Eric Estrin writes the weekly column "Hollywood Breakthrough" at TheWrap.com. His own Hollywood breakthrough included writer/producer jobs on such series as "MacGyver," "Outer Limits" and "V.I.P." and freelance episodes written for "Miami Vice," "Cagney and Lacey" and "Earth 2." As a journalist, he wrote a monthly TV column for Los Angeles magazine and worked as special sections editor for the trade paper Television Week. He is the creator and producer of the LA Observed Script Project and its resulting script, "Right of Way." Eric lives in the Ventura County community of Oak Park. Email
On Writer Action, a computer chat-board for Writers Guild members, anything goes. Well, not anything. That's where I come in.
Until recently, the Los Angeles Times was a perfectly good name for a great metropolitan newspaper of record. These days, not so much. It's time for us to come up with something new.
Scott Ritter warns we're on the verge of nuclear war. History says we ignore him at our peril.
Our correspondent does battle with a robot at BMG Music — and appears to win in the end. Or does he?
I hate telemarketers. No matter how many you tell Do Not Call, there’s always another one to interrupt your work,...
My daughter ran into the house the other night screaming that there was a tarantula on an outside window near...
The first time I tried to surf I was 12 and had recently moved to South Florida from one of the fly-over states. It all came back recently during family day at Malibu Makos surf camp.
First of all, let me apologize to the Dodgers and their fans. The team rarely wins when I’m in the...
We’ve traveled a lot this summer, or at least it seems that way. First up was Israel, which my Florida...
Two years ago, in the summer of 2004, my friends Kerry and Deana hosted a party centered around a MoveOn.org...
Let me say at the outset that I have mixed feelings at best about so-called “reality TV.” I was putting...
| A judge's ruling that declares capital punishment unconstitutional in California causes Martinez to wonder if we are beginning to weary of the savagery and he hopes for the dawning of a new day of compassion.
| Take My Picture Gary Leonard is a regular weekly feature of LA Observed.
| The outdoors venues in Los Angeles this summer constitute one of America's largest Shakespearean hotspots. Let Don Shirley be your guide.
| Their voices were cutting in and out as they followed Marisol's path up the hillside.
Hot dogs wouldn't hurt. Hot dogs to fight a curse.
| Natural history museums grew out of the "Wunderkammer"--a device for cultivating wonder in the face of the amazing diversity and weirdness of the world, but also for discovery, of the new, the unknown, of patterns, and laws. The LA River has become a kind of cabinet of wonders for Los Angeles: a site for thinking about and making sense of nature and culture in the city.
| The Dodgers do need help in the back of their rotation. But giving up a top prospect for an ace like David Price would be a huge mistake.
The latest version of the mayoral web site, Data LA, is greatly improved from its shaky first edition. Even modestly computer-savvy Angelenos get enough information to come to their own conclusions about the mayor and the rest of city government.
Before I lived in Echo Park, there was a tiny 1920s bungalow-cottage-standalone house on N. Occidental in Silver Lake. I...
