2-17 Expert Witness: Gossip
Raquel and Ferrone leave the building, Adios, girl bosses. Film Noir takes a dive and Liner Notes live another day.
ADIOS, CHICAS
The last woman CEO has left the building. The media conglomerate is now marked “safe” — from the female gaze.
What’s really going on? Here’s the lede of a story which is far more interesting at the bottom than the top.
YouTube chief exec Susan Wojcicki will step down after nearly a decade at the helm of the Google-owned video site, leaving all of the major social media and entertainment platforms in the management of men.
You might think such is the navel-gazing concern of the billionaire C-suite. Dig down a few graphs:
The recent job cuts in the tech sector has jeopardized the progress many companies made in diversifying their workforces during the pandemic . . .
Attrition rates for people who work promoting diversity have outpaced other [furloughs] at 600+ U.S. companies who laid off workers since late 2020 — a disparity that grew worse in the past six months —
All this, according to data from Revelio Labs, a company that analyzes trends in the labor market.
History on repeat. After a burst of affirmative action, “We Care!”, etc, there’s a flurry of hiring and photo opportunities. Budgets are drawn up to make long term investment in under-represented voices. The data piles up that un-represented markets are a wise investment. The John-Wayne boomer market isn’t paying the bills, and hasn’t for a long time.
Popular culture needs product that looks like real lives, which are complicated! — and filled with you, know, women. —“Others.” —Voices, language, and perception from every block.
Keep this thought in mind, every time the red carpet gets yanked.
Because within minutes, someone ELSE will be exploiting the opportunity the former bosses spurned.
Maybe it will be you.
Yes, it’s cruel when hard-won doors are slammed shut. Last hired, first fired. Readers wondered how Elon Musk could destroy the value of his new toy Twitter in weeks, by being an utter prick. He looked mad, throwing his employees out on the street. —Turns out, he was a clubby trendsetter. Every other CEO took up the new diet, laying people off in spite of their profit margins. They waved buh-bye to those annoying new-ish faces who, they sigh, were never going to fit in bro culture.
Why do they do it, really? And what are you, dear plebeian, going to do about it?
Since balance sheets are not the evidence in attrition decisions, we must look for another answer. Did the top dogs make a plan to depress the labor market, enforce worker subservience?
Well, sure, whatever. But . . . every Marxist needs a pinch of Freud and a Whore’s Eye View.
These Captains of Media are circling the wagons because they think it will get them laid.
I’m not kidding. Their great purge will make them hard in the eyes of their peers, (and how other men see them is #1 in their conquest) Embracing their inner elitist, they swear, will raise their harem profile. A generation of these dudes are in full panic mode about their virility— and indeed, their mortality. They didn’t get the equestrian memo: you hold the reins, you don’t seize them.
Such men are vulnerable when their id is on the line. We can already watch the business chessboard and see the newer candidates moving boldly forward. The power balance is in full wobble.
By 2024, you’re not going to recognize what this industry looks like.
If I was a small-to-medium publisher right now, or an editor wondering, NOW WHAT? — I have the glad news.
You have been blessed with the greatest bargain sale of the last twenty years. Some of the people being laid off are rainmakers — they made millions for their former bosses. And I don’t mean the coders, I mean the A&R, the editorial, marketing, operations and programming side. —All those women and “no-longer-minorities” made millions for the major media empires, throughout the pandemic. The next prospective titles, the potential books and scripts? MANY of the pitches being rejected today during the purge would’ve seen significant advance offers six months ago. The opportunity didn’t change. The evaluation didn’t change! There are mother diamonds lying in the street. Go pick them up.
MARLOWE MOVIE AND THE NOIR THIRST
I have a new movie review out today on Book and Film Globe— Marlowe.
This genre entry from Neil Jordan and Liam Neeson will leave you half-starved— but those who buy tickets only prove how big noir is; the thirst is real!
My review provides succor, satire, and suggestions to keep you alive while we wait for something decent.
There’s a killing to be made in Noir storytime, even if the floundering theatrical biz can’t get their arms around it. Right now, Poker Face is keeping us on life support.
