Assistants

For his first feature as writer-director, Steve Morris tells the story of a group of film-school friends struggling in low-level jobs in Hollywood, wishing they could realize projects of their own. After a piece of script coverage written as a joke for a nonexistent screenplay starts to snowball into a project that might actually go into production, they seize on the situation, hoping for what could be their big break, but the hoax strains their loyalties....

As the war on drugs has spread from Mexico to Central America, so has the U.S. role in Honduras. Pentagon contracts are helping to fund new military bases in remote regions of that country, and U.S. troops and special Drug Enforcement Administration agents have been deployed to train local security forces and assist in counter-narcotics operations. It's a delicate partnership, and one that is already causing controversy. Last week the Obama administration confirmed that DEA agents were with Honduran security forces aboard a U.S. helicopter during a botched May 11 operation.

Hundreds of low-income and unemployed residents in Los Angeles County are receiving job training and placement at local hospitals, clinics and pharmacies in an ambitious effort that taps into the growing need for healthcare workers. The Youth Policy Institute, a local nonprofit managing the program, opened its doors to applicants in March and has already enrolled about 400 trainees. There is room for 1,200 participants total. "The demand is so great for this," said Dixon Slingerland, executive director of the institute.

OKLAHOMA CITY - The Lakers can only hope that their point guard of the future is better than the one of their recent past. Even if the player who fits both descriptions is Ramon Sessions. After providing a considerable boost upon his acquisition in March, Sessions was a disappointment for most of the Western Conference semifinals. His performance in the Lakers' season-ending 106-90 loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder in Game 5 on Monday night at Chesapeake Energy Arena may have been a new low. Two of Sessions' playoff-worst six turnovers triggered big runs by the Thunder.

Gene Stallings, Dallas Cowboy assistant coach, was named Monday to succeed Jim Hanifan as coach of the St. Louis Cardinals, filling the last coaching vacancy in the National Football League. Hanifan and his assistants were fired 15 minutes after the Cardinals' final game, which left them with a 5-11 record. Critics contended that Hanifan, who was popular with his players, had been too soft a disciplinarian. Stallings, 50, like Patriot Coach Raymond Berry, is a native of Paris, Tex.

The Orange County Sheriff's Department opened up recruitment Wednesday for its first class of correctional services assistants, who will help staff the jails at an eventual cost-savings of $10 million a year. Because they are non-sworn personnel and receive less training, they are also less expensive, said Sheriff Sandra Hutchens. She said they will eventually make up 35% of the positions in the jail. Sworn positions will be reduced through attrition, Hutchens said. "Just this year we have been required to reduce our budget by $28 million and next year we're looking at a $60-million reduction," Hutchens said in a statement.

In a scene from the trailer of "Styl'd," a new reality show premiering at 10 tonight on MTV, junior stylist's assistants Janna Brown and Gary Samuelian wearily drag, shove and push rolling racks full of clothes up a steep dirt hill in Runyon Canyon. It's an extreme scenario, with shades of gimmicky stunts à la "America's Next Top Model," but it aims to illustrate the physical and mental demands stylists go through for their job -- showing it as a literal uphill battle. Brown and Samuelian are among five junior assistants competing for a styling contract and spot on the Margaret Maldonado Agency's impressive roster of artists.

Alone on a Manhattan street corner late one night, Kurt Hathaway, a greenhorn production assistant eager to please a demanding movie director, faced a daunting task. His assignment: Secure enough on-street parking spaces near the next day's shooting location so the director, talent trailers and assorted muck-a-mucks could park without aggravation the next morning. His equipment: two purloined police barricades, a ball of string and all the ingenuity he could muster.

USC, which doesn't play this week, will practice at sunrise today so coaches not already on the road recruiting can travel across the Southland and the country in search of talent. Running backs coach Todd McNair left Thursday and two or three other assistants also will be out of state as USC seeks to replenish a roster in need of depth despite several top-five recruiting classes. Coach Pete Carroll and several assistants will remain in Southern California. On Thursday, before the Trojans practiced, Carroll crossed paths with Washington Coach Steve Sarkisian at a City Section playoff game between Los Angeles Jordan and Harbor City Narbonne.

