 However, he first attracted public attention in the 1980s producing morbid alternative comics stories, sometimes working solo, sometimes with his brother Josh Alan Friedman scripting the panels.These stories portrayed celebrities and character actors of yesteryear in seedy, absurd, tragi-comic situations.The brothers also wrote stories about talk-show host Joe Franklin, including one strip, written by Drew, for "Heavy Metal", "The Incredible Shrinking Joe Franklin", that prompted Franklin to sue the artist for $40 million.