Interesting LA Times Paragraph of the Day

It’s been nearly ten years since super-agent Swifty Lazar hosted his final, epic Oscar weekend bash. Thankfully, Lazar’s Grammy Awards counterpart Clive Davis is still going strong at age 79, set to welcome the crème de la Grammy crème on Saturday for another Beverly Hilton jam.

LA Times reporter Randy Lewis caught up with Davis earlier this week at one of the famed pink bungalows at the nearby Beverly Hills Hotel. Davis ran through the 2012 guest list, A to J, while pointing to another A-artist as a beacon in the record industry stormy night:

He’s particularly gratified by the success over the past year of British soul singer Adele, even though he wasn’t involved in the commercial and artistic breakthrough of her “21″ album, which has sold more than six million copies in the U.S. alone, according to Nielsen SoundScan.

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Create a social media strategy, launch your campaign, and track the results in our Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting February 16. The online event and workshop will feature speakers including The Onion‘s Baratunde Thurston (left), Facebook’s Morin Oluwole, and bitly’s Tim Devane. Register now.

Talk about driving a hard bargain. The LA Times reports today that the naked man rescued by firefighters after climbing a Downtown LA radio tower only agreed to come down on the condition of hamburgers. Specifically McDonald’s hamburgers.

The man climbed to the top of the tower Wednesday night. At one point, police sources said, he asked for hamburgers from McDonald’s. Officials complied, and he agreed to come down after eating his meal.

Firefighters eventually brought the man down with the help of an impromptu pulley system. Wonder how much that rescue cost? If there’s ever been an argument for expanding the food stamp system, this would probably be it.

Photo Credit: KTLA-TV Channel 5

A couple of years ago, the Recording Academy loosened eligibility rules for the category of Best Comedy Album. It’s OK now for the soundtrack of a TV program to be considered an “album.”

It’s only because of this rule change that Kathy Griffin is in the running again this weekend with 50 & Not Pregnant, a product put out by Universal Network Television. That does not sit well with Dylan P. Gadino, editor of Laughspin.com. He recently told LA Times reporter Deborah Vankin that Griffin does not belong in the category for a fourth straight year:

“You shouldn’t be able to take audio from a television show and call it a comedy album,” says Gadino. “Original intent, editing and production should come into play.”

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In an intriguing piece of LA Times commentary, author Ernest Hardy reminds that it’s not just the Oscars that can be guilty of slighting an industry icon and then belatedly trying to make up for the oversights with a career nod. This weekend, it will be the Grammys’ turn to embrace the phenomenon of residual voter shame.

Hardy’s piece begins, simply, with the sentence “Diana Ross has never won a Grammy.” He notes that her Lifetime Achievement Award ceremony this Saturday will not be televised and frames this weekend’s “consolation prize” within a larger failure:

The Grammys aren’t the only place where 67-year-old Ross, a primary architect of modern pop culture over her five-decade career, has been undervalued. It’s long been fashionable to lampoon her in the media and in critical circles, to dismiss her voice and her trailblazing accomplishments–to cast her in the one-note role of incorrigible diva…

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Here’s a tip for all you Dodger ownership bid watchers. If you have not already, set up a Google News alert for “Bill Shaikin.” The LA Times baseball beat reporter remains the go-to source for breaking developments about the Frank McCourt sweepstakes.

Shaikin’s latest scoop, posted online last night, reveals that 31-year-old New York real estate entrepreneur Jared Kushner is among nine groups in the current running to buy the Dodgers. Kushner is the son-in-law of Donald Trump, as well as the owner of a Manhattan newspaper re-invented by former mediabistro.com editorial employee Elizabeth Spiers:

Kushner, who became owner and publisher of the New York Observer in 2006, has played a key role in expanding the family business beyond real estate. At 31, he would be the youngest owner in Major League Baseball.

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There’s a Starbucks down the street and another a few blocks west on Los Feliz Blvd. But since this particular version of the java-sipping-screenwriter-makes-good panned out at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival, it seems only appropriate that the coffee house in question is the more independent Kaldi Coffee & Tea in Atwater Village.

