Representation | Chris Aldrich

Read CAA Closes $750M Deal for ICM Partners, Consolidating Major Agency Landscape by Alex Weprin (The Hollywood Reporter)

Some 425 ICM employees will join CAA, with 105 expected to be laid off as the Department of Justice allows the acquisition after an antitrust review.

Listened to Unlearning White Jesus from On the Media | WNYC Studios

Examining the consequences of 'White Jesus' in America.

In a time where monuments are being toppled, institutions and icons reconsidered, we turn to a portrait encountered by every American: "White Jesus." You know, that guy with sandy blond hair and upcast blue eyes. For On the Media, Eloise Blondiau traces the history of how the historically inaccurate image became canon, and why it matters.

In this segment, Eloise talks to Mbiyu Chui, pastor at the Shrine of the Black Madonna in Detroit, about unlearning Jesus's whiteness. She also hears from Edward Blum, author of The Color of Christ: The Son of God and the Saga of Race in America, about how the image came dominate in the U.S., and psychologist Simon Howard on how White Jesus has infiltrated our subconsciouses. Lastly, Eloise speaks to Rev. Kelly Brown Douglas, womanist theologian and Dean of the Episcopal Divinity School at Union Theological Seminary, about the theology of the Black Christ.

This is a segment from our October 1st, 2020 program, God Bless.

Read Hollywood has a talent pipeline problem. Brian Grazer and Ron Howard have an app for that (Los Angeles Times)

Impact Creative Systems, an offshoot from Imagine Entertainment, is launching a new app called the Creative Network, a LinkedIn-meets-Slack for screenwriters and studio heads.

I’ll have to take a look at this, but I’m not really sure what the direct problem is that they’re solving for. The bigger problem is usually filtering through a load of crap to find the actual talent, and I’m not sure how this app is fixing that particular problem. They may be making the net wider which is good, but there’s still the filtering problem which is the bigger problem.

Naturally getting talented people to help mentor people is a good thing, but it’s also the piece that almost never happens because it takes a lot of time and effort and doesn’t always pay off. I’m not sure where their system is adding value aside from a few links.

This definitely disintermediates the agent in the system, so perhaps the extra value is seen in circumventing them to take advantage of the unwary writer one is mentoring?

Read Madonna to Co-Write, Direct Her Own Biopic by Borys Kit ( Hollywood Reporter)

Diablo Cody is co-writing the "untold true story" that will be produced by Amy Pascal.

There are so many untold and inspiring stories and who better to tell it than me. ❧

Of course there will be a huge amount of bias from her perspective.
Annotated on September 17, 2020 at 12:18PM

Madonna being front and center to guide her own biopic should not be a surprise from anyone who has followed her career. But it is noteworthy since most biopics, when based on people or musical acts, tend to have their subjects as consultants and executive producers, involved mainly from rights points of view. This has been the case with recent hits Rocketman and Bohemian Rhapsody. ❧

And I think she’s learned from Rocketman and Bohemian Rhapsody that if you’re heavily involved in making and producing your own biopic, it’s unlikely anyone else will do one anytime soon and you’ll be able to control not only the immediate narrative, but also the long term narrative (at least within popular culture).
Annotated on September 17, 2020 at 12:23PM

Kanye West apparently tweeted screenshots of one of his contracts with Def Jam in 2012 this morning. While it may seem crazy and odd, this is the sort of data that doesn’t get leaked within the entertainment industry very often. I’m curious to see how the level of the details released shifts the balance of power to artists in the future since surely this contract would represent one of the higher levels of performer contract in the business at the moment.

A&R and business affairs executives are sure to hate this for the coming year(s). It would be nice if more artists shared these sorts of points in public to help out others without the level of legal representation that Kanye has.

I also wonder if/when these sorts of contracts will have non-disclosure clauses in them to help protect the labels? It may start today if artists aren’t careful.

pic.twitter.com/6U5BUW6TYS

— ye (@kanyewest) September 16, 2020

Read ‘I was selling honey to survive.’ Then Mel Gibson threatened to sue (The Irish Times)

Chilean teacher receives cease and desist letter after using actor’s image in branding

Read How an unknown British actress played a role in the downfall of two Hollywood moguls by Stacy Perman (Los Angeles Times)

Ron Meyer, the former vice chairman of NBCUniversal, was the second mogul embroiled in a sex scandal with Charlotte Kirk to be toppled in less than two years.

Watched The Reason Paul Schneider Left Parks And Rec After Season 2 from YouTube

The Reason Paul Schneider Left Parks And Rec After Season 2
We all remember Parks and Recreation season 2: Leslie was trying to fix the pit. Andy and April began their triumphant weirdo love story. Chris Traeger and Ben Wyatt joined the merry band of civil servants. But do you remember Mark Brendanawicz?

Paul Schneider played Mark, the Pawnee, Indiana city planner who was a relatively central character on Parks and Recreation's first season and who had a scrapped romance subplot with Amy Poehler's Leslie Knope. In the second season, Mark's purpose began to flounder despite a second, and ultimately crumbled, romance with Rashida Jones' Ann Perkins. During the Parks and Rec season 2 finale, Mark announced he was leaving city government for a job with a private-sector construction company...

...which earned him a new nickname from Leslie, "Mark Brendanaquits”, and he was never heard from again. Chris and Ben's entrance into Parks and Recreation as guest characters on season 2 proved to be the perfect gift in disguise to slip Mark's departure past everyone with few questions asked.

Looking back, there are some mysteries left unsolved. Why have Mark leave at all, and why did Paul Schneider exit Parks and Recreation and never return?

In short, Paul Schneider left Parks and Recreation because he felt sidelined. Several years after the fact, the actor opened up about his Parks departure in an interview with Screen Crush, revealing that he felt he'd been at a creative crossroads with the series' writers after Mark's character was altered from the first season. The early episodes of Parks and Rec are rougher and feature more tension and disdain between the characters, just like its predecessor, The Office. Mark Brendanawicz's character is a relic of that previous style, and he was reportedly an even less likable character in earlier versions of Parks and Recreation. A shift in emotional perspective came about as the series continued on, and while it worked out well for many principal characters, it didn't for Mark. Keep watching the video to see the reason Paul Schneider left Parks and Rec after season 2.

I vaguely remember him from the beginning, but mostly I remember Leslie continually badmouthing Mark Brendanawicz in later seasons. It seemed relatively obvious to me that he would leave given his minimal interaction on the show from the beginning of the series to the end of the first season. These sorts of situations are never fun for the agents/managers, particularly if the writing staff and producers aren’t sure what they’re doing or where the show is going.