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Hollywood's Most Threatening Blog
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Why Variety and the Los Angeles Times have so much to lose in their battle to bring down Deadline Hollywood Daily.
Nikki Finke, who runs Deadline Hollywood Daily, has broken some controversial stories in Hollywood, so it’s not surprising to see her become one herself. This weekend, Variety launched an extraordinary three-part attack that was ostensibly aimed at blogging in general but clearly was aimed at one influential online journalist in particular.
The trade publication’s weekend package included a column by Variety editor Peter Bart under the headline “Hollywood’s Blog Smog” that bemoans the fact that blogs are sometimes used as weapons of intimidation by players in the industry who know how to manipulate them. Then there was a bylined article that seemed to be little more than an extension of Bart’s editorial; the headline—“Tempest of the `Toldja!’ Journalists"—clearly aimed at Finke, because a screaming “TOLDJA!!” in her headlines is one of her signatures. And Finke was blasted in a piece from columnist Michael Fleming (“How I Got Blogged Down”) about the difficulty of maintaining journalistic standards given the overheated online competition.
It’s not that Finke doesn’t have her own favorites—but that hardly means Peter Bart is in a position to call names.
There may be a great deal of validity in Variety’s discussion of blogging in general and Finke in particular. But she is largely inoculated by the simple phrase, “consider the source.” Variety’s Bart—who obviously ordered up this assault—would be in a far better position if he were not guilty of two cardinal sins: transparently carrying the studios’ water on many occasions and ceding so much of the turf of real news coverage that there was plenty of soil in which a blogger with Finke’s news chops and outsized personality could take root.
Finke is truly a larger-than-life figure in Hollywood, a place thickly populated with big personalities. The former debutante is much discussed but rarely seen; only a couple of photos of her are floating around the Internet, the most recent of which, Finke claims, is from 2006. She is accused of being many unpleasant things: shrill, vindictive, self-promoting, and more. But what can’t be disputed is that she has broken some important news, notably NBC-Universal’s hiring of Ben Silverman to run the network and more recently, the fact that Peter Chernin was leaving his job as Rupert Murdoch’s No. 2 man at News Corp.
Thanks in part to a loyal cadre of sources and to the enormous vacuum she filled during the writers’ strike, Finke’s column has become a must-read in Hollywood. And clearly, Variety’s Bart cannot take it anymore. But the most serious allegation in the whole Variety takedown came from columnist Fleming. He briefly spanked Time Out! New York and Perez Hilton, among others, for reporting Natasha Richardson’s death before it had occurred. But he reserved his sharpest barbs for Finke.
“On Jan. 29, 2008, at 2:33 p.m., Nikki Finke on her Deadline Hollywood site stated that ICM was beset with troubles and that Jeff Berg was leaving. A little later, that item disappeared. A new post materialized with the same time stamp, and this lead: ‘Let me knock down that rumor making the rounds that Jeff Berg is supposedly leaving ICM on April 15th ...’ Finke, Fleming observed, was ‘in the unenviable position of debunking a rumor that she had started.’”
He also suggested that her writers’ strike coverage was filled with “rah-rah pro-union posts,” which belatedly counters Finke’s assertion that Variety was a shill for the studios.
Asked about the allegations about the Berg post and about the Variety onslaught generally, Finke untypically declined to comment. No doubt she’ll have her say and then some on her website, probably by the time you’re reading this.
And she may have a lot to work with. Bart has been editor of Variety for a long time—he’s in his late seventies. I recounted as long ago as 1996 the ways in which he carried water for his friend (and television co-host) Peter Guber during the years when Guber ran Sony Pictures into the ground. (Variety's relentlessly upbeat spin on Sony’s financial failures is detailed in Hit & Run: How Jon Peters and Peter Guber Took Sony for a Ride in Hollywood, the book that I co-wrote with Nancy Griffin.) There was more material questioning Bart’s objectivity—as well as alleged sexism and racism—in a blockbuster 2001 article by Amy Wallace in Los Angeles magazine.
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It was unfortunate that Natasha Richardson's death was reported erroneously, but understandable. I knew through friends that she was brain dead and could not be resuscitated quite early on I think, Tuesday, of that awful week.
I had gathered as much before it was confirmed by friends, because due to cabin pressure changes, if there had been any hope of recovery she couldn't have flown.
The acting community is really very small and the news flew, and brain dead became deceased. No malice was intended, it was testament to the inordinate number of people who loved and admired Natasha Richardson that the news traveled so fast, so quickly.
