July 2006

July 30, 2006
Back to showbiz.
Yesterday I spent a long, dizzying and rewarding day of seminars at the Hollywood branch of the Directors Guild, catching up with other members on the sea-change taking place in the moviemaking business. The transformation of film recording and playing to digital recording and playing from experts in this

July 22, 2006
The LA Times, praise G*d, has become quite funny and readable lately.
An editorial today approvingly reports that an open microphone at the dinner table at last Monday’s Group of 8 summit in St. Petersburg was responsible for revealing the REAL George Bush,
He was heard to say that politicians “talk too

From the particular (that’s you and me) to the general (that’s large groups of people, crowds, states, countries), deductive/inductive reasoning brings them all together.
It is no news that individuals declare war on each other, either politely or perhaps in (civil?) court.
To plead that there would be no war if only nations were sensible

Events in the Middle East are escalating rapidly. The latest spark was the involvement of one Gilad Shalit, a lone Israeli soldier, on June 25, abducted by agents of the militant Hezbollah fighters, who hold seats in the Lebanese government.
Let’s revisit a time 92 years ago, two years after the Titanic went down. You

July 17, 2006
I read today in a health report in the LA Times, that if 70 is in the rear-view mirror, which it is, I shouldn’t feel guilty if I’m skipping the gym, the daily workout on the tennis court, the few laps in the swimming pool, practice drives at my home-built driving range,

I wonder how many English immigrants to these shores have bought English and Irish products from Pasadena’s Rose Tree Cottage, either by mail-order, or with a visit accompanied by a spot of afternoon tea, served with traditional elegance by my friend Edmund Fry, looking for all the world like a properly dressed movie butler (think

As everybody must know by now, Star Jones left ABC’s “The View” on June 26. She announced her departure on the show BEFORE the PTB (Powers That Be) had given her permission, and it certainly wasn’t in that day’s script. She caused Barbara Walters to be publicly embarrassed (a cardinal sin), who herself then made

You pitch an idea to a production company, nothing happens, and later you find your idea being used in a script.
What to do?
It’s long been established that you can copyright a manuscript, but not an idea. But wait!
Legal theory says that if you suspect that your idea has been hijacked, you can