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Media Mess: Website Jezebel Shuttered, 23 People Laid Off at Company, Join Conde Nast, Other Dismissals

Roger Friedman
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Media Mess: Website Jezebel Shuttered, 23 People Laid Off at Company, Join Conde Nast, Other Dismissals

It’s no fun writing these stories.

Jezebel, once a big deal website for women, is being shut today by G/O Media. Jezebel is part of the company that housed Gawker long ago. (A revived Gawker closed a while ago.) G/O still has some other sites, but they are all suffering. No knows how to monetize these sites. My sympathies are extended to them.

A big part of the problem, the biggest maybe, is Google. Google rules the internet. They capriciously change the algorithm that brings readers to sites. There is no one to talk to at the company. It’s a machine. It’s the antithesis of publishing. Or humanity. I have a constant headache dealing with Google for this site. I can’t imagine having a dozen employees depending on me. It’s impossible.

Google controls web traffic and they also control advertising via Google Adsense. There is constant discussion on Twitter X about SEO– Search Engine Optimization — and how to overcome constant censoring by Google, or getting around the latest algorithm changes. No one really knows anything. The ‘experts’ are always trying to make logic out of a Kafka like scheme.

So I am sorry about Jezebel, which had lots of good writers and articles. It’s a dismal situation. Conde Nast just had a bunch of layoffs, and more are happening throughout what is left of online publishing. Amazon just alid off a bunch of people in Amazon Music, communications and editorial staff. And they’re Amazon! Most of the blogs you read have very few readers other than a small, targeted audience. How they survive is a mystery. It’s not a game for the faint of heart.

Bleaker Street: Meg Ryan-David Duchovny Rom-Com DOA at Theaters After One Disastrous Week

Roger Friedman
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Bleaker Street: Meg Ryan-David Duchovny Rom-Com DOA at Theaters After One Disastrous Week

Meg Ryan and David Duchovny’s romcom, “What Happens Later” is DOA at theaters.

So what does happen later, after the death of a movie? VOD, DVD.

“What Happens Later” comes from Bleecker Street Films, which did a disappointing job marketing the film despite the stars appearing on a few talk shows. The movie made no connection with the public. The press had no grasp of it.

I can say that I never received a press release or screening for it. “What Happens Later” was supposed to have the flavor of a Nora Ephron movie, but there was no effort to promote it that way, especially in New York.

After one week, “What Happens Later” has made just $2 million. Last night, it made the same amount as “Radical,” a movie with no stars that played in 1,000 fewer theaters. That’s how bad things are.

Neither Ryan or Duchovny needs money or has to prove anything in their careers. But it would have been nice to have even a middling hit.

Jane Fonda Celebrates Victories of Climate Change Activist Candidates, Others Backed By Her Political Action Committee

Roger Friedman
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Jane Fonda Celebrates Victories of Climate Change Activist Candidates, Others Backed By Her Political Action Committee

Viva Jane Fonda!

The tireless climate activist (and Oscar and Emmy winner, Tony nominee, and God knows what else) is celebrating, and rightly so.

Fonda’s Political Action Committee saw almost all of their endorsed candidates for Virginia’s state legislature won. The number is a whopping 13 out of 14.

As the actress notes on her website:

“That means that Democrats held the Senate flipped the House and won control of the State General Assembly. Take that Gov. Youngkin! We also supported winning candidates for School Board and Board of Supervisors in Fairfax County, Virginia!”

Fonda adds: “Our candidate for Minneapolis City Council won the first round of ranked choice voting by only 59 votes.”

Before the pandemic, Fonda started her Fire Drill Fridays marches and webcasts. She went to Washington and got arrested protesting the lack of action on climate change. Along the way she’s built a grassroots campaign that has targeted subjects like fossil fuel but also the inequality of race and financial status when it comes to pollution.

She says on her blog: “I’m posting about this because I want people to see that down ballot races are truly strategic when it comes to confronting the climate crisis. It’s state legislatures, city councils, county executives, mayors, and supervisors where the robust work on climate is taking place these days. Please remember this when you vote in 2024. And we must ALL vote. Voting for someone doesn’t mean you’re marrying them! It means making a pragmatic decision that will make a difference in how hard or easy your life will be. And let’s all remember this: IT’S BETTER TO TRY AND MOVE AN ALLY THAN TO BE BLOCKED BY A FASCIST.”

Fonda is also celebrating wins in Minneapolis, San Diego, and Pennsylvania.

