* A big issue in the movie biz is the pattern of theater owners increasingly charging movie companies to run their trailers. For example, Regal Entertainment Group has now cut the number of trailers that studios may run free with each movie from two to one.
Here’s a suggestion: How about theater owners remitting some of that trailer income to customers. Ever go to the theater because you really want to see a given movie, say, Lincoln or The Artist or The King’s Speech–only to be initially assaulted by multiple, high-decibel, over-the-top action, violent trailers of movies you would never consider seeing? Good, I’m glad I’m not alone.
* As a way of marking the centennial of the birth of Richard Nixon, the Nixon Presidential Library in Yorba Linda, Calif., has put out an exhibit of newly declassified documents. Some of them reveal behind-the-scenes relations between Nixon and the Clinton White House. Nixon-as- elder-statesman provided Bill Clinton with welcomed post-Cold War advice.
In an accompanying exhibit video, Clinton pays tribute to Nixon at his 1994 funeral. “May the day of judging President Nixon on anything less than his entire life and career come to a close.”
How ironic. And how applicable.