People felt such anguish, that rather than give people false hope that she might recover, friends delivered the truth, even though it had not been confirmed by Natasha's family or the press.
Please, let's not add insult to injury by turning this into some kind of cause celebre. Natasha was adored, and people were and still are devastated. It makes little difference which day of the week she left us. All that matters is that she is gone and cannot be replaced.
Once interesting Variety and the Hollywood Reporter have become the rag where press releases go to be reprinted. Since the corporate takeovers of both papers, the wall between advertising and editorial has crumbled, so that both Variety and Hollywood Reporter are boring, useless except for the raw data in charts, and even that is available online elsewhere.
No wonder a blogger has filled the vacuum
I am a regular source for Nikki but I never, ever call the Variety newsroom for one reason and one reason only: I know that Nikki will print the truth, however ugly it may be, whereas Variety will not print anything that might make the studios/networks look bad since Variety's lifeblood is advertising from those companies. There is a place for Variety and it does break neutral/positive news but for the real scoop it's Nikki since she's in a position to run it and Variety isn't.
Ooooh, more he-said-she-said oiut of Hollywood. Just what we all need!
Tho I'm not a regular source for Nikki, I'd always come to her first with my breaking tags, no bout a doubt it. With her incredibly low VIQ (Vested Interest Quotient), where else ya gonna go? (Not Seattle's proud daily anymore, given the Intelligencer's bold entertainment business coverage went & got them bankrupt now, didn't it?). Nice of Kim to keep us up-to-date on what's churning up the Hollywood Execs' poor tummies. Perhaps Mr Bart & Co should look into spending more of their hatchet budget on volcano monitoring, or something...
Love & Hugs to all our Readers.
ps. Sorry to the SI crew - was just being playful there. We don't want to see you go... Us Aussies aren't born with a balanced perspective on what's generally regarded as being humorous.
At the time of her death Natasha Richardson did not have a publicist which left the door open for a lot of speculation and the use of unreliable and conflicting sources.
smdunne must be VERY important because he?she? knows people who know people who know people who know it's a bad idea to put brain dead people in planes.
"Maintaining journalistic standards" in the gossip business is a laff and a half. After watching HBO's "Winchell" and reading further about his MO, it is clear that Walter Winchell set the bar high for yellow journalism in the 1940's. The rest are swimming in his wake.
Wow, I so don't care.
There is a story published today in VARIETY : WGA Levies Suit Gets Messy, in which the journalist Dave McNary relates what happened yesterday at a hearing in Los Angeles Superior Court on the lawsuits against the Writers Guild, Screen Actors Guild and Directors Guild.
It is a story written by a journalist based not on sources but on his attendance at the court hearing.
When the L.A.WEEKLY commissioned, from former L.A. TIMES journalist and author of FATAL SUBTRACTION and THE LAST MOGUL Dennis McDougal, a story on so-called foreign levies, Nikki Finke, who writes a column for the WEEKLY, went to the editor warning that if I were McDougal's source she better kill the story.
McDougal has certainly proven over the years that he can take care of himself.
What real journalist would go to the extreme Finke did, to harm another journalist, and to suppress the publication of a story?
Consider that the story, which impacts on every writer, lyricist, performer, director, composer, and other creatives in the business Finke covers, is a story that Finke has never gone near.
And that the lawyer, who filed all three foreign levies lawsuits, against the Screen Actors Guild, Directors Guild, and Writers Guild, is Finke's own lawyer, representing her in her own private lawsuits.
In attempting to get the story killed, more than embarrassing herself,Ms. Masters, did Finke not disgrace herself?
Eric Hughes
scough - I'm not remotely important. My spouse is though, as a grossly underpaid and overworked Emergency Room physician in a public hospital, and is in a position to make informed comments on a situation like Natasha Richardson's. Your comment was ugly and ignorant. The only reason I commented was to ask that she not be used as some kind of media event. I hope that you will now crawl back into whatever sorry little hole you crawled out of.
To Eric Hughes:
Someone gave you very incorrect information. You can check with LA Weekly Deputy Editor Jill Stewart and former Deputy Editor Joe Donnelly. Yes, I was asked by the editors if it was OK with me that Dennis McDougal write about the WGA. I said yes. I have known Dennis since we both worked at the LA Times, and I consider him an excellent reporter. And I never once mentioned you. I completely stayed out of the story because I knew Dennis had it covered.
I just had a conversation with Nikki Finke who provided me with information that I had been incorrectly informed about events preceding the publication of the LA Weekly story.
I want to thank her for so quickly contacting me so that I can provide this timely correction.
Eric Hughes
Thank you.
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