Per Kurt Streeter‘s report in the LA Times, that’s where then-40-year-old aspiring LA scribe Nicholas McCarthy retreated last winter for six weeks after the 2011 Sundance Film Festival, to expand his short The Pact into a feature-length project. Following this year’s triumphant feature screenings, Kaldi is where McCarthy will be cranking out his next coveted project. Per the article:

On Monday morning [January 30], he returned to Kaldi Coffee & Tea. When he walked through the door, he saw Clay Tarver, one of the regulars. Tarver’s screenwriting credits included Joy Ride, a thriller co-written with J.J. Abrams, creator of the television series Lost, and he is viewed with admiration at Kaldi. McCarthy had leaned on him for so much advice that he had included Tarver in the credits for The Pact.

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Another day, another bit of fodder for the Lakers vs. Clippers debate. Actually, make that two bits.

Along with Friday’s news that the Clippers have signed free agent Kenyon Martin, LA Times reporter Gale Holland has distilled her own fan allegiances dilemma down to some unique pick ‘em methodology. And when it comes to tattoos, the comparative discussion inevitably must begin with Lakers forward Matt Barnes:

Barnes has his twin sons’ footprints on his neck and a heavenly mural of his mother, who died in 2007, on his torso. A pair of eyes on his back glares at viewers over “La Famiglia,”a tribute to the Italian half of his heritage. He plans to add the rest of his family tree to what empty space remains below. Barnes said the eyes are a reminder to “watch my back.”

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Interesting little tidbit from an LA Times piece on Karl Rove‘s “American Crossroads” super PAC–which has brought in $18.4 million from wealthy oligarchs in the past year. Guess who’s name turned up on the 2011 donor roster?

The end of the year tally  included $100,000 from Sam Zell, whose properties include the Tribune Co., owner of the Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Tribune, among other papers.

It gets better. Guess what Zell’s money is helping to buy? Videos like this one, attacking President Obama’s track record on jobs and unemployment. Isn’t that just the cow’s knockers? Incompetent billionaire bankrupts a company, lays off thousands, and then has the sack to spent a reporter’s salary or two funding political attack ads accusing Obama of devastating the middle class.

Watch Zell’s video after the jump if you feel like retching.

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The website for Third Street restaurant Il Covo lists the loose English translation for its Italian name as “den of thieves” or “lair.” But after reading Jessica Gelt‘s recent LA Times article about how this establishment and others around the city have been overtaken by Smartphone-wielding customers, FishbowlLA is inclined to look up the Italian for “end of civilization.”

Then again, we’re not in the business of catering to LA’s multi-tasking parents, studio execs and Cedars-Sinai superstars. For those who are, like Il Covo general manager Eric Rosenfeld, it’s now all about accommodating device-totting diners. For example, his restaurant provides small plates on which customers can place their Smartphones, so as to avoid spillage:

“If a diner would like to have their phone on the table, we want to protect it as much as possible,” Rosenfeld explains, adding that many restaurants in Los Angeles even keep a discreet stash of iPhone and BlackBerry chargers on hand and train servers on how and when to approach a diner on a phone and what to do if a phone is in the way when it comes time to deliver a plate. (The hard and fast rule is never put your hands on another man’s phone.)

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Patrick Goldstein has an interesting take on the current media fascination with the astronomical free agent salary deals landed by Major League Baseball stars Prince Fielder and Albert Pujols.

He suggests that just as the DVD boom once fueled the headline-grabbing paydays of Hollywood A-listers, billion-dollar media rights deals for MLB teams are now powering a similar inflationary curve on the baseball diamond. This shift has also taken out a once common top-tier talent agency tactic:

CAA was famous for leaking its star salary numbers in the ’90s, and every dazzling new salary breakthrough sent a telling message to stars signed to a rival agency–why isn’t your agent raking in all that moolah for you? When salaries are in decline, as they are now, you rarely see the likes of Kevin Huvane or Ari Emanuel feeding any information to the press, as today’s salary news only offers another instance of the scaling down of A-list actors’ earning power.

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