ROB TANNENBAUM FINDS BRITTANY HOWARD’S PLAYLIST
Musician-curated streaming playlists are little works of beauty most artists are asked to do as part of a bigger deal, an amendment on a contract. They are marketed: not-at-all. Many display a cynical response to a beloved inspiration: the old-school devotion of putting together tape cassette of all your favorite songs, in perfect segue groove.
I love ripping a memorable playlist. The gift caught my eye today, when discerning tastemaker Rob Tannenbaum recommended his FB friends to singer/songwriter Brittany Howard’s station on Sonos.
Hair on Fire! It’s called Encylopedia of Brittany. It’s sublime from the moment the needle drops.
LIBRARY CRUSH OF THE WEEK
Liner Notes!
Streaming killed the art of liner notes, but I’m not taking it anymore. I checked out a compilation of Alligator Records living blues recordings — epic curation, as is founder Bruce Iglauer’s liner history.
I emailed my librarian, “You have everything Alligator ever recorded; you have to get the dude’s memoir!” They said yes, and I await: Bitten By The Blues is on my request list. I love my library!
What are some of your favorite all time liner notes, on LPs, tapes, or CDs?
I have to say I’m a sucker for all things on the old Prestige label, like the original Holy Modal Rounder notes from Peter Stampfel. What a glorious rant: “Once Weber played ‘La Bamba’ for 18 hours straight without making the same pass twice.”
RAQUEL WELCH, RIP
The original sixties dark-eyed California Dream Girl.
She was the survivor. —The Amazon thunder-thigh stance. Her hypnotic waist-to-hip ratio that she studied like an Eadweard Muybridge motion reel. Journos called me this week to ask about her exact bust measurement! All I could say was, it’s not a record breaker; being a 34-36C wasn’t the point.
Welch had kinesthetic charisma off the charts. She knew how to move on camera like few others, and had the ability to throw a thousand-yard stare, which she shared with Clint Eastwood. You knew she could take on that T-Rex in 1,000,000 years BC. All that in one still photograph. One poster.
Welch had a decades-long career; that’s the shocking measure. She made the leap to her first love, musical theater, in the Muppets, and on Broadway. She got to kick everyone’s ass on Seinfeld.
No, Welch wasn’t Mexican. Her father was a Peruvian snob who wouldn’t allow Spanish to be spoken at home, and her mother was a Mayflower descendant. Raquel said she didn’t study her father’s first language until she was in her sixties, and then she relished it.
Welch was uncontroversial in her pop appeal, and a radical behind the scenes. It’s interesting she got jibed for not coming out as “Latina” in her youth — I no one did that in the Sixties. And yet. She didn’t let Fox Studios change her name to “Debbie” when they begged her. What does that tell you? No other starlet held onto their Spanish given name in those days, unless it was “Linda.” The Hispanic diaspora knew, and they loved her.
Welch did a love scene in 1969 with Black NFL-fullback-turned-actor Jim Brown (100 Rifles) and the KKK nearly had an aneurysm. That was bold as hell. Her and Pam Grier, man. Unstoppable.
Then, a moment only industry peeps could see the extent of: Welch successfully sued MGM Studios in 1981 for breach of contract— after casting and signing, they said she was “too old” at 40 to play the love interest in Cannery Row. Man, they wish they looked that good. Actors love her for this alone.
Today, 56-year-old Salma Hayek is on screen in Magic Mike 3 doing a lap dance with the much-younger Channing Tatum. You know she says a silent prayer to Saint Raquel.
She was a star; she was a great beauty. She was something else.
RIP, RICHARD FERRONE
One of my favorite voice actors, Richard Ferrone, died in October — I’m just learning now. What an amazing interpreter, voice, a vibe!
I personally mourned that Dashiell Hammet didn’t live long enough to hear Ferrone narrate Red Harvest— it’s one of the best classics EVER recorded.
I learned from the AudioFile story, above, that Ferrone studied to be a labor lawyer before he left the law for the theater and his gift was discovered. His empathy for the working man, the underdog, the hopeless and the damned — it all came through. Rest in Power, Mr. Ferrone. You gave it your all.
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Thanks for writing this post: excellent insight to remember re: this toxic masculinity CEO club and solutions to challenge their club; also, adored the Raquel Welch tribute; "She was a star; she was a great beauty. She was something else." the best last lines ever about Raquel -