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Published Works
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Through the lens of the New Wave music movement of the 1970s and 1980s New York City, Rocked and Rolled! conveys the universal and ever relevant human struggle to express, invent and reinvent oneself in a world of scant opportunity and annihilating competition.
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In the late 21st century, the country is run by two forces: The Government and The Media. But when Annette Sands, the head of the network, is slighted by the President, she manufactures a reality show revolution that grows beyond anything she could have imagined—or could have controlled.
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Pilgrims, government forces and rebel fighters head toward an apocalyptic showdown as the revolutionary movement of the Mulro Nation
descends upon The Synchronized Society, and most of the
world cowers from behind their screens. -
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Self-help books are written by the wrong people—experts.
Self Helpless tackles the topics of self-reliance, risk-taking, self-belief, creativity and self-care with humor, insight, and the authenticity
of personal experience. -
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An exploration of existentialism in the 21st century, Sartre in the Subway discusses how media, technology and individual behavior interact with the 20th century philosophy’s existential tenets—freedom, commitment, action, accountability and absurdity.
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A young American flees a tough economy for the Peace Corps.
Living in Tunisia in the period between the Vietnam War and the age of
Islamic radicalism, Rick Murkey must deal with the consequences of being an American in a society his country has influenced—and disrupted. -
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Delve into the world of predatory traffic cops, malevolent dentists,
deceptive cooking shows, pushy street performers,
subversive falafels, Winnie the Pooh,
and other conundrums of living. -
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“Madison Avenue is such a supremely absurd location that the only way to describe it truthfully, is in fiction.” Ad Nomad chronicles the career
of a downtrodden copywriter in the bizarre world
of pharmaceutical advertising. -
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Through lyric, ballad, sonnet, calligram, triversen, free verse and
graffiti verse (an original poetic invention), this collection takes
the full measure of poetry in a celebration of the verbal,
the visual, the emotional, and the conceptual. -
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A collection of essays about the relevant and irreverent,
indignation and exultation, love of life and fear of death,
and many of life’s pleasures, curiosities, doubts
and all the discoveries in between.
Press & Reviews
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Plastiglas® Artist
An art form I invented in the 80s: collaging plastics, lighting gels and acrylics on glass. Selected works below.
Getty Tree
Music Tunes the Universe
Inscrutable Characters
A Child's Map of the World
Battle of the Bands
Rainbow Tree
Walpurgisnacht
Mommy and Daughter
Ascending
Broken Lines are Crosses
Canals
Colors in Conflict
Blue Dancer and Friends
Cricketeer
Dissolving Constructions
Earth's Core
Fiery Sky and Green Earth
Man, Woman and Dog
Carnival Party
Don Quixote
Reaching
Taking Shape
Troubadour, Lady and The Spirit of Love
Mr. Greenjeans Feeing the Animals
Woman on a Hill
Awake and Dance
Dancers in the Storm
Combo
Fading Mosaic
Cool Combo
Egghead
The Two Graces
Reed Player
Cubist Calypso
So Many Faces
Lady Liberty and Gang Green
Party Animals
Blue Diva and the Troubadours
See Life
A Couple of
Going Shopping
Organisms or Abstractions?
Courtship
Blue Sleeper and Blue Bird
Fiddler, Femme, and Family
Runes
Melting Music
Party Scene
Solid Construction
Random Design
Iconic Couple
Rainbow Grove
Selfie
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Singer - Songwriter
♬ Ladies call me baby
cuz they think that baby’s got baby teeth
They say “let’s play with baby”
but they won’t let baby out on the street ♬
♬ Respect me now
While I am living
Don’t wait to love me
When I’m dead ♬
♬ When you called me the other day
It was a shot from the distant past
You asked if I could see you today
And I told you yes too fast ♬
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Advertising Copywriter
Celebrating a successful career in pharmaceutical advertising where I worked on a wide range of life-changing drugs for the past three decades.
Selected ads, concepts and campaigns below.
