A career or so ago, your faithful (and at times fitful) observer plied his trade in the back end of Hollywood, running publications read by retailers who sold and rented movies, videogames and the like. Movie industry people are fun and a half in the Never-A-Dull-Moment Department. Take the guy who helped perfect the digital video disc, stamping his name on key patents.
This Warner Bros. executive was fond of saying things to ink-stained wretches like yours truly, “I wish you people would just go away.” He suffered gladly neither fools nor journalists who didn’t write precisely his self-possessed view of the world. Then there was the time this half-charming/half-insufferable man -- not exactly a Don Juan but for some time shacking up with none other than Faye “No More Wire Hangers!” Dunaway – ambled into a press conference, turned to one of his lieutenants, pointed at an underling sitting there, and said, “I thought I told you last week to fire him!” Lovely management style.
