Film / TV / Video
83 posts found
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It's SHOWTIME for this Cantor
At the dawn of Hollywood talkies, "The Jazz Singer" told the story of a young Jewish man's conflict between a career in the entertainment industry and being a cantor. The sacred and the profane seemed two poles whose opposing magnetic draws tore the protagonist apart. But that was 1927. Today, more than 90 years later, I only had to drive to Westwood to meet Gary Levine, who has his feet planted comfortably in both worlds. During the week Levine is… -
Steven Spielberg dreams anew
Over the last two weeks, lost amid Wall Street's financial turmoil, came the announcement that Steven Spielberg's DreamWorks was leaving Paramount, having found financing from The Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group ("Reliance"), one of India's largest private companies. What does the fact that no American studio or financier made a better offer say about Spielberg, his dream company and the state of the movie business today? What does it mean that Spielberg's other founding partners, David Geffen and Jeffrey Katzenberg,… -
Sandler and the Zohan
As everyone knows by now, Adam Sandler's "You Don't Mess With the Zohan" dives in where few comedies have gone before: The Middle East conflict between Arabs and Jews. Hollywood has a long tradition of preferring onscreen Jews to be Semitic-lite (or even better, portrayed by non-Jews such as Gregory Peck in "Gentleman's Agreement"). Sandler, however, pulls no such punches in "Zohan" -- Israel is Israel and Zohan's nemesis is a Palestinian terrorist -- there is no attempt to create… -
William Shatner gets a place at the Seder
William Shatner is God. And Pharaoh. And Moses, too. Just in time for Passover, the Jewish Music Group (a division of Shout Factory) has released "Exodus: An Oratorio in Three Parts," performed by the Arkansas Symphony Orchestra. It is conducted by David Itkin, who created and composed the Oratorio, sung by baritone Paul Rowe and includes dramatic readings from the Bible and from the haggadah, spoken by none other than Shatner. "It's perfect seder entertainment," Shatner said recently, but more… -
Gang of actors reaches a new stage
The Actors' Gang, now in residence at the historic Ivy Substation in Culver City, is celebrating its 25th anniversary. The substation, constructed in 1907 by the Los Angeles Pacific Railroad, looks more like a Spanish mission than an electric power facility, strangely appropriate for The Actors' Gang, which is both a theater troupe with a strong sense of mission and a longtime source of power plays and electric performances (and that's as far as I'm willing to stretch this metaphor).… -
Elvis at the crossroads
Elvis is back in the building. On March 14 at the Cinerama Dome, Elvis will return, one more time, in a special 40th anniversary screening of the “Singer Presents Elvis†special from 1968, or “The Comeback Special†as it is more popularly known, as the kickoff event of the Paley Center for Media’s PaleyFest 2008. A panel discussion afterwards will feature Priscilla Presley, his widow; as well as Steve Binder the producer and director of the special – which is… -
KCRW gives us 'The Business'
In an underground office on the campus of Santa Monica College, Claude Brodesser-Akner is working with his producer, Matt Holzman, and associate producer, Darby Maloney, to describe the current status of the Oscar broadcast -- and work in a pun. Finally, Brodesser-Akner says, with some satisfaction, "The Oscars are mired." Welcome to the world of "The Business," a half-hour syndicated radio program devoted to the nuts and bolts of the entertainment industry (pun intended), hosted by Brodesser-Akner each week since… -
Zsa Zsa Gabor: The Last of the Hungarian Mohicans
"I want a man with kindness and understanding. Is that too much to ask of a millionaire?" -- Zsa Zsa Gabor Lately, I have been thinking about Zsa Zsa, and it makes me sad. A few years ago, she crashed her car on Sunset, and she has been wheelchair-bound since. She had been a recluse for some time before that, depressed, not wanting to leave the house. She, who for so long relied on her looks, no longer wants to… -
Hate the Game, Love The Player (Michael Tolkin and "The Return of The Player")
The fall season is upon us, with new books, movies and TV programs all vying for our attention as palliatives to the news of war, terrorism and melting ice caps. Even as the days get shorter and our own day of judgment looms imminent, we wonder: Is there a hero out there who can set us back on the path of reason, on a course of love, someone to heal us and show us the way -- someone, who is,… -
Kaplan's Collage
Here's Marty Kaplan blogging on Huffington Post about suggested treatments for Mel Gibson's "problem": "'Jew Like Me' is another strategy. Walk a mile in my shoes. Gain 10 pounds at my table. Wait two hours after lunch before swimming. Laugh that ironic meta-laugh right along with us when Jon Stewart says, 'Jewey.' Sensitize yourself to code like 'New York Times' and 'neocon.' Defend Likud. Like halvah. Who knows -- you might even get a development deal out of it. 'Gentleman's… -
Great Scott: Scott Steindorff's Excellent Adventure in Hollywood
Scott Steindorff is a happy man. A successful movie and TV producer, his NBC series, "Las Vegas," just got picked up for another season; he won a Golden Globe for the HBO miniseries, "Empire Falls," starring Paul Newman, and produced the feature film of Philip Roth's "The Human Stain" with Anthony Hopkins and Nicole Kidman. Upcoming on Steindorff's slate are adaptations of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's "Love in the Time of Cholera," TC Boyle's "The Tortilla Curtain," Michael Connolly's "The Lincoln… -
The Sayings of Chairman Levine
"When is a dirty bathroom a broken window?" This is the question that opens Michael Levine's recently published business tome, "Broken Windows, Broken Business" (Warner Business Books). Levine is a successful Hollywood publicist. I am indebted to him forever for one of my most memorable Tommywood moments -- a séance with Hollywood's evergreen legend, Robert Evans, at his home, and on his bed (see "The Kid Still Stays in the Picture," March 2004). Levine, like many a Hollywood success story,…