Local Author, British Culture Buff, Launches UK Mag

Ex-pats craving a bit of British culture may find it in a magazine recently launched by local anglophile, Larry Jaffee.

Jaffee, who moved to Kings Park when he was 12 years old and went to Kings Park High School, is a self-published author who once interned at the Smithtown News, last month became the publisher and editor of UK: Cue.

The magazine aims to take a look at “British film, theater and television on both sides of the Atlantic” and targets expatriates living in the States and Americans who have a penchant for the British entertainment industry.

“It is something I have been thinking about a long time,” said Jaffee, who cites Steve Jobs death as an impetus to creating the publication.

“I thought he was an interesting business man, brilliant man. What struck a cord with me was the whole, think different idea,” said Jaffee.

Jaffee attended Hofstra and became the editor of the paper in his senior year after serving the prior year as the arts editor.

“I don’t think it is surprising that I am doing a magazine like this. I find the most comfort in writing about the arts,” he said.

Jaffee can trace his fascination to all things British back to his childhood, where he said he began collecting Matchbox cars that were made in East London, through his teen years of “ingesting large amounts of Monty Python’s Flying Circus.”

In 1992, Jaffee began the Walford Gazette, a quarterly fanzine, covering the British television hit, EastEnders, a show about a working class neighborhood in East London that was broadcast here on public television. That publication spurred him to author two self-published books, Walford State of Mind and Albert Square & Me: The Actors of EastEnders.

“I am a big believer in self-publishing.  I was sitting on all this content from EastEnders, so I did a book on the actors on the show,” said Jaffee, who currently blogs for the Huffington Post. “The book did well by self-publishing standards and sold over 1200 copies. Then I did a second book and just did a reprinting of it.”

Jaffee raised $5,000 through Kickstarter.com for funds required to print the UK: Cue prototype.

“I recruited a terrific Anglo-American editorial team of professionals, such as Sight & Sound contributor Graham Fuller, who penned the cover story on Carey Mulligan,” said Jaffee, who found the planning and editing to be the easy part of his endeavor.

“The hardest was making the various business deals, picking a printer, coming up with the right prices.”

The newly established editor and publisher is headed to Brit week, a convention happening in Los Angeles, where he hopes to generate some interest in his publication.  Afterwards, he plans to start hitting some big names like British Airway, Jaguar and Virgin Airways, for some ad revenue.

As for the name, UK: Cue, Jaffee thought it was fitting name, with many purposes.

“A director gives direction, a cue in all three art forms. Often plays inspire film that inspires television shows. Me, as the editor, is sort of cuing the reader as to what they should know about.”