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The Business
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Hosted by Claude Brodesser-Akner, The Business looks deep inside the business of entertainment. A half-hour of thoughtful and irreverent dialogue with Hollywood's top deal-makers, filmmakers, moguls, artists and agents, The Business will clue you in on who's making pop culture pop and what's keeping Hollywood's Blackberries juicy.
UPCOMING SHOWS
RECENT SHOWS
Another Visit with Pixar's Big Bird
Legacy Player:
Pixar's Brad Bird just received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Writers' Guild. So this week we revisit our conversation with the creator of The Incredibles and Ratatouille. Plus, the entertainment industry home team.
Why Can't SAG and AFTRA Get Along?
Legacy Player:
The uneasy alliance between the two actors' unions has turned into outright hostility. Plus, the unions want money from the digital future. When will that future arrive? Finally, who gets credit before the credits roll?
Everything You Wanted to Know about Agents
Legacy Player:
There's been a mad game of musical chairs in the agency business in the last few of weeks. The agency business is changing, but the relationship between agents and clients seems to be as quirky as ever.
Celebrities Can Be Taxing
Legacy Player:
Using Tax Day as a very weak hook, we talk to the man who helped clear Wesley Snipes of tax fraud conspiracy charges. The question: what are the special challenges of representing a celebrity in court?
AFTRA-SAG Split; a 'Miss Guided' Novice Writer
Legacy Player:
Hollywood's actors' unions file for an untimely divorce. Then, what happens when a novice TV writer gets her own show?
Qualified to Act?; The ShoWest Goes On
Legacy Player:
In a town where actors are more likely to wait tables than wait in the wings, how do you define a working actor? That's the central question in our lively conversation with two actors. How SAG answers that question may determine if there's a strike. Plus, this year's ShoWest movie exhibitors' conference.
Big Gulp to Blockbuster
Legacy Player:
Jim Keyes was the former CEO of 7-11 stores. Now he's applying the lessons of the Big Gulp to the small screen at the troubled video-rental giant Blockbuster. Plus, Variety game reviewer Ben Fritz asks, "Why are hardcore video gamers so sensitive?" And good agentry with writer and producer Rob Long.
Gaming Goes Casual; Pilot(Less?) Season
Legacy Player:
Video games are an $18 billion business in the US, and they just keep growing. Will Hollywood studios get in on some of that interactive action? Plus, will TV's increasingly pilotless way of making shows crash and burn?
A Studio Executive 'Wants to Direct;' Goodbye, HD-DVD
Legacy Player:
What happens when a studio executive comes out from behind his desk to direct a major motion picture? We talk to Kent Alterman, formerly New Line Cinema's EVP of Production and now the Director of Semi-Pro. Plus, we say goodbye to HD-DVD.
Variety up for Sale; Oscar Prognosticators
Legacy Player:
The venerable Hollywood trade paper, Variety, is up for sale. What will a new owner mean to the business? We'll have a lively conversation with blogger extraordinaire Nikki Finke and PR veteran Howard Bragman. Plus, which Oscar prognosticators predicted with paramount precision?
How Green Is My Oscar?
Legacy Player:
The divide between movies that make money and movies that get awards has been growing in the last few years. Why? And what does that say about how Hollywood is changing? Plus, the 1967 Oscars signaled a coming cinematic revolution. Is this year's crop of best picture nominees the harbinger of another?
Ding Dong the Strike Is Dead!
Legacy Player:
The writers' strike has meant reruns, reality and rankor. So how will things change now that the strike is over? Plus, when will the digital pie that the writers want a piece of actually be out of the oven?
Wilshire and Washington
Legacy Player:
In the wake of Super Tuesday, The Business broadcasts from the corner of Hollywood Boulevard and Pennsylvania Avenue. We talk to Variety's political guru, Ted Johnson, and check back with MGM CEO Harry Sloan, an elephant in a sea of donkeys.
Pixar's Big Bird
Legacy Player:
Animation had lost its luster until Pixar came on the scene and shined it up. We talk to one of their chief polishers, writer and director Brad Bird, about retired superheroes, rats that cook and Oscar gold. Plus, do movies make money (redux)?
So Much Reality TV It's Unreal!
Legacy Player:
TV was already getting more and more into unscripted fare before the strike. Now, there's so much reality programming it's unreal! We get the lay of the unscripted landscape with Joel McHale of E! Entertainment's show The Soup. Plus, while most of the industry suffers, video games rock on (redux).
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Host
Host Claude Brodesser-Akner looks deep inside the business of entertainment in a half-hour of thoughtful and irreverent dialogue with Hollywood's top deal-makers, filmmakers, moguls, artists and agents.
Schedule
Live
National Syndication:
Produced by
Tapes & Transcripