..Gary Dretzka
..Noah Forrest
..Leonard Klady
..R.J. Matson
..David Poland
..Douglas Pratt
..Ray Pride
..Michael Wilmington

Maybe it’s just me. Has anyone else out there in the blogosphere been made to feel uneasy by the amount of coverage being devoted to Hollywood’s annual celebration of itself, the Oscars, in such august mainstream journals as the New York Times and Los Angeles Times?

(OK, in the case of the LAT, it should be noted that the newspaper hasn’t been “august” since Tribune Co. began dismantling what was left of the Times Mirror empire, shipping its plunder back to Chicago in boxcars. But, once upon a time ...)

Having perused the papers’ glitzy new Carpetbagger and Envelope sites, I wonder:

So, why is someone who writes for a website as obsessed with the Oscars as is Movie City News taking potshots at the NYT and LAT? Certainly, their existence makes the Carpetbagger and Envelope competitors for the kinds of ads, information and access that fuels MCN, and, thus, there exists the appearance of a conflict of interest. Or, perhaps, I'm jealous of the fact that the employees of those papers make more money covering Hollywood than I do. Maybe, maybe not. I used to work inside the belly of the beast as a correspondent for the Chicago Tribune, and, before that, I had to deal with the academy as both an editor and writer. Now, I write columns for MCN, mostly on my own time and dine, and also freelance pieces for other outlets. So, like Joni Mitchell, I've looked at life in the Hollywood trenches from both sides.

If one or both of the Times had been as thorough in their reporting of the White House, Pentagon, CIA and the last two presidential races -- as is their coverage of entirely meaningless Oscar and Golden Globe campaigns -- would the incumbent President have been cocky enough to employ false premises to invade Iraq? Maybe, maybe not … still it’s a question worth asking of every Big Media outlet willing to apply different standards to its coverage of movies, TV and music, than what’s expected of the work represented in other sections.

If Judith Miller had been taken into the confidence of Jack Valenti, instead of some joker named “Scooter,” would American troops today be patrolling Shanghai and Tijuana, in search of pirates mass-producing bootleg discs of Stealth and The Dukes of Hazzard? The LAT would have had to fire its limousine-leftie columnist, Robert Scheer, for decrying the Hollywood-Pentagon axis, instead of decrying the illegal downloading of intellectual property (ours, not theirs … which, as always, is fair game).

There’s something unseemly about reading snarky blogchat in the New York Times, especially, on such dubious fare as screenwriter Eric Roth’s misplaced credit for Munich, the Carpetbagger author’s mea culpa for misreading of reviews of Cinderella Man and, of course, reader e-mail on all sorts of things you’d never think would disturb Times’ readers. Today, the vox populi considered the possible effects of King Kong on the movie industry’s mythic “slump” (the Hollywood equivalent of George II’s weapons of mass destruction).

At the LAT’s Envelope, which, being a Tribune product, would be a more logical candidate for the title, Carpetbagger, the emphasis has been on red-carpet fashions, gift bags, parties and routine analysis of the various races. (Remember, hardly anyone has actually seen all of the movies mentioned as favorites.)

For years, the handicapping of Oscar races was the exclusive province of Las Vegas odds-makers, who did it for a novelty and rarely saw any of the movies they touted. Then, in an attempt to pump up ratings and readership, such outlets as People, Entertainment Weekly and Entertainment Tonight began covering the Academy Awards in the same worshipful tones usually reserved for coronations, state funerals, White House weddings and Elizabeth Taylor's divorces. Newspapers followed suit, even giving credence to such corrupt exercises as the Golden Globes and any awards show produced by Dick Clark.

Like the Emmy, Grammy, Tony and Country Music Association awards ceremonies, the Academy Award clambake is an event worthy of coverage ... up to a point. All the others are phony, revenue- and ego-driven attempts to cash in on television's appetite for celebrity-heavy content. None delivers the kind of consumer traffic once expected from such honors, and none routinely rewards the most worthy of candidates.

Although the folks at the Academy would disagree, the Oscars have become little more than an infomercial for the Hollywood brand, couture designers, Wolfgang Puck’s catering business, distributors of DVDs of nominated titles, and the studios’ slates of potential summer blockbusters. Photographers for fashion magazines line the red carpet not to promote the movies, but to boost the supply of free photographs available to their editors for filler pictorials. Reporters are there to scribble down any publicist-approved drivel from their star clients that will help them make the early deadlines of papers back east.

It’s glamorous and fun, to be sure. Only a handful of those journalists gathered outside the Kodak Theater, however, likely will have any recollection of who walked away with a prize in 2005. The NYT and LAT once were able to prioritize all of this nonsense, and hold off their coverage until it made sense both to editors and readers.

