Category: News

LB: Mike Gold on Roger Ebert

Since Roger Ebert’s unfortunate death last week the interwebs have been flooded with obits/remembrances/tributes. I know it’s not a competition, but the fact is that nothing captured the flavor of the man and moved me as much as this one, on ComicMix.Com:

Roger Ebert, Behind The Screen
by Mike Gold

dt.common.streams.StreamServer.cls Roger Ebert, Behind The Screen The multitude of Roger Ebert obituaries were wrong. I knew a different guy.

The Roger Ebert I knew was this kid fresh out of college who, after about a year at the Chicago Sun-Times, was pressed into service helping high school newspaper editors improve their craft. I was sports editor at the Niles High West Word, and the guy painstakingly yet affably showed me a slew of techniques that immediately improved my work, stuff that I use to this day, stuff that, as an editor, I share with others. read article

Quick Update on the DOCTOR WHO ANNIVERSARY SPECIAL

First off, it’s going to have both these doods:

Doctors-1--and-11
Pic ripped off from the Doctor Puppet Blog! Go there! Enjoy!

Secondly, it’s going to have a much-discussed but seldom-seen old monster:

Zygon read article

The FCC Wants to Hear from You/Us

FCC-logo
Doesn’t this logo just ooze good intentions and benevolence? Yeah, we didn’t think so either. But it’s kinda cool, and isn’t that all that matters?

In a nutshell, the Federal Communications Commission wants to know what we think of its rules, regulations, attitudes, and plans.

It must want to hear from us because has a new online slogan:

FCC-page-Capture read article

Does FASHION POLICE Owe Its Writers $1+ Mil?

The writers say the show does. And even though FASION POLICE isn’t a union – as in Writers Guild of America, West – show, the WGAW is helping the writers take legal action – as in sue.

fashion_police

Here’s the WGAW’s press release: read article

Love & Money Dept – TV Writing Deals for 4/4/13

Latest News About Writers Who Are Doing Better Than We Are

  • Martin Scorses (yeah, that guy) is developing his film, GANGS OF NEW YORK into a series. (No network has been announced yet, but Marty’s working with Miramax, and our recollection is that they usually get things done.)
  • Robert Connolly (UNDERGROUND: THE JULIAN ASSANGE STORY) is adapting David Kunst’s nonfiction book, The Man Who Walked Around the World, for HBO. (Yeppers, Connolly’s a feature writer. Cuz the guys at HBO are still starfuckers, and dat’s how it goze.)
  • Stephen Gaghan (TRAFFIC) is turning David Maraniss’ book, They Marched Into Sunlight, into a 6 part limited series for FX. (Yeppers, another feature writer, this one with an Oscar. Writing about the Vietnam War. Which only men over 50 seem to care about/remember these days. Wowser.)
  • Nicholas Osborne (some producer credits; who cares?) is writing/producing CONQUISTADORS, a limited series based on Kim MacQuarrie’s book Last Days of the Incas, also for FX. (Hmm, FX doesn’t need you to be a star to write for them, just an unknown from another medium. How can we turn that to our advantage…?)
  • Speaking of fresh starts, Paramount has decided to get back ilnto the TV biz, according to studio boss Brad Grey. (So get your Paramount-pally agents on that one ASAP.)
  • And speaking of FX, they’re expanding into several more channels, including FXX, which will aim at “younger viewers” and maybe even have some original programming (instead of just IT’S ALWAYS SUNNY IN PHILADELPHIA reruns, which till now seem to have been the kind of thing FX intends for its “younger viewers.”)