Summer is always a great time for seeing live concerts and this summer that seems particularly so, In the last week I caught a number of great shows:

NIKKA COSTA at the EL REY. Great show. Great live performer. An on your feet for the entire show, sweaty audience participation performance. Someone we went with who is a huge fan thought it was mellow for her -- but I find that hard to believe. Costa is a funk master. She inhabits a space somewhere between Lenny Kravitz and Amy Winehouse -- with some Janis thrown in there as well.

Caught SAM PHILLIPS at the newly launched LARGO @ THE CORONET. Phillips has a new album, "Don't Do Anything" and she performed many songs from that accompanied by a few select players and by the Section, a
The old Largo was a bar with table seating and food and very small stage. The New Largo is more akin to a small concert hall -- you sit in assigned seats -- no food and drink (although is a separate bar) and it's more of a concert than a club date. Even so, Phillips low key conversational style, her humor and her irony, made for a wonderful evening immersed in her smart songwriting.

My wife went to TOM PETTY at the BOWL, She said it was great. II passed. Seen him enough for now.

ROBERT PLANT AND ALISON KRAUSS, RISING SAND TOUR. One of the surprise hits of this Spring is the collaboration between Robert Plant and Alsion Krauss, and the Rising Sand Revue delivers Plant doing some interesting versions of Led Zep tunes, Alison Krauss doing some of her own, and T Bone even gets a few of his own. The evening, at the Greek, reminded me of another great evening there, Springsteen and the Seeger sessions -- rock artists rediscovering a treasure of American roots music, this time from Appalachia. It is really is an extraordinary combination of talents that yields a completely unexpected results. We all know that Plant could be on a Zeppellin reunion tour -- even begrudgingly doing so in the memory of Ahmet Ertegun whose death was inspiration for their reunion concert early in the year. But Plant is choosing te pursue this tour. SEE IT IF YOU CAN.

THIEVERY CORPORATION at the Hollywood BOWL with Seu Jorge -- Love Thievery Corporation. They put on a great show last summer (or was it the summer before?) with Os Mutantes. This year they brought their usual assortment fo singers in Portuguese, French, English, from all over the world, including Perry Farrell doing a song. It's great that these two guys who have been around for more than twenty years and started out in DC are still cutting edge.

BEBEL GILBERTO performed at the same show. I had seen her before (also at the Bowl) and despite feeling that she had a great voice, I had not found her to be a great performer. That was then. She has come into her own and she gave a great rousing performance at the bowl.

In the last week two friends sent me articles of reviews of new publications from Yale University Press that are of note.

Jacob's legacy: A Genetic view of Jewish History by David A. Goldstein
Dan, my Massachusetts hospodar, called my attention to Jerome Groopman's review "Genes and Identity" in The New Republic of June 25, 2008, which presents a thoughtful discussion of Jewish genetic history. To read the review posted by Powell's books, click here.


ALFRED KAZIN: A BIOGRAPHY by RICHARD COOK
At the same time, my buddy Jeff also alerted me to a review by Edward Mendelson the Kazin bio in the New York Review of Books that discusses what it means to be a Jew in America or at least what Kazin meant by it.
Which I can't link to, but I recommend that you check out.

DEANNE STILLMAN @ ALOUD TONIGHT
LA CENTRAL PUBLIC LIBRARY

Deanne Stillman, author of the just publishing MUSTANG (Houghton Mifflin) is being interviewed by Samantha Dunn as part of the Aloud Series. CHECK IT OUT!!! Fans of this column have heard me sing Deanne's praises but she is not only a unique writer but a unique mind and I'm sure a conversation with her is going be very interesting. Unfortunately I can't attend. Sorry to be missing it.





