@Politico reporter in L.A. covering intersection of entertainment, media, sports, tech and politics. Alum of @latimes, @thr. [email protected]
Los Angeles
Joined September 2010
- Tweets5K
- Following1.2K
- Followers10.8K
- Likes11.8K
Pinned Tweet
Hollywood — and its L.A. production ecosystem — is in deeper trouble than most people realize. To see it firsthand, I went to Illinois, where 25+ productions were in progress, as the state steadily steals film and TV work once centered in the Southland. The contrast was stark: Illinois’ showbiz boom was in full swing, while California lawmakers were fighting to protect the state’s production incentive from a new threat. My @POLITICOMag debut: politico.com/news/magazine/2…
A remarkable box office showing for a documentary: A24’s “You Can See Everything” earned $19.5 million in its second weekend, up 25% from its $15.6 million opening weekend. Those are extraordinary numbers for a documentary, especially one playing in 2,655 theaters.
Scoop: Nithya Raman’s outside legal experts have assured her she can act on Hollywood matters as L.A. mayor, despite recusing herself from several industry-related City Council votes because her husband works in entertainment. Karen Bass isn’t buying it. politico.com/newsletters/cal…
Reading Emily St. John Mandel’s new novel, “Exit Party,” I came across a reference to the 2025 L.A. fires. I think it’s the first time I’ve seen them appear in a work of fiction. It delivered a dizzying jolt: an event the city lived through, already part of the past in a dystopian future.
The American Entertainment Alliance, the group pushing to revive Fin-Syn rules limiting studio ownership of content, is backing the federal production incentive bill. But AEA says tax breaks alone won’t save Hollywood. Who owns the content matters too, it says. AEA’s statement:
Listen to the conversation here — great to speak with @mkimreporter and @Erik_Hayden3: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcas…
CA’s expanded film tax credit is showing results in L.A., a new FilmLA report finds: Incentivized productions logged more than 2x as many on-location shoot days in the 3rd quarter as a year earlier. But total filming was down 4.8% year over year and nearly 29% below the five-year average.
I'll be joining @KQEDForum today at 10 a.m. for a conversation about runaway production, the push for a federal film tax incentive and the Paramount-WBD merger. Tune in: kqed.org/forum
Daniel Miller retweeted
ICYMI: Google founder Sergey Brin was a bit player in California politics.
One year, $100 million, and one explosive wealth tax later, he's a main character -- and he could be for years
politico.com/news/2026/10/19…
Paramount's takeover of WBD roiled Hollywood and could reshape the media landscape. But CA voters? Mostly shrugging. While 24% say the antitrust settlement was bad for CA versus 16% good, 43% aren't sure and another 16% say it was neither good nor bad, according to our new @POLITICO poll. The findings also suggest Rob Bonta may escape a political backlash over the deal. More: politico.com/news/2026/10/20…
Nathan Fielder’s “You Can See Everything,” the documentary about Elizabeth Holmes, opens to a huge $15 million at just 855 locations. That’s $17,544 per theater. For comparison, the biggest domestic debut ever for a traditional documentary was “Fahrenheit 9/11,” which opened to $23.9 million in 868 theaters.
Xavier Becerra described “the travesty” of Trump’s cuts to women’s health research. “We will have to probably go it alone for the next couple of years,” Becerra says of CA likely needing to step up to fund women’s health research while Trump remains in office.
California gubernatorial candidate Xavier Becerra was the final speaker at the WME Women’s Health Summit. The Democrat kicked off the conversation by calling out “vaccine deniers at HHS” and explaining how and why doctors “lost control” of their profession.
It looked like the Paramount-WBD antitrust case was closed. Then a new filing landed in court — from a kid named Alex. He’s from Scranton, he’s pro-merger and he’s sure the companies will “try to get along so very well and proceed on keeping Hollywood alive forever.”
🤖 Made with AI
A trip to Philippe’s before a Dodgers home playoff game verges on the holy, as far as L.A. experiences go.
“Paramount just bought us on Tuesday.”
“I work in post-production but I’m out of work and afraid I’m going to miss an opportunity.”
“You’ve seen ‘12 Angry Men,’ ‘A Few Good Men’ — a lot of the titles have ‘men’ in them.”
This isn’t a Hollywood gathering. It’s jury duty in L.A.
Mixed results for two of the four films taking aim at Big Tech this fall: “The Social Reckoning” stumbled with a $5.5 million domestic opening. But “Musk” was a bright spot, taking in $68,900 from just four theaters — about $17,225 per theater. That’s especially notable given its nearly four-hour runtime, which limits the number of screenings theaters can squeeze in each day. By comparison, “The Social Reckoning” averaged $2,111 per theater. Read our piece on the quartet of films casting Silicon Valley founders as villains: politico.com/news/2026/10/07…
Stunning photos by @latimesphotos documenting the pounding the SoCal coast is taking as a Kelvin wave, Tropical Storm Rachel and high tides combine to batter the shoreline.
Scoop: Georgia Sen. Jon Ossoff is heading to L.A. for a fundraiser hosted by Miramax CEO Jonathan Glickman, UTA CEO David Kramer, filmmaker Grant Heslov and several other Hollywood players — 15 days before Election Day. Details: politico.com/news/2026/10/10…