Jane Fonda is the rare celebrity who has spent her whole life devoted to positive change, and to exposing corporate and government fraud. She is fearless. And what’s great is, time has proven her right on everything she’s campaigned for and against whether it was war, women’s rights, things like the South Dakota pipeline, or now, the most urgent shifts in the environment.

You can read her blog here.

Bravo!

Talking Heads Start Making Sense: Reunion Once in a Lifetime Tour May Be Shaping Up as Group Reconnects on Publicity Tour

Roger Friedman
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Talking Heads Start Making Sense: Reunion Once in a Lifetime Tour May Be Shaping Up as Group Reconnects on Publicity Tour

“Stay tuned.”

Two words from Talking Heads guitarist Chris Frantz have set the rock world aflame.

Is there a reunion tour coming? Of course there is.

Frantz posted those words on Instagram yesterday with a clip from the group’s recent appearance on Stephen Colbert.

Since the Toronto Film Festival, David Byrne, married couple Frantz and Tina Weymouth, and drummer Jerry Harrison have been promoting the re-release of their 1984 Jonathan Demme concert film, “Stop Making Sense,”

After years of acrimony, the quartet has actually seemed to be enjoying themselves, reminiscing about the good old days. Byrne is actually laughing and engaging with the other three who made waves on their own as the Tom Tom Club. (The latter made one of the most sampled records of all time called “Genius of Love.” Mariah Carey even used it for an entire record!)

Presumably the Heads’ legal problems have long been settled, so an anniversary tour of “Stop Making Sense” actually makes sense. Plus, Byrne’s Broadway musical, “Here Lies Love,” is closing in two weeks after a disappointing run, so he may be open to a massive money making opportunity.

A Talking Heads reunion tour would be a sell out in minutes, of course. Even though there would be a desire to book arenas, they would be better off in places like Radio City Music Hall or the Beacon Theater where they could do “sit downs” or residencies. Or why not a Broadway theater? Whatever happens, it will be a “once in a lifetime” event!

Rachel Maddow Was Back on MSNBC Monday After 2 Weeks– And She Beat Sean Hannity Again

Roger Friedman
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Rachel Maddow Was Back on MSNBC Monday After 2 Weeks– And She Beat Sean Hannity Again

Rachel Maddow was back on MSNBC Monday after a bout of COVID.

She had to take last Monday off, which I’m sure alarmed network executives. Maddow’s once a week show is their ratings jewel in the crown.

Indeed, Maddow’s return this past Monday was a success. She beat Fox News’s Sean Hannity at 9pm by almost 400,000 viewers. She had 2.45 million fans.

Maddow’s triumphant return pulled along Lawrence O’Donnell at 10pm who similarly trounced Greg Gutfeld. Stephanie Ruhle bulldozed Fox’s Trace Gallagher at 11pm,

Still, Fox News won the night with its earlier shows including The Five, Jesse Watters, and Laura Ingraham.

What’s weird about all this is how the key demo goes: the Fox audience is skewing a little younger as the evening goes on. The MSNBC key demo goes younger earlier, with Ari Melber beating Bret Baier. So younger people are watching Fox after 9pm? Or it just that the older Fox audience goes to bed?

Either way, it was great to see Rachel back on the screen, making sense of the incomprehensible.

The Strike Ends: The Rush to Promote Movies for the Oscars Is On, Get Ready for a Flood

Roger Friedman
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The Strike Ends: The Rush to Promote Movies for the Oscars Is On, Get Ready for a Flood

Even though Bradley Cooper’s “Maestro” played at the Venice and New York Film Festivals, it still hasn’t had a lot of ballyhoo. Cooper wasn’t even allowed to speak the New York Film Fest even though he directed and starred in the movie. SAG strike rules forbade it.

But with the strike over, Netflix — like all the studios — are ready to turn on the spigot of publicity. This isn’t just for box office, but for awards season. In less than a month, nominations will be announced for the Critics Choice Awards and some kind of Golden Globes. Also, the NY Film Critics and other cities’ critics groups will be making decisions.

We’re finally going to hear from Cooper and co-star Carey Mulligan, who’s so sensational in the biopic marriage story of composer Leonard Bernstein.

We’re probably going to be hearing from and seeing the casts of a lot of movies that opened during the strike including “Killers of the Flower Moon,” “Barbie,” and “Oppenheimer.” They’ve been silent since mid July.

