LA Observed archive
for August 2004

If you don't find what you want here, check another month or search below.

Canada blames Gehry *

When hockey officials in Canada asked Frank Gehry to design a new trophy, they apparently expected something, well, else. The unveiling in May at a Hockey Hall of Fame ceremony...

Gumbel book deal

Andrew Gumbel, the L.A. correspondent for the Independent, has sold Steal This Vote! to Nation Books. They call it "an entertaining history of American electoral fraud, and the larger than...

L.A.'s a hot dog town

Now there's a blog just for scouting out the best frankfurters around. The Hot Dog Spot is mildly Valley centric, though its team of tubesteak seekers apparently hasn't gotten yet...

Arnold night in NY *

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger gets a prime speaking slot tonight at the Republican convention to introduce himself to the national party. In today's L.A. Times, Joe Mathews stops in with some...

New space reporter

The Times' John Johnson is moving to the science desk to cover space exploration. He has been the roving reporter on the Central Coast. The memo from Science Editor Ashley...

LAT exec goes to Hoy

Gisselle Acevedo-Franco, vice president for public affairs at the L.A. Times, gets the new title of president of Hoy, the Tribune's Spanish-language paper here. Also, Juan Arango, general manager and...

Local Emmy winners

KMEX channel 34 won the most (seven) local Emmy awards over the weekend, followed by Fox 11 (six). Individual winners include Diego Carro of KVEA/KWHY as best news writer, Cris...

On location in New York

After a night of parties, the Republicans get going today in New York. KCRW's Warren Olney goes on the air from the convention at 1 p.m. with "To The Point"...

DWP chief defends PR millions

Dominick Rubalcava is president of the commission that oversees the city Department of Water and Power. In an interview with the L.A. Business Journal's Howard Fine, he defends the department's...

LAT does LALA Times

David Shaw's Media Matters column in yesterday's Times was all about George Wolfe and his news satire site, the LALA Times. Wolfe, 40, is an ex-playwright from Virginia and now...

This month in Los Angeles *

The magazine's September issue out now is a good one, and I'd say that even if I didn't have the cover story on Mayor Jim Hahn and his political conundrum....

Times shakes up cityside

Janet Clayton came upstairs from the editorial page in June to take over as editor in charge of L.A. Times state and local coverage. After sizing up things for a...

Playing catch up

Some things to note from while I was gone:    • Larry McCormick: The co-anchor of the KTLA "News at Ten Weekend Edition" began at channel 5 as a weatherman in 1971....

OK, time's up

I'm back after a few weeks away from the web to recharge and enjoy the summer. There are some changes to point out. You can now read posts by topic...

Summer respite...

I'm out of here until August 30. I thought about pressing guest bloggers into service or claiming to be "on assignment" then posting an occasional item. But in the end,...

We all feel his pain

| 9 Comments
Lee Watters tried to register for CalendarLive. It didn't go well. He emails: I registered. They sent me the confirmation email. I logged in. They sent me to the screen...

No 'Birth' tonight

The Silent Movie Theatre scuttled plans to screen D.W. Griffith's landmark but racist film The Birth of a Nation tonight because of threats and complaints. The Times website reports: Charlie...

Reuters outsources to India

| 1 Comment
The wire service (oops, "financial news and information provider") will set up a newsroom in Bangalore to replace higher-priced editorial staffers elsewhere in the world, AP says. They will focus...

'Rich in faith'

| 1 Comment
The Ahmanson family made a lot of money in Los Angeles and left a lot of it here. The theatre at the Music Center is named for Howard F. Ahmanson,...

Block vs. O'Reilly

| 5 Comments
Television Week editor Alex Ben Block accepted an invitation into the Fox News lair of Bill O'Reilly and lived to tell about it. It was an irresistible invitation to go...

Checking in on L&T

The same night that Bill Clinton guests on "The Daily Show," his favorite fiction author is being featured on "Life and Times" on KCET. Walter Mosley's latest Easy Rawlins mystery...