The assignment here was to create an ad for ALZA, the marketer of Ditropan, for internal circulation at a major corporate event. The client chose this concept over several others by agency veterans, and was so popular at the company event that ALZA ran it in publications in a play to be bought out. Johnson & Johnson acquired ALZA months later.
Copywriting is just like screenwriting—it takes more than words to communicate. In this Viagra ad, I turned the scene of a singles bar, a man and a woman, and their dialogue, and transposed them into an iconographic equation.
I was lead writer of a relaunch campaign for Regranex, a biological topical ointment that promotes healing in diabetic foot ulcers. Since a patient with diabetes may not feel a wound, due to neuropathy, and since diabetes impedes proper healing, even a small foot wound on the foot can develop into an ulcer and eventually to gangrene, necessitating debridement and, in the worst instance, amputation.
In 1999-2000, Nexium was launched to take the place of Prilosec as the #1 Proton Pump Inhibitor to treat GERD, because Prilosec was going off-patent. Nexium had not been proven more effective than its predecessor, but since it was slightly different in molecular structure and came in higher dosage, it seemed more potent. This ad concept told a "generational" story—Son of Prilosec.
Contigen Bard Implants are injectable collagen that would gradually be absorbed naturally in the body. This ad dramatizes sling therapy, the standard care for stress incontinence at that time, which overcorrected to the extent that patients could not urinate and needed to be catheterized.
While preparing a physician awareness campaign for Alpha-1 antitrypsin Deficiency, I interviewed many patients with this rare genetic disorder that originates in the liver . Their disturbing consensus was that doctors often lost patience when COPD therapies did not improve lung function. Some MDs even viewed AAT patients as "head cases." This camouflage concept targets physicians who automatically diagnose COPD symptoms in the conventional manner and thus mistreat it.
Thelin was a medication to treat PAH, a disease that afflicts women and drastically restricts breathing. This concept underscored the constriction PAH patients experience.
To underscore the peril of amputation resulting from diabetic foot ulcers, this Regranex ad explored familiar, pedestrian icons for walking.
THE LIGHTER SIDE OF LUBRICATION. Pharmaceutical advertising covers a spectrum of products and services. On one end, are biologics, radiation, targeted medicines and immunotherapeutic agents that work in the molecular environment. On the other end, are over-the-counter products that physicians can promote to patients. The premise of this concept for K-Y was that certain delicate moments require a doctor to put aside his prescription pad and recommend a familiar and accessible treatment.
Xolair was the first biologic therapy for refractory allergic asthma. It is an anti-IgE monoclonal antibody that can reduce the severity of an allergic asthma attack by incapacitating antibodies that circulate after exposure to an allergic trigger. The message of this concept was that Xolair would permit asthma patients to sleep a full night without exacerbations.
Synvisc for OA of the Knee: "I Get Around!" Most people will develop osteoarthritis (OA) during their lives. It is the outcome of joint wear-and-tear, erosion of cartilage, and degraded synovial fluid. People with OA of the knee often cannot stand up, sit down, or walk down a stairway pain-free. Synvisc, an injectable substance, is indicated for OA of the knee. It is derived from rooster combs and for reasons that are not fully understood, it fortifies and replaces degraded synovial fluid, providing pain relief to sufferers of OA of the knee.
The physiology of tear film is not well or widely understood. Dry eye disease is often treated with self-medication. Patients typically "pour" money into OTC eye drops that give temporary relief without addressing or improving the underlying disease of conjunctivitis sicca. To tell the Restasis story—how it helps patients make their own tears—we needed to explain tear film, to establish the chronic and degenerative pathology of dry eye disease, and to expose artificial tears as providers of ephemeral relief.
Premarin and Prempro were once blockbuster hormone replacement therapies, with a collective reputation for mollifying hot flashes, reducing bone loss, and promoting heart health in women in menopause. One of my most significant advertising achievements was a special campaign concept to celebrate Premarin's 60th anniversary with a national essay-writing contest. Devising prompts and reading 1000s of essays came naturally to me from my years of teaching English and reading SAT essays for the College Board. Thousands of women wrote about the liberating impact of Premarin products on their careers and lifestyles.