Robert Plant & Alison Krauss and T-Bone Burnett, Raising Sand revue. Tonight at the Greek, Tomorrow at the Santa Barbara Bowl. A truly extraordinary show. Reminds of Springsteen;s Seeger sessions in that we have a rocker rediscovering a treasure trove of American music and teaming with some of the greatest musicians to deliver a sound that transcends categories. Plant covers a number of Zep tunes, Alison Krauss does of her some catalog, and T Bone gets to play a few.  Listen, Plant could be doing the Zep reunion tour, he prefers to do this. Doesn't that tell you something?

FRENCH KISS FOR SETH GREENLAND.
Not exactly, but the vide for his new book, Shining City has been posted on his french publisher's website replete with French subtitles. Check it out here.

Denise Hamilton's THE LAST EMBRACE (Scribner), has been getting lots of buzz. I met at BookExpo and she was kind enough to send me a copy of her 1940s set ion Hollywood mystery (She is also the author of the Eve Diamond series). Looks cool. Have put it in the stack to read for fun/vacation reading (whichever happens first)


I've also been listening to The Paul Carlon Octet's "Roots Propaganda" album, which is as if Duke Ellington's big band broke down in Africa and started to incorporate all kinds of world rhythms into a swinging jazz sound. Going to keep listen to it some more, it's infectious and grabs you in strange ways.....

Sample Track 1: "Roots Propaganda" from Paul Carlon Octet

Sample Track 2: "Yorubonics" from Paul Carlon Octet

My friend Steven Roth drew my attention to an item that he saw in ArtsJournal, that they in turn picked from Sign and Sight (I get sight and sound and missed it), that they in turn picked up from Die Welt that drew up a conversation printed in French -- between Valentin Temkine and Pierre Temkine that "decodes" "Waiting For Godot" and situates it in 1943 in the Free Zone of France.

As Temkin posits it, Vladmir and Estragon are French Jews who lived through the anti-Semitic Times surrounding the Dreyfus trial and onc the Nazis invaded France and curtailed liberties for Jews in Paris they fled to the Free Zone. But time is running out there. They have been part of or made contact with the resistance and they are waiting for Godot, who is to lead them across the border to Spain. Pozzo is a Petainist collaborator and Lucky represents the silence of the intellectuials in France who were at the service of the goverment.

The key that unlocks this interpretation of Godot for Temkin is a phrase where Vladmir and Estragon say that if they could go to the top of the Eiffel Tower they would throw themselves off. But,  as they explain, they are no longer are allowed to go up the Eiffel Tower. Temkin explains that between 1940 and 1945 only Jews were no longer allowed access to the top of Eiffel Tower.

THe article interpolates other llines, and facts from beckett's bio, is in French and is worth reading. Click here for the article in French.

I look foward to seeing GODOT staged with this new interpretation. 

I also had the sublime pleasure this weekend of seeing Charlie Chaplin's "City Lights" at the Audrey Wilder Theater at the Hammer Museum.

The film was being shown as part of the LA Film Festival and was chosen at the express request of honoree, director, writer auteur Melvin Van Peebles who selected it as one of his favorite films.

It was pretty great. It was not a pristine print. But it's hard to beat seeing Chaplin on the big screen in a great theater.  There are some great bits in the film -- we probably laughted hardest at the sequence where Chaplin having swalled a whistle, burps in whistle tones. All in all, however, I probably prefer "Modern Times" but that's just a matter of ranking greatest over great.

One of the most interesting aspects of the film is that the plot hinges on a blind flower girl who eventually has an operation that allows her to see.

During the movie, my daughter asked me if that was possible -- an operation that would allow a blind person to see. I had to say that in most cases it can't but that the movie hoped that it could.

In 1930 when City Lights was made, it must have seemed that many medical advances were just within reach. And if we look at all the medical advances between now and then -- and there have been many, it is impressive. But the ability to make the blind see, remains elusive.

Cataract surgery and laser and lasik surgery have allowed millions who would be vision impaired to have great vision -- to see. But that is mostly operating on the lens. Same for detached retinas.

You would think with cameras and players advanced to the point where a laptop can have a webcam and we can watch movies on our cellphones or Ipods --that there would be some way to clamp a camera to someone's head or replace an eyeball. But not yet......