Kinsley sighting

A conversation with Times editorial and opinion editor Michael Kinsley will be first up when Zócalo returns to the Central Library on Sept. 7. This week's program at California Plaza...

JTV

| 1 Comment
New York real estate lawyer John Odoner hopes to launch Jewish Television as a 24-hour digital cable channel early next year, the New York Times says. His planned programming includes...

Gawker editor #3

| 21 Comments
Choire Sicha of Gawker.com is being promoted with the title of Editorial Director of all the websites at Gawker Media, including Defamer here in L.A and Wonkette. Sicha had replaced...

More PR trouble *

| 4 Comments
Another batch of questionable public relations contracts with a political twist has caught the media's eyes. The Times' Jason Felch reports today that the giant Metropolitan Water District has paid...

Shaketown

I'm reading The Myth of Solid Ground: Earthquakes, Prediction, and the Fault Line Between Reason and Faith by David L. Ulin, which must be the prettiest, most thought-provoking writing about...

Turmoil at the Voice

The LA Weekly shares owners with the Village Voice and must be closely observing the tremors shivering the timbers of the New York weekly. As the New York Times summarizes...

Tough call in Fawnskin

After scouring the forest around Big Bear for nine days, searchers on Sunday told the parents of nine-year-old David Gonzales that most of them were giving up and heading home....

Sunday shorts

   • They're out there: George Noory sends "Coast to Coast AM" into the overnight air from a studio on Ventura Blvd. (LAT Mag)    • Business as usual: Mayoral candidates still raising money...

The Gagne question *

| 9 Comments
In advance of going out to the stadium tonight, I decided to look at how Eric Gagne has done in the week since the Dodgers traded his bullpen setup man,...

New L.A. landmark

| 2 Comments
Where else but here would deem an eight-story parking garage as a cultural monument. The Beaux Arts-style design by Curlett and Beelman at 816 S. Grand Avenue downtown got its...

Toluca subway tunnel

| 12 Comments
Preserve L.A. has an update on the old 1920s subway tunnel entrance visible on West 2nd Street at Beverly near downtown. There was a City Hall hearing today about the...

Friday media shorts *

| 2 Comments
New entries added at end    • Former LAT publisher David Laventhol is writing the history of Times Mirror for Public Affairs. The company's former chief exec, his working title is A...

Charging for links **

| 6 Comments
Fark is one of the most popular blogs that links to stories, but competitor (see comments) Jason Calacanis tells Wired News that the site asked him for money in exchange...

Dargis arrives *

| 12 Comments
Manohla Dargis' first film review for the New York Times runs in today's paper. A.O. Scott takes Open Water; she reviews the L.A. movie. In Collateral, the edgy new thriller...

Blogger acceptance *

Mark Glaser writes in USC's Online Journalism Review that more newspapers are cooperating with bloggers to link stories and drive readers to the paper. The prime example is the Wall...

A word about sponsors

| 10 Comments
L.A. Observed is pleased to introduce a new Premium Sponsor: The Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles. The community paper is published weekly on Fridays. Click on the logo at...

New stunt from "John and Ken"

| 25 Comments
KFI's "John and Ken Show" is holding five local Republican members of Congress hostage in a fashion over illegal immigration. The talk show hosts are mobilizing their large-for-radio audience to...

Those big bad SUVs *

| 6 Comments
Slate magazine's Andy Bowers does a little poking around and discovers that in many cities — including Los Angeles, Santa Monica and Pasadena — SUV's exceed the tonnage allowed to...

Behold the blook

| 2 Comments
Yes, blook. Ian Williams in the LA Weekly uses the term to describe the recent books by Arianna Huffington and the sister-brother team of Amy and David Goodman. He calls...

I guess publicity wasn't enough

That Valley man who was freed from jail on a murder rap after his alibi checked out — thanks to footage from HBO's "Curb Your Enthusiasm" — is suing the...

Green card TV

| 2 Comments
The headline is from Franklin Avenue, the blog by Michael Schneider and Maria Villar that is having a good week. Their top item today is about this morning's L.A. Times...