One of the most important roles of medical writing is changing how people think about an illness. Dry eye disease is an inflammatory disease in which an individual cannot produce an adequate tear film, resulting in corneal damage. The message of this concept is that dry eye disease is a problem rheumatologists might treat since it has a similar pathology to other inflammatory diseases and is often a comorbidity of them.
I wrote, researched and annotated a 25 slide presentation on the microenvironment of chronic lymphocytic leukemia and mantle cell lymphoma, the way in which ibrutinib circumvents these diseases and cost benefits of treating these cancers with this new therapy.
This FAQ was developed for Pulmozyme, a remarkable medication that cuts through the mucous molecules that line the tubes of the lungs, thus helping cystic fibrosis patients fend off illnesses.
Stress urinary incontinence affects women of all ages, resulting in embarrassment, inconvenience and a limitation on activities. This product was a collagen implant injected into the urethral neck to help block involuntary incontinence. The message here was that with the use of this product, a patient with stress urinary incontinence would now be free to do anything.
One of my first assignments in pharmaceutical advertising was for Pampers, the P&G juggernaut for baby's bottoms. It was fun writing for a product that sold itself, but the doctors to whom the ads were directed were not entirely comfortable with selling new mothers on disposable diapers.
Fear is one of the principal obstacles to care. A person with chest pains may be likely to ignore this symptom if he believes that acknowledging it will result in open-heart surgery. The message of this ad was that there are many other approaches to heart care. This was one of my first assignments and printed ads.
Real estate advertising is all about branding a property, making its features distinctive and creating a mystique around it. In this case, I turned a co-op in the Meatpacking District into a beach side resort. (A beach along the Hudson River was being planned at the time.)
I got my first agency job by writing a brochure to promote a residential building in downtown Manhattan. This brochure was for a luxury residence on West 34th Street near the Javits Center. The neighborhood was not yet upscale like Chelsea or trendy like Hell's Kitchen. Frankly, it was barely a neighborhood, at all. To become one, it needed a name, so we called it TUNJAV.
SELLING A DREAM @CRYSTAL SPRINGS— I have never played a hole of golf, yet people I know love it so much they'll play nine holes in the snow. Crystal Springs, a resort community in Vernon/Great Gorge, New Jersey, had nine golf courses--a duffer's paradise. I entered his dreams to write this ad.
BUILDING OR BILLBOARD?— A rival real estate agency devised a simple ad out of borrowed interest: a license plate reading "Licensed to Rent." It was a sensation. Fast, iconographic ads became the trend, so I branded a New York City landmark skyscraper like an Absolut bottle. During the holiday season I'd seen the building in question lit like a crucifix. We transposed this seasonal gesture into a self-promoting billboard. Our effort confirmed an advertising truth: an intriguing visual concept with fewer words and cleaner lay-outs can have greater impact.
One of my first concepts was a rebranding of Uncle Ben's rice as a component of a gourmet recipe.
Our client was a restaurant near JFK Airport. We called attention to the unlikely appearance of great food in a remote outer-borough restaurant.
NPM, my first agency, pitched a national rental corporation (REIT) called Avalon Bay. Avalon Bay operated rental communities across the US. marketed as temporary housing for relocated executives. They were luxury, modular apartments, with conference rooms, health clubs and other amenities. Avalon Bay used this ad to introduce their brand, and it appeared in the Sunday New York Times.
In this humorous ad, I use the iconic sailor kiss in Times Square to highlight the importance of a well-Blistexed lip.
Getting a good score on standardized tests to be accepted at "one's dream school" is a mania that has fueled a burgeoning multibillion dollar industry. I tried to give it a light touch.
I was always attracted to the challenge of giving glamor and allure to more downmarket goods. A concept from early in my career, this ad for Greyhound gave bus travel a romantic aura.
This 70s style ad for one of the first GPS systems plays on the yogi sensibility of "finding oneself" without knowing how to physically get anywhere.
