Weekly archive
August 10 - August 16, 2008
Saturday, Aug. 16
Eating L.A.'s Pat Saperstein joined LA Observed author Denise Hamilton on a culinary tour based on locations mentioned in "The Last Embrace," Denise's latest Los Angeles-based mystery. This one, set...
Leroy Sievers is the former "Nightline" executive producer who has been commenting on the air and blogging about his cancer for National Public Radio. Sievers had previously been the CBS...
Los Angeles photographer Charlie Grosso has been working on an exhibit she calls Wok the Dog, an examination of "the commerce of meat," shot at markets around the world where...
As the LA Observed Script Project nears its natural end point, producer Eric Estrin has an assignment for the would-be screenwriters out there. This project’s been a total blast to...
One of the challenges facing new L.A. Times publisher Eddy Hartenstein will be stopping the brain drain of top journalists who see no future in a Sam Zell-run media venture....
The reports — starting, I believe, with Cynthia Littleton in Variety back in July — have all been accurate. Up next in the rotating chair of Los Angeles Times publisher...
Friday, Aug. 15
Occasionally someone who gets caught abusing L.A. stereotypes complains that I don't point out the same style violations by writers about New York. Go figure — we call it LA...
Even though Tribune's innovation guru keeps advising Sam Zell's newspapers to make stars of their staffs and be funnier, in last month's cutbacks at the Los Angeles Times the editors...
Record producer Jerry Wexler has died at age 91. NYT DWP commission president Nick Patsaouras sent Mayor Villaraigosa a resignation letter, but apparently has been talked out of quitting....
Thursday, Aug. 14
A hockey fan who posts at LetsGoKings.com as riseandfall9 describes being shot outside a club in Hollywood and having to call 911 himself even though a half-dozen other people looked...
A generation of Los Angeles kids grew up watching cartoons on Channel 9 and drinking their milk when Engineer Bill or his announcer said "green light" — and stopping...
LA Observed author David Rensin was on a book tour-vacation when Hollywood manager and producer Bernie Brillstein ">died, but I for one have been anticipating David's reaction. He helped Brillstein...
Zach Behrens at LAist test-drives the city's new website for searching and keeping tabs on City Council files, motions and votes....
Film critic and KCRW host Elvis Mitchell was stopped recently at the U.S.-Canada border between Detroit and Windsor and a search of his luggage found a box of contraband cigars...
NPR's "Morning Edition" ran a story today from inside the county's Twin Towers jail in Downtown, calling it the country's largest mental institution. NPR.org The LAPD lost a $500,000...
Wednesday, Aug. 13
You may think the Los Angeles Times is shrinking in print, but don't let your eyes deceive you. This Sunday's LAT was 368 pages fatter than a week before, if...
At the urging of the City Council, City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo agreed to suspend his lawsuit against Controller Laura Chick and she agreed to suspend her review of his office...
Hey, if Sam Zell and Tribune can colonize the Los Angeles media, why not Arianna Huffington in Chicago? The site launches Thursday. From Romenesko letters: Huff Post bloggers work for...
I was an assistant metropolitan editor at the Los Angeles Times when the Rodney King riots erupted in April, 1992 and the Northridge earthquake struck on Jan. 17, 1994. Huge...
Tuesday, Aug. 12
The city Ethics Commission did go ahead this morning and levy almost $15,000 in penalties against Councilman Jose Huizar for misusing his campaign accounts, partly to do opposition research on...
Darren "Bo" Taylor was co-founder with USC Trojans coach Pete Carroll of A Better LA and ran Unity One. The Coach Pete Carroll website posts: There are superheroes. And then...
The city Ethics Commission votes today on whether to fine Councilman Jose Huizar $15,000 for violations including the use of office-holder funds to investigate David Tokofsky, then a school...
Monday, Aug. 11
Eric Estrin and the LA Observed Script Project were featured tonight on the KCAL news at 8 pm and 10 pm and the Channel 2 show at 11. Eric says...
While perhaps a billion people watched the U.S. and China meet in basketball at the Olympics, Sports Business Daily says that few had more riding on the game than the...
Allan Sloan of Fortune Magazine, a persistent skeptic of Tribune dealings, breaks down Sam Zell's latest creative financing scheme for Marketplace: "The company is in, as you know, big trouble....What...
Los Angeles City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo today filed a civil court challenge to block Controller Laura Chick from asserting the power to audit his office, and she called in the...
Back in the 1920s, when Ventura Boulevard through Sherman Oaks was a two-lane highway with dirt shoulders, real estate agents pitched it as the "Wilshire Boulevard of the Valley." It...
L.A. journalist Sharon Waxman plans to launch The Wrap News in January as a Hollywood counterpart to Politico. Market Watch ABC's interest in Jay Leno and how it could...
Photographer and music journalist Rena Kosnett thinks she got one of, if not the, final interview with the singer, songwriter, musician and former "South Park" voice who died Sunday. Hayes,...
Dodgers outfielder Andre Ethier can't convince Joe Torre to play him full time, even though he's second on the team in home runs and gets on base more than Juan...
Sunday, Aug. 10
The Times' Paul Pringle weighed in Saturday with an investigative piece saying that the SEIU-affiliated United Long-Term Care Workers local headed by Tyrone Freeman, and a related charity, have been...
Echo Park author Sarah Miller has an amusing piece in the Times opinion pages Sunday about John Edwards' former extra-marital squeeze, who rented the room Miller had vacated in a...
It's pledge break time at KCRW, so my segment did not air last Friday in the usual 4:44 pm slot and will miss this coming week too. LA Observed on...