INCREDIBLE NIGHT AT THE HOLLYWOOD BOWL: THIEVERY CORPORATION, BEBEL GILBERTO, LOS AMIGOS INVISIBLES,

Going to the Hollywood Bowl is one of those authentic incomparable LA experiences -- dining under the stars in a box, with firends, listening to great music on a beautiful summer's night, looking at that iconic Hollywood bowl --- it is wonderful.
Last night the headliner was Thievery Corporation, who are two Wash DC artists. who take to the DJ stands and then have a whole world mix of talent performing with them. Last nights guest vocalists including Perry Farrell and Seu Jorge.

Opening for Thievery Corporation were Los Amigos Invisibles who I enjoyed very much. Now I can't tell you that I understand any of their songs, or caught all the music they referenced but there was a moment when I think they slipped into a little Stevie Wonder and there were even a few bars from Was Not Was Walk the dinosaur. Maybe it's my imagination but that's what I heard!

According to an AP news report that is being carried right now by Alabama's the Anniston Star, Germany is requesting the extradition of John Demjanjuk and will try him for crimes committed at Sobibor. See the story here.

Summer seems to be a good time to catch up on videos and cable movies. Here a bunch I recently watched, with very short reviews

"You Kill Me" A John Dahl movie with Ben Kingsley and Tea Leoni. I enjoyed this, definitely worth watching, Kingsley is a  hit man whose alcoholism gets in the way of his job, so he joins AA. Leoni is the woman with boudariy problems that he enters a relationship with. THe joke here is the way the AA language and experience colors Kingsley's being a killer and returning to doing his job well.

"Lust, Caution" Ang Lee's R-rated epic set in Shanghai during the Japanese occupation would like to Casablanca or Notorious, but although gorgeous, it is BORING despite a few explicit sex scenes which might make you think you should rent this but I can't recommend it.

"Eastern Promises" Cronnenberg continues be one of the most interesting filmmakers over the course of his long and varied career. Great performance by Viggo Mortensen, interesting script. In the end there is something that makes only very good and not great. Not sure what that is but  I almost feel this should be the pilot for a BBC TV series. Still I recommend this (although there are some brutal scenes not for the squeamish -- ths is not for Kids and not a chick flick -- although viggo could be a draw.

"The Darjeeling Limited" Wes Andersen's film, starring Owen Wilson, Jason Scwartzman and Adrian Body is practically unwatchable and I can't say that I liked the short Chevalier Hotel any better.

Having spent a great deal of last year consulting for Fanista.com. I recently signed up with the Gerson Lehman Group as a consultant on media, technology and content.

As part of the GLG groups, I am asked to comment on certain news stories and trends. Asked to comment on the recent story about the LA Times intention to move to a 50/50 ad to edit ratio, and to comment in general on the cuts at the LA Times occasioned by Sam Zell's acquisition of the paper and the state of the newspaper industry, I offered up the following:

The L.A. Times's Human Wrecking Ball

www.washingtonpost.com | (view article) Tech, Media, & Telecom > Media > Print > Publishing

Tom Rothman, the chairman of Fox Filmed Enterainment, has been introducing movies on their cable channel since last year but I've only discovered this recently.

Let me start by saying two things: First, is it not enough to receive millions for running a successful movie studio, do you have to take the job away of a host -- someone like yours truly, or some other film reporter/arts journalists/ nerd. And second: this may be all the more galling since I know and life Tom, having gone to law school with him.

Now that I've spent my bile -- let me say that watching Tom Rothman alternates between finding him stiff and sort of fake in his delivery and being interested in what he has to say. Because let's face it, he knows a things or two about movies, making them, and particularly to the extent he talks candidly about it, how certain movies got made from the studio point of view (which he does, here and there).

On the whole, although I would prefer to see someone else doing it (i.e. me), I have to say that I'll tune in again, from time to time, to here what Tom Rothman has to say.....

