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The Business Brief

The Business Brief
Four minutes from the heart of Hollywood from Matt Holzman, producer of “The Business,” public radio’s show about the business of show business.

RECENT SHOWS

The Iraq Movie Surge

The $100 million action thriller Green Zone opened the weekend before last, and so far it's brought in an unimpressive $24 million domestically. But perhaps even … more >>

Trade Wars

For years and years, the business has been the happy battle ground of two trade papers – Variety and the Hollywood Reporter. But in recent years, the fight has stopped … more >>

Distribution Is Marketing

I'll spare you the Oscar talk; I’ll just report that it looks like ratings for the telecast are up and James Cameron got smacked down, so all is right in Hollywood. … more >>

Water Cooler Talk

In 1994, 204 million Americans watched the winter Olympics in the picturesque Norwegian town of Lillehammer. The games that just ended in Vancouver had an 8% smaller … more >>

Rating the Raters

Nielsen, by far the biggest of the media ratings companies, proudly announced last week that they will start counting on-line and DVR-TV watching this fall. To which I … more >>

Black Blockbuster

As the nation celebrates the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, the name of President Obama is coming up an awful lot. But the folks in Hollywood are not talking much about … more >>

Everybody Hates Jay

If you've just woken from an extended bout of unconsciousness, you may not have heard that NBC moved Jay Leno to 10pm last fall, and that now that grand experiment in … more >>

The New (Entertainment) World

"Nobody knows anything." That's the line lifted from William Goldman's 1983 Hollywood memoir adventures in the screen trade that has famously come to describe the … more >>

How Is $400 Million like $100,000?

Avatar is finally coming out this week. At a cost of $300 or $400 million, James Cameron's sci-fi action epic is one of the most expensive movies ever made. At the same … more >>

Tortoise and the Hare

Slow and steady wins the race is the moral of the famous fable about the tortoise and the hare, but the folks in Hollywood clearly aren't big on Aesop. A better analogy … more >>

Speak Up, Hollywood!

Before she came to Hollywood and before she became host of the business here on KCRW, Kim Masters covered politics for the Washington Post. She told me that it was … more >>

The Digital Revolution Will Be Televised...for $24.95

Yahoo has launched a nice new ad campaign with messages of digital empowerment like "now the Internet has a personality – yours." But one of their slogans has got to be … more >>

Back from the Boondocks

The story of Troy Duffy's rocket-ride to success and equally dramatic plummet back to Earth is combination of Hollywood legend and Greek tragedy; call it Icarus meets … more >>

Which Way, Emmys?

Last night was the 61st prime-time Emmy Awards, the television industry's biggest night, and the question has to be: who cares? I'm not trying be provocative, I'm asking … more >>

Tyler Perry's House of Payin'

In 2004, a guy from New Orleans named Tyler Perry showed up in Hollywood. He had the temerity to suggest that the studios might want to turn his wildly popular stage … more >>
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Program Details

Host

Matt Holzman

KCRW producer and host of Matt's Movies; former Executive Producer of The Business

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