And the end of the strike makes it a lot easier for all the talk shows, as well as “Saturday Night Live,” to give a retroactive push to the films. You can only imagine the jostling among bookers to get Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert De Niro, Margot Robbie, Ryan Gosling, and so on.

Who loses in this revived PR machine? The directors. They’ve been doing all the heavy lifting for months, answering questions, posing for pictures, etc. They did yeoman service, but now it’s time to step back and let the beautiful people they cast in their films take over.

On this year’s red carpet, when a star is asked. What are you wearing? The answer will be: a grin.

Breaking: SAG Actors Strike is Over as Union, Studios Reach Agreement Thanks In Large Part to The Nanny

Roger Friedman
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Breaking: SAG Actors Strike is Over as Union, Studios Reach Agreement Thanks In Large Part to The Nanny

The 118 day actors strike is over. Details coming

SAG president Fran Drescher, best known for playing “The Nanny,” stood her ground when the AMPTP used all kinds of PR tactics to pressure the union.

But Drescher and her negotiating team would not give in. Though this is just a three year contract, it sets new standards for the future in streaming royalties and artificial intelligence.

Why the studios forced everyone to go through a four and a half month strike and work stoppage will be studied in the future. But as of now, Hollywood is back to business.

Taylor Swift Will Hold Jung Kook at Bay with New “1989” Set to Best BTS Singer’s Album

Roger Friedman
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Taylor Swift Will Hold Jung Kook at Bay with New “1989” Set to Best BTS Singer’s Album

The sales numbers are shaping up for albums this week. Guess who will be number 1?

Hitsdailydouble says Taylor Swift — who last week sold 1.5 million copies of “1989 (Taylor’s Version)” — will be back on top. Swifties are picking up another 225,000 copies.

This means that BTS star Jung Kook, despite a ton of hype and stuffing of the ballot box, will finish at number 2. “Golden” will come in with just 160,000 copies sold.

This is certainly a loss for Scooter Braun, who now runs BTS business in the US but became Public Enemy Number 1 for buying and then selling off Swift’s masters without permission.

Jung Kook’s single, “Standing Next to You,” is currently holding positions 1-4 on iTunes. But that is suspect, and part of a pattern with BTS singles on iTunes. Fans swamp the site with purchases, but when it’s over, the numbers are always lower than expected.

Barry Manilow Comes After Mariah Carey with a Surprise Version of Her “All I Want for Christmas” Perennial

Roger Friedman
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Barry Manilow Comes After Mariah Carey with a Surprise Version of Her “All I Want for Christmas” Perennial

All Barry Manilow wants for Christmas is a hit with his cover of Mariah Carey’s holiday song.

Manilow dropped “All I Want for Christmas” last Friday with little fanfare. But now it’s jumped up to number 4 on iTunes holiday song list. His spare version is a welcome relief to Carey’s Phil Spector wall of sound perennial. Manilow’s voice never sounded better.

Meanwhile, Manilow’s Broadway musical, “Harmony,” opens Monday with all new songs. He’d like that to be a hit, too, Santa.

Disney-Marvel’s Adrift “The Marvels” Panned by Reviewers: Have Cash Cow Super Hero Movies Finally Worn Out Their Welcome?

Roger Friedman
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Disney-Marvel’s Adrift “The Marvels” Panned by Reviewers: Have Cash Cow Super Hero Movies Finally Worn Out Their Welcome?

All good things must come to an end, even super hero movies.

So it may be for “The Marvels,” which debuts tomorrow night. The 33rd Disney-Marvel comic book film is being panned by reviewers.

Despite the great Brie Larson, “The Marvels” has a 54% rating on Rotten Tomatoes — and it’s sinking.

Reviewers are calling it a mess, boring, and irrelevant.

What’s clear is that “The Marvels” was always a movie in search of an idea. It’s been held and reworked a lot. Now it seems to make up for lack of a plot and a villain, Marvel threw in a lot of Marvel Universe connections to keep it alive.

I guess it didn’t work, not even the sight of Robert Downey Jr. in the trailers. Iron Man/Tony Stark has been dead a long time.

Marvel had been on a roll for a long time. But with the pandemic and strikes, they are finally seeing backlash. They’ve also got a major problem with the next three planned “Avengers” movies. Jonathan Majors is supposed to star as the villain Kang. But he’s on trial soon for domestic abuse. Whether or not he’s found innocent of all charges, Majors may be too tainted now for Disney to keep him. “The Avengers” movies are now in limbo.

Marvel may have to wait to be marvel-ous for a while.

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