No longer, though. They've bought into the hype, and their pages and websites have been turned into adjuncts of AMPAS.

While the NYT actually grasps the basic concept of blogging, by adding links to other sites (including MCN) to its own chatter, the Envelope is merely an on-line extension of the LAT’s daily Calendar snoozathon. Largely dependent on the reporting of freelance pundits (Tom O’Neil’s scattershot Gold Derby) and other hired guns (Elizabeth Snead, Steve Pond), the site also devotes space to the Grammys, which signals the Times’ intention to cover awards ceremonies in other disciplines. I’m guessing, though, the MTV Movies Awards will get more cyber-ink than the Tonys, which should be right in the New York Times’ wheelhouse.

If nothing else, the Envelope provides the LAT with an answer to the recurring question of why it’s deferred to the New York tabs its obligation to cover Hollywood celebrities in ways other than puff pieces in Calendar. It’s Gossip Lite, if you will.

Unless you’re among the large cabal of reporters and editors who routinely monitor Jim Romenesko’s website at PoynterOnline, you’re probably unaware of the ongoing debate about the worthiness of Internet blogging, at least when it comes to adherence to the basic tenets of journalism. Big-shot columnists have continually downplayed the effectiveness of bloggers – Matt Drudge, being the most common target of disdain – in conveying news and information in any dependably accurate manner. They huffed and they puffed, and they still couldn’t buckle the foundation of the Internet, which was built on the free flow of ideas … however ridiculous.

Just as General Motors came to embrace fuel-efficiency, in the face of competition from Japanese automakers -- and such hippie cuisine as yogurt, granola and organic produce was appropriated by purveyors of otherwise unhealthy food – Big Media apparently has decided it’s high time to tame the Wild West of the Internet for its own nefarious purposes. If you can’t beat ’em, co-opt them.

Instead of sitting on the sidelines, waiting for the day when Hollywood realizes that it no longer is cost-effective to invest in full-page ads young people no longer see, the NYT and LAT have spread their legs like prostitutes in a high-end brothel. With the promise of easy-to-digest celebrity news, non-judgmental coverage (including nearly verbatim press releases) and the gleeful promotion of every insipid new entertainment product – without also tarnishing the sanctity of their news pages – the most influential of our newspapers have completely given in to the lure of easy money.

By comparison, Harry Knowles looks like Thomas Paine.

Once they’ve convinced Hollywood of their commitment to mediocrity, the Big Media outlets won’t be satisfied until they have reversed the tide of banner ads and for-your-consideration pop-ups that have begun to flow toward indie blogsites. Just as Tribune brass have conspired to eliminate the position of political cartoonist from their op-ed pages, it’s possible that learned criticism of the arts someday will disappear, as well.

Will independent bloggers go the way of pamphleteers and broadsheet hangers of 1776, and the underground press of the 1960s? Don’t bet against such a possibility. Big Media has been unsuccessful, so far, in its attempts to install tollbooths on what once was referred to as the Information Superhighway, but it’s become tougher for independents to break into the web without also bribing someone at a search engine to leapfrog their site ahead of someone else’s link.

The LAT didn’t fully embrace the idea of a free, entertainment-heavy blog until two things happened, independent of each other. One, the marketplace rejected its strategy of charging extra for a Calendar file diminished by the loss of several key writers; and, two, its free site recorded tens of thousands of unexpected hits for the front-page revelations of Marilyn Monroe’s shrink. Suddenly, it understood what the publishers of free “alternative” weeklies had known for years … give away an information-heavy product, behind a sexy cover, and both advertisers and readers will follow.

Suddenly, an investment of hundreds of thousands of dollars – and a couple of high-profile editors and writers – began to make sense. The Envelope was born, alongside industry-friendly coverage of Las Vegas and other popular travel destinations. When the draconian budget cuts were announced, the Internet enterprise was spared most of the bloodshed.

The Carpetbagger arrived not long after LA Weekly columnist Nikke Finke’s warning of impending doom over shrinking movie-ad spending hit the fans in the offices of Wall Street analysts and publishers across America. Coincidence? Not at a time when the NYT and LAT are expending as much staff, space and money on the lies told by Hollywood deal-makers, as they once devoted to those of politicians, generals and the titans of industry.

Thank goodness, Judith Miller resigned before she could have been re-assigned to the NYT’s Hollywood beat. No matter what the MPAA and other Hollywood hawks might argue, going to war over weapons of mass distraction is far too great a price to pay for freedom.

December 14, 2005
- Gary Dretzka

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