Dear Kirstie Alley: Look, I'm fat too. Maybe not as fat as you, but still, I've had three kids and as a TV critic, I spend a fair amount of time on my butt. After 40, it's so easy to gain, so difficult to lose, even with a workout. So I get why you'd think starring in a reality show about losing weight and developing some organic products along the way might seem like a good idea--there's no better motivator than the camera, right? But it's not a good idea. Not a good idea at all. You've always been entertaining, funny and profane and people may tune into "Kirstie Alley's Big Life" thinking it will be reassuring to watch a celebrity struggling with the same issues of over-indulgence and sloth that plague us all. But times they have a'changed since you made "Fat Actress," when everyone thought it was cool that you weren't afraid to play an insecure, self-involved, overly-catered-to celebrity.

SAN MARCOS, Calif. —When paramedics arrived at the Purdy home March 20, Margaret was seated in her favorite chair in the living room. The morning sunshine streamed in through a picture window that overlooked a valley. A plastic bag was over her head, tied securely at the neck. A suicide note in her handwriting was in a folder on her desk, beneath a shelf with books about death and dying. She had written that the pain from her various medical conditions had become unbearable. Alan Purdy met the paramedics at the door.

OKLAHOMA CITY — Point broken. The Lakers continued to suffer in point-guard production against the Oklahoma City Thunder. Ramon Sessions had two points and no assists in 24 minutes of the Lakers' 77-75 loss in Game 2 of the Western Conference finals. Steve Blake had five points on one-for-five shooting in almost 27 minutes Wednesday. Blake missed the possible go-ahead shot with 3.9 seconds to play, his three-point attempt from the corner a little long and a tad to the right.

In Los Angeles, red carpet treatment is not just for celebrities. Here, mere mortals can find specialists - medical concierges, cat whisperers, image consultants - for almost everything. And that includes experts who are hired to help families prepare for their newest members. Enter the baby planner. Before the advent of the current expert culture, it was a role that used to be filled by mothers, grandmothers and best friends, doling out advice, shopping lists and favors.

Long after the Lakers' biggest win of the season, Kobe Bryant met his daughters in a Staples Center hallway. One of his girls was dragging a purple streamer that got snagged on an object. Bryant immediately turned around and walked through a throng of reporters to help her set it free. The moment symbolized his play in the Lakers' 96-87 win over Denver in Game 7 of their Western Conference first-round playoff series Saturday evening. While absorbing double- and triple-teams, he sacrificed for others.

Phoenix Coyotes Coach Dave Tippett knows how electrifying the atmosphere at Staples Center can be when the Kings are successful in the playoffs. Before this season they hadn't won a first-round series since 2001, when Tippett was an assistant to Andy Murray and created a power play that was among the NHL's most potent. With the Coyotes and Kings soon to meet for the Western Conference title, Tippett will experience that atmosphere again, but from a different bench and perspective.

Finally, the names Wayne Gretzky, Luc Robitaille and Kelly Hrudey are on the verge of having some long-awaited company, some fresh names in the Kings' playoff ledger. How about Mike Richards, Dustin Brown and Jonathan Quick, to name a few? The Kings are one game away from going somewhere they have been only one other time in franchise history, going past the second round of the playoffs. The Kings pulled to the brink of the Western Conference finals with a 4-2 victory over the St. Louis Blues on Thursday night at Staples Center, taking a 3-0 series lead.

About 300 university professors and assistants stopped work Friday to protest Yugoslavia's low wages and 170% annual inflation rate.

University of Nebraska football players and graduate assistants arrested in the French Quarter say they were behaving themselves, and it was the police who were profane and abusive, Coach Tom Osborne said Friday. "The players said they did not use any profanity on the officers, did not hit any cars, did not climb any railings," Osborne said. "Most of them do not drink at all in that group. And there's no charge of anything like that.

Kings Coach Darryl Sutter understands the ways of the twentysomething male, the rare breed happening to play hockey for a living. After all, his son Brett, who plays in Carolina's system, is 24 years old. Then there is his nephew Brandon, a year younger than Brett, who was Carolina's alternate captain this season and scored 17 goals and 32 points for the Hurricanes. It's another way of saying that Sutter "gets" Kings defenseman Drew Doughty. "Drew's a kid, right? I've got kids older than him," Sutter said of the 22-year-old.