Our Town

There’s a very strange crime spree unfolding across LA, with high school music teachers blaming it on the rising popularity of a traditional form of Mexican music known as banda. According to the New York Times article by Ian Lovett, a theft in Bell is just the latest of many:

In the last few months, dozens of brass sousaphones–smaller tubas used in marching bands–were taken from schools in Southern California.

These mini-tubas can set parents back anywhere from $2,000 to $7,000. To frame the rise of the banda craze, Lovett talked to KCRW DJ Raoul Campos.

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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.

From To Kill a Mockingbird to The Accused, the Oscars have always loved a good courtroom drama. But the one framing the Academy Awards this year is casting a pall over the upcoming 84th ceremony.

In Manhattan bankruptcy court yesterday, CIM/H&H Media LP fired back at Eastman Kodak, arguing that the once mighty Rochester company must honor the final nine years of a $72 million naming rights deal:

Signs on the Kodak Theatre, as well as in and around the shopping center where it is located, on street signs, freeway off-ramps, maps, and brochures, make undoing the agreement impossible, according to the filing. With the 2012 Oscars less than three weeks away, “disassociating the Kodak name from the theater before the Academy Awards show, the major event, is not practically feasible,” according to the filing.

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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

KCET is beefing up their programming for the month of March with a slew of new shows featuring the likes of Roy Firestone and Holly Robinson Peete.

Firestone returns as host of LA Tonight With Roy Firestone, a weeklong half-hour interview series (March 12-17, 10 p.m. and midnight) that invites celebrities who live in Los Angeles to discuss their lives and current issues in today’s society. Firestone will be joined by Andre Agassi, Burt Bacharach, Chris Botti and Steve Tyrell.

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The Tribeca Film Institute is expanding their Tribeca Teaches program to Lennox Middle School in Los Angeles — the first pilot run outside of New York City.

TFI and non-profit Southern California Crossroads will focus on bilingual storytelling through video games. Experienced filmmakers will partner with teachers, community activists and parents in assisting students during the 18-week program.

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The Los Angeles Dodgers are trying to wash their hands clean of the Bryan Stow assault.

The baseball organization asked U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Kevin Gross to dismiss a claim filed by Stow and his family shortly after owner Frank McCourt filed for bankruptcy.

Despite the reported 442 security personnel on hand for opening day last March, Stow still managed to get brutally attacked in the parking lot of Chavez Ravine, leaving him in a coma for months.

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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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Mel Gibson may be called to testify in the discrimination case of Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department deputy James Mee. Mee is the deputy who arrested Gibson back in 2006, and who Gibson allegedly berated with anti-Semitic comments. Mee alleges that supervisors made him scrub Gibson’s anti-Semetic slurs from his report on the incident–and that he was subsequently denied promotions as a result of the incident.

Gibson had worked as a spokesperson for the department prior to his arrest and was seen as close with the top brass. LA Sheriff Lee Baca may also be called to testify.

We here at FishbowlLA typically prefer our news substantial, rather than circus freakshow. But you better believe if these two hit the witness stand it we’ll be down at the courthouse with all the other bozos, throwing elbows while struggling to get one coherent five-word question in.

It was a quintessential LA story. Late yesterday afternoon, media outlets including the LA Times and KTLA quickly picked up an LAPD alert of a fight between several Hollywood Blvd. superhero characters. Catwoman was said to have pepper sprayed Jack Sparrow, with an alien and another pirate also involved in the fracass.

Only the victim wasn’t a Sparrow. After several hours of insane Twitter pick-up on this news, activity that pushed “Jack Sparrow” up the LA trending topics list, NBCLA reporters Samantha Tata and Kim Baldonado revealed that the target of an exasperated, harassed Catwoman was in fact an Ozzy Osbourne impersonator.

Should Ozzie be insulted that his likeness was mistaken for Captain Jack? Might Johnny Depp consider biting off the head of scurvy rat in a fifth Pirates flick, as a wink-wink? That’s all tbd. But in the meantime, even though Tata and Baldonado had Sparrow in their original report (since updated), theirs was the only initial dispatch that had otherwise accurate info about the exact sequence of events. As opposed to the increasingly embellished misinformation being spread last night via social media.

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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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