Cartier-Bresson dead in France

| 2 Comments
Couldn't find an L.A. angle, except that Henri Cartier-Bresson's photographs probably hang in every museum in town. The Reuters story on his death at age 95 calls him "one of...

Psst, what's the code for syrup?

| 2 Comments
In today's Times food section, Leslee Komaiko offers a quick rundown of restaurants with "secret" fare not on the menu -- you know, the higher-brow equivalent of In-N-Out's animal style...

Axing blog comments *

| 37 Comments
Not here, not yet — despite some recent talk in various comment threads. But Michelle Malkin, the former L.A. Daily News editorial writer and current syndicated columnist who blogs, has...

Chick finally pulls her endorsement

| 1 Comment
Almost from the moment that city controller Laura Chick endorsed Jim Hahn for reelection, she has been making noises about changing her mind. After all, her audits of problems in...

Checking in on Perenchio

| 7 Comments
Business Week's L.A. bureau chief Ron Grover has a media piece in this issue on Jerrold Perenchio, the "heavyweight on Latin airwaves" who has also been a big money player...

Inside the Dodgers deals *

| 13 Comments
In today's sports section, The Times' Jason Reid comes up with a pretty good reconstruction of the moves and deliberations behind last week's Dodger shakeup. He reports that the new...

Another NY Post howler

A few weeks ago there was the banner headline — allegedly called in by Rupert Murdoch — screaming that Kerry had chosen Richard Gephardt to be his veep. Then over...

Fineman crowns 'best reporter'

| 1 Comment
Dave Lopez of Channel 2 was voted the best local TV field reporter by readers of Ron Fineman's On the Record. Lopez finished ahead of Patrick Healy, who had won...

Odd place for a premiere

| 7 Comments
The Michael Mann film Collateral stars Tom Cruise as a hitman in downtown L.A. at night, so it was fitting perhaps that the premiere Monday was held at the old...

Villaraigosa makes the big call

| 22 Comments
Antonio Villaraigosa called some reporters to his Mt. Washington home today and told them in interviews that he is running for mayor. The Times' Jessica Garrison was first up with...

Pasadena choosing a book

For the third year, the Pasadena Public Library is selecting a book for its "One City, One Story" program. Star-News editor Larry Wilson had the short list of prospects in...

Grading Anschutz as mogul

| 1 Comment
In today's LAT Business section, Claudia Eller checks the progress of Phil Anschutz' crusade to remake Hollywood. Around the World in 80 Days bombed in June, apparently to the boss's...

Save Disney Hall from art

| 18 Comments
Sam Hall Kaplan, the author and former Times design critic whose columns run in the Downtown News, really doesn't like the Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Brugge sculpture destined for...

No specific threat

| 1 Comment
Mayor Jim Hahn made a point of announcing today that he has been briefed by homeland security secretary Tom Ridge and that Los Angeles is not the target of any...

The New Yorker, online

| 2 Comments
You know how the website for The New Yorker takes down the story links after each week's issue passes into history, without an archive? A New York City blogger named...

He's disturbed by 'Orgasms'

| 9 Comments
In an op-ed last week in the Daily News, Paul Carnes of Woodland Hills objected to the banners hanging around town for "Orgasms," now being staged at Canoga Park's Madrid...
Clinton fundraises in LA
kermit-la-brea-closer.jpg Jim Henson Studios on La Brea became a presidential campaign stop on Thursday.
Brown declares disaster area
porter-ranch-sign.jpgThe natural gas leak above Porter Ranch now qualifies for various government actions. Story
Wet coyote
wet-coyote-vdt.jpgSpotted between the storms at Here in Malibu.
Performing arts with cheer
guys-dolls-kevin-parry.jpgDonna Perlmutter closes out 2015 with productions downtown and on the Westside.
Junkyard down
upick-firetruck-560.jpgAfter 53 years, Sun Valley's Aadlen Brothers and U-Pick Parts cleans out. Photos