Entertainment Industry

One of Michael Jackson's most famous lyrics proclaims, "It don't matter if you're black or white." But when it comes to the late singer's identification with African Americans, that declaration becomes much cloudier.

Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Bob Iger wasted little time setting the tone for this year's Allen & Co. conference in Sun Valley, Idaho. Getting into his rental car after checking in at the Sun Valley Resort here, Iger held court with the media for a few minutes and declared: "People are going to pay [for] content. . . . We're not worried about monetizing content."

Move over, Grauman's Chinese Theatre. The hot new Southern California tourist attractions are the restaurants, boutiques and tattoo parlors where some of reality television's most popular shows are filmed. Tourists from as far away as Germany fly in to visit the West Hollywood tattoo shop featured in the Learning Chanel's "LA Ink." Fans of the E! Entertainment Television hit "Keeping Up With the Kardashians" stream into the Calabasas clothing stores run by the show's stars.

When members of the Screen Actors Guild cast their ballots for president in the coming weeks, they will be voting for a leader who can best repair the damage inflicted on Hollywood's largest talent union over the last two years. With 125,000 members, the 76-year-old SAG is still the mightiest union in Hollywood. But its clout has been diminished by internal bickering, a divided boardroom and a disastrous power struggle with a smaller union that represents actors as well as broadcast journalists, disc jockeys and recording artists.

Hollywood's long-running battle to pry open the vast Chinese market suffered another setback Tuesday. China has appealed a ruling by the World Trade Organization that it broke international rules by restricting imports of movies, music and books. The ruling, issued last month, stipulates that Beijing cannot force foreign media companies to distribute their content through Chinese state-owned entities that have a monopoly over the market. That was a victory for major Hollywood studios and others who have been frustrated for years over limited access to the Chinese market.

Hollywood's biggest slasher story isn't playing at any theater near you. It's hitting the industry's corporate suites, where the sacking of studio executives has reached epidemic level. As evidenced by Disney's recent firing of its studio chief, Dick Cook, and Universal Pictures' dismissal Monday of chairmen Marc Shmuger and David Linde, Hollywood is in a state of panic-producing turmoil. It used to be that Hollywood's corporate parents could stomach a dry spell from their studio managers.

The Walt Disney Co. said Wednesday that it would build a 56-acre production facility in northern Los Angeles County, casting a ray of light on an otherwise gloomy film economy that has hemorrhaged thousands of jobs in the last decade. The Burbank company said the proposed Disney/ABC Studios at the Ranch would occupy a corner of the Golden Oak Ranch, a sprawling 890-acre parcel off California 14 that has been the setting of such classic films as "Old Yeller." Plans call for 12 soundstages, production offices, a commissary and other facilities that could be used for film, television, commercial and new media projects.

Carol Lombardini may have the least glamorous job in Hollywood. As the chief negotiator for the major studios, she must find consensus among a group that often has conflicting interests and priorities. But Lombardini, the new president of the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, has had plenty of time to learn what she's getting into. The 54-year-old former labor attorney has spent most of her career at the alliance, where she worked under her longtime mentor, Nick Counter, who died last week after retiring this year.

The attack on movie critic Ben Lyons by Chris Lee was so vicious ["Dumbing Down the Film Critic," Dec. 28]. It is shocking that it got past your editors and made it into print. What was Lee's motive and what is his vendetta? I have worked as a TV sports anchor, Major League Baseball TV play-by-play announcer and am about to begin my 28th year as radio play-by-play announcer for the Boston Red Sox. I have seen some very harsh reviews of people in sports but nothing even close to Lee's assault on Lyons.

Re "Actors' hospital to close," Jan. 15 Oh, come on, Hollywood! Are you telling me that "the industry" can't find ways to economize enough to pay for the Motion Picture & Television Fund Home and Hospital? The money is clearly out there, but it needs to be reallocated more humanely. Some ideas: Maybe cut back on the money spent on the Oscars telecast (including the amount of swag given to the already rich and famous presenters). Cut back on similar extravagances at other awards shows.