage lasted a month. A Danville native, Sandra Carlton Via is 51.
The Elvira comics attract a lot of first-time comics readers - "especially older men," says Bonnie Ferguson, manager of Roanoke's B & D Comics.
"Ed's dedication sets the books apart from other publishers who answer to boards of directors," who rely on bottom-line sales figures, says Michael Raub, a longtime Via friend and former publisher who lives in Norwalk, Conn.
While Claypool comprises only a fraction of 1 percent of the comics market, one reviewer says it has promise. "The editor is working with an excellent bunch of writers and artists to create a world built on fantasy, vampires and odd experiences in much the way that `Dark Shadows' used to be," says Maggie Thompson, the editor of Comic Buyers Guide, a weekly trade newspaper.
"He's trying to bring the types of comics he enjoyed as a kid back into the marketplace" for the general-audience reader, adds Mike Gold, a comics editor who knew Ed when he lived in Stamford, Conn.
Via went beyond just collecting comics in 1979, when - at the age of 25 - he moved from his mother's home for the first time to Stamford. There, he traveled within a circle of comics writers and illustrators, and invested in a company that sold original comic-book art.
In a 1986 deposition, he described his profession this way: "I am a landlord, I am a writer, and I produce motion pictures."
At the time he owned a four-bedroom house - and rented out three of the four bedrooms. His writing included three unpublished books and a dozen horror-genre short stories, and several published articles for comics magazines. He also produced and financed a detective film called "Detectives Inc.," a live-action movie based on a comic series of the same name.
"It's hard-boiled detective and action - a combination of `I Spy' and Raymond Chandler," says Raub, who believes the film has been shown in film-festival circles, but has not been distributed.
Via also produced a play based on Sherlock Holmes' adventures that played in off-Broadway theaters in New York for six months.
Despite his artistic ventures, Via was never known as an exceptional student. "He had the easy-going demeanor of a man who knew he wouldn't have to follow the mules through the field,'' recalls David Shiflett, a fellow student at North Cross School who is now a columnist for the Rocky Mountain (Colo.) News.
Known in school for his quick wit, Via drove a yellow Mustang Mach IV with a racing stripe and spoiler. ``I was under the impression he didn't drive it as fast as he should,'' Shiflett recalls.
"He was kind of disheveled, in the way an English eccentric would be."
Via has an encyclopedic memory and "considers himself the final authority on movie trivia, baseball scores and `Dark Shadows,''' a longtime friend says.
A board member of the Salem-Roanoke Baseball Hall of Fame, Via collects baseball cards and sometimes flies to major league games in Milwaukee and other cities with his attorney/pilot John Rocovich.
Listed as a top giver to the Virginia Tech Foundation, Ed is believed to rely as heavily on Rocovich as his mother did, if not more. Says his friend Walton Rutherfoord: ``I'm sure Ed will be generous for his part for things he finds are worthy of support.''
His brother, Peter Via, 53, is more reclusive and more independent than Edward, although he does sometimes socialize in South Roanoke, where he lives with his third wife, Lynn. An Andrew Lewis High School graduate who attended Campbell College, Peter Via has a second home in Floyd County.
A director of the Mill Mountain Zoo from 1972 to 1979, Peter is a jewelry and ham-radio equipment collector who likes to hunt and fish. Friends say he supports the National Rifle Association and NRA-supported political candidates.
The Via sons are not expected to support Roanoke-area charities to the extent that Marion Via did, though Rocovich does solicit their advice on - and, possibly, their money for - the Marion Bradley Via Memorial Foundation.
``They think anyone who invites them anywhere wants money, and there's a certain amount of truth in it,'' one family friend says. ``But if you start that kind of calculus, you'll drive yourself crazy.
``The rich are just ... different.''
Ed Via's comic books, by the way, are on sale in Roanoke comic-book shops, where, as Via writes, you can ``Run, stalk, or flap (do not walk!)'' to get them.
Till then, he signs off, ``Bye, everybody - and unpleasant dreams!''
by CNB