This is exactly the question England's Guardian newspaper set out to answer. In today's installment, dance critics, visual art critics, and other arts writers, review horse racing, darts and crickets. Click Here.
Tomorrow the sports writers take on the arts.

MORE ARTISTS IN LA THAN NEW YORK -- LA has most artists in The US

According to an NEA report published on June 1, Los Angeles is the city with the most working artists in the US, and California, the state with the most. Read the  article about the report in the LA TIMES here.

DAYWATCH
I watched Timur Bekmambetov's film "Daywatch." I have to admit that I found a lot of it difficult to follow. but the effects and action sequences are impressive -- I have a feeling that WANTED which opens soon, will also be stronger on visuals than coherence.

ROMAN POLANSKI: WANTED AND DESIRED
Speaking of "wanted," I watched the new documentary about Polanski's conviction and flight from the US (it's currently showing on HBO) --it's well made and you get a full measure of Polanski's charm.
 
The documentary has been reviewed as being "even handed" but I would characterize it as sympathetic to Polanski, although it spells out the facts of the case.

It is clear that Polanski offered champagne and quaaludes to a thirteen year old girl whom he photographed topless in a hot tub, then had sex with her, including sodomizing her, all of which he characterized as consensual and which she did not. The documentary does not point out that consent is not relevant, as no 13 year can give legal consent to having sex with someone over 18 -- it is automatically statutory rape.

However, at the plea bargain stage, all charges were reduced to one of sex with a minor in order to spare the girl in question from having to testify. The film then focuses on the judge and the sentence, which when it appeared that Polanski who served 42 days in prison would have to serve no more, was prepared to give a stiffer sentence. That's when Polanski fled.

The Judge comes off badly, but the documentary doesn't really address what should have happened to Polanski, and what really would be fair now. It would be hard for me to give an answer -- I certainly can't say -- but I would have liked to hear other more expert opinions. The film concludes with info that recently a deal to settle Polanski's outstanding charges fell apart.

A GREAT BIG THANKS
to everyone who was kind enough to read my Op-Ed, "the pariah loophole" and responded so favorably. I hope this will help the Justice department in their efforts to deport the remaining Nazi war criminals in the United States.

Here's the link to "The Pariah Loophole" in today's LA Times in which I discuss how former Nazis remain free here because no country will take them.

This week I have two columns to share, one on Adam Sandler and Zohan, which I've posted; and another on "Making Book on LA" about the bookseller's convention, BookExpo, which was just in LA, and that I will post later (either in the blog or the Tommywood column.

Also tomorrow, Friday June 13, 2008, I will have an Op-Ed article in The Los Angeles Times, which I am contractually embargoed from posting or sending out until Saturday, but which you can certainly read in print or online tomorrow.

In the New York Times books blog, paper cuts, Rachel Donadio has a nice obituary reminiscence about Matthew J. Bruccoli, the Fitzgerald expert, who wrote many many volumes on F. Scott,, particularly about his time in Hollywood.

In high school I was a Fitzgerald fanatic, and wrote a big senior essay on Fitzgerald (although I can't recall what the paper was about). I do recall reading many of Bruccoli's books, or the books he edited. I also recall a visit to Princeton's archives where I was able to actually look at handle Fitzgerald originals including his diary.

A lot of LA restaurant news that you need to know:

Just ate at "The Hall" at the PaliHouse Hotel on Holloway just east of La Cienega (where the Nike Store once stood). Very cool. Reasonably priced -- bistro fare plus... So they have mussels, steak frites, a delicious roast chicken, but the setting is what grabs you, basically most of the restaurant is in a courtyard adjacent to the lobby of this extended stay hotel (minimum booking a week, with condos to go on sale soon).

Anisette is about to about (they are already serving breakfast and lunch, dinner comes next week. Right off the 3rd Street Promenade, in the clock tower building, where I once had an office, Anisette is designed to look like a classic bistro down to the zinc bar. The menu is also classic, onion soup, croque monsieur, salade nicoise, towers of seafood, daube de bouef and so on. Alan Giraud, the chef was at Bastide,and Lavande -- . They will serve Brunch on weekends and be open to 12-1Am most nights. With valet parking. I am very much looking forward to trying this out.

The folks behind A.O.C., Lucques, and the Hungry Cat, are opening a restaurant in Brentwood at the site of the former Hamburger Hamlet. It will also be bistro fare, but a California local produce version of bistro. There will be a cafe with their own baked goods open all day, and also serving prepared dishes to take home (such as Lucques short ribs). The bar will remain a bar area and the bakc area will be a restaurant. look for this as-yet-unnamed restaurant to open next January.

Santa Monica Seafood is also on the move. They will be giving up their current location on  Colorado  to move to  Wilshire and 10th. At the new location, I hear, they will have a little restaurant cafe and raw bar.

All good news for the hood.....

Reports appeared today that the LA Times Sunday Magazine is no more (again). Or Rather than the current regime has all been fired and that the magazine has been turned over to the business side who will devise their own version of the magazine, free from the control of the editorial side, and engage writers as they see fit -- Annie Gilbar, who some of you may recall from LA Style days, but who more recently has been hosting a show on the Home Shopping network -- not that there;s anything wrong with that.....
    I suppose this is the way of the world as extreme capitalism overtakes every institution and industry. Yes, the bean counters are in control. But is this any different than at the movie studios? Who runs the studios these days? In many cases it si executives who made their bones not in the creative ranks but rising from the marketing department -- Disney's Oren Aviv, Universal's Marc Schmuger come to mind.  At Sony, their have both Amy Pascal and Michael Lynton, at the studio's helm
    There is obvious concern that the editorial product will suffer as a result. It well may -- depeneding on what kind of magazine you are expecting. The Sunday Times may be less, say New York Review Books, and more Angeleno.
    But in order not to be tossed out with other advertising supplements the Magazine will still need to have a voice, and there is no better distinguishing factor than excellence. At the end of the day, if you hire good writers, and pay them well, --- I would like to say that will guarantee success but it doesn't (BUT I AM ALWAYS IN FAVOR OF WRITERS BEING WELL PAID).

Sightandsound.com does a great job of summarizing what's been appearing the European press of literary or cultural note. Two items I want to bring to your attention, Gyorgy Konrad, author of "The Case Worker: among many other important works on the importance of Memory.

Nepszabadsag 10.05.2008 (Hungary)
Does man need to remember? There is no question about it for writer György Konrad: "The personal history is an active working instrument, a collection of examples, a living metaphor which shows its muscles like an animal. (...) It is human to remember, it is was makes us human. Nature is indifferent to history. Grass growing on a mass grave is no less green than anywhere else. Nature does not mourn and bears no witness. To remember is an unnatural action, which takes a stand against death. Why would I want someone to live who is no longer alive? Is it not humility which prescribes the over-simplicity of forgetting. One says that people who never forget are dangerous. But one also says that God never forgets. Man's memory is a similar hubris, an audacity, like the invention of fire. The apple which forced Adam to decide between good and evil gave everything he had ever lived a simultaneous presence in his mind. Remembering is rebellion."

And the Warsaw Weekly's series on the history of Polish Anti-Semitism

Polityka 02.06.2008 (Poland)

The Warsaw weekly has now started translating selected articles into German - one of them being Tomasz Wolek's instructive history of Polish anti-Semitism and the complex relationship between Poles and Jews. It ends in a rallying call: "If anti-Semitism is an infectious disease, then it must be treated. But every therapy should be preceded by an appropriate diagnosis. We must be untiring in our efforts to get to the bottom of this shameful phenomenon and attack its historical roots. This text is not a moral treatise but a modest attempt to do just that."

Today marks the 40th Anniversary of the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy.

I shook Robert Kennedy's hand once.

I was a young kid and was attending the Puerto Rican Day parade in New York along Fifth Avenue with my father. My father loved parades and we went often -- whatever the occasion or and ethnic group: The Columbus Day Parade, the Macy's Day Parade, the St. Patrick's Day parade, the Puerto Rican Day Parade and Israel Day Parade -- we were regulars.

My father was also very active in local democratic club politics in Manhattan and he knew many of the local politicians. On this Sunday (I think it was a Sunday) I was standing at the edge of the curb with my father watching the parade when we saw the new Senator, Robert Kennedy, marching down the street.

I'm not exactly sure why, whether it was because he recognized my father or because my father hailed and greeted him or because he liked little kids, but he stepped over to me and held out his hand for me to shake. I still recall his bending down and looking me straight in the face and his smile I grasped his hand with mine. Shaking his hand made me feel connected to him, to his campaign and to all that he came to stand for.  And then he walked on.

As I said, my father was involved in Democratic politics. He and my mother had offered to host a cocktail party in our home for Robert Kennedy's Presidential campaign at which he was to appear on June 17, 1968. My parents were very excited and nervous about it.

 i  was so taken with "Bobby" and his Presidential campaign that I wore a "bobby" button for most of 1967-68.  I believed in him and everything that his campaign promised for America: social justice, a society that cared, and end to the Vietnam war-- all cast in an idealistic yet pragmatic can-do agenda.

There had been a cover of Time magazine with Kennedy on it done by Roy Lichtenstein in his pop style that I had framed and put on my wall.

The night of the California primary I stayed awake with my father watching returns. Kennedy had basically set California as a litmus test for his campaign --if he lost, it was over; if he won, we were confident he would go on to win the nomination.

As it got past midnight, I was tired. My father suggested we both go to sleep and wake up early the next morning to find Kennedy the winner.

My father woke me early with the words "The Senator's been shot." I still remember sitting in my little room (what in real estate parlance would be referred to as the maid's room), a window looking out to an air shaft and watching my 13 inch black & white television with the rabbit ears tilted out the window for better reception.

"Again" was the word that stuck in my mind. Again. Martin Luther King had been shot just two months before, John F. Kennedy five years before -- It seemed as if America was becoming unglued. We certainly felt that way as we watched in shock the reports confirming Kennedy's death.

A few years ago, when I had to close out and empty my parent's apartment after they had both passed away, I came across the framed picture of Bobby Kennedy from my childhood.

It now hangs in my office and I am looking at it as I write this.  He looks so young -- it's as if he's in mid-speech -- a speech he was never to finish.

And it is usually his mother.

    I am reminded of this when reading the obits of Yves St. Laurent, who died this past week.

    About fifteen years ago as part of co-authoring Marvin Traub's memoirs, I accompanied on his last visit to the Paris collections as head of Bloomingdale's. At one event, a cocktail party, I found myself talking to a very nice, very well put-together and ageless seeming older woman who was, in fact, Yves St; Laurent's mother. She had a sparkle to her and it was clear that she was a force in her son's life. She was the first one he showed his drawings and designs to, the first he designed dresses for... and I noted in the obituaries that she survives him.

Amy Fine Collins, who often writes on fashion, and who administrates the International Best Dressed List, has written an exclusive web piece for VanityFair.com called "Jewish Like Me" about her own feelings and experiences, and coming to terms with her Jewish identity.

Like many journalists, sometimes the best stories you have to tell, are the ones you avoid, that force you to discuss uncomfortable moments in your life and expose others -- going to those places and writing about them sometimes produces great writing, great stories (and in the case of the Judd Apatow gang, great comedies --but that's another story). Here, Collins has written a wonderful piece that deserves to be read far and wide, and she deserves kudos for doing do. Brava! and, more to the point, Mazel Tov!

Then go to a showing of "Sex in the City." I went with my wife last night, and despite being a Tuesday evening, the theater was filled, filled with women in groups of five or more, so much so that the estrogen was palpable.

As for the movie, to fans of the show it delivered what they were looking for, plenty of the girls, lots of over the top fashion and dress and shoe fetish -- not a whole lot of story or character development (certainly none for the men).

To say the movie was long -well, let me put in another way, the movie was akin to waiting for your wife to get ready to leave the house, in fact, the movie was pretty much structured that way as well, with plenty of attention to each dressing ritual, each holiday, each event.

Here's the thing: most of the women in the room will see it again, tell their friends who haven't seen it to do so, and see and buy the video.

    BookExpo, the bookseller's and publisher's convention was held in LA last weekend, It was dizzying and fun. Great to see and run into friends and people who one knows just by email  I have a stack of free galleys, and signed books to go through, and a stack of business cards to follow up on.
    In short: the general consensus was that booksellers spent less and fewer attended BookExpo this year, but they were happy to be in LA and had fun here. There were parties all over town. Last Friday both Public Affairs and the New York Review of Books had parties at the Bel Air Hotel.
     Still it's great to see so many people who love books -- and as someone said, the people who buy books, continue to buy books.
    There was a fair amount of talk about digital books and the Kindle. Everyone agrees it will be part of the mix, just how much is not clear.
    The real question, at least for publisher and writers, is when most non-fiction books only sell 6,000 copies, what can you pay, how many people can you employ, how do you structure a business around that reality?
    Anyhow I am working on a long column on the book Expot that will appear in the Arts and LA insert of the Jewish Journal of Los Angeles, so I will give a fuller picture then.

There is an article in today's New York Times where M. Night tries to repair some of the damage done surrounding "Lady in the Lake," his last movie which performed abysmally. 

He goes on about his maverick qualities and how he hasn't sold out - blah, blah blah.

Part of what M. Night fails to say (and perhaps fails to recognize ), is the reason that the collective schadenfreude of Hollywood has grown as his last projects performed poorly,  is that he fails to acknowledge that studio and development executives have any talent, purpose or can add anything to his work.

    Let me analogize: as a print journalist , I work with editors and although some of them I grumble about, others have improved and do improve what I write, that goes for editors making suggestions for new subjects to write about, to asking questions about what I've written that force me to reassess or clarify my thinking and my writing, to line editing and the work of copy editors.

    The notion that Studio execs, producers and development execs -- professionals who have read thousands of scripts and have watched and studied thousands of movies and have some experience with what has worked and what doesn't -- can add value and improve his work or at least serve as a sounding board -- is not something that M. Night acknowledges. Night thinks it is all him, him, him. And his poor showings recently at the box office are, appropriately, to be blamed on him.

    I remember when "The Sixth Sense" was a spec script, No one, including its producer Barry Mendel, knew if the film would work. They gave M. Night a chance. He needs to realize that, in fact, he doesn't work alone.

This morning's newspapers are writing about the success of the "SEX IN THE CITY" movie. The newspapers and studios are SHOCKED, SHOCKED SHOCKED that women over 30 are going in droves to the movies.
This hasn't happened since....Well, since THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA starring the over 30 Meryl Streep, or THE FIRST WIVES CLUB, with Bette Midler, Goldie Hahn and Diane Keaton, or WHAT WOMEN WANT with Diane Keaton and Jack Nicholson.
    Which is to say that actually of course women over 30 can drive a movie to be a hit -- BUT THE STUDIOS WILL NOT MAKE MORE MOVIES FOR THIS AUDIENCE, because the reall question is HOW OFTEN WILL WOMEN MAKE A MOVIE A HIT? In the World War II era, movie audiences were heavily female, and the Screwball comedies or noirish thrillers which we all admire today got made because women could be counted on to go to the movies in the afternoon, mid-week, or on the weekends with their dates or husbands. Now getting these women to the theaters is an EVENT -- and although the studios will put projects into development to attract this demographic they will do so sparingly -- They are still chasing "The four quadrants" men, women, teens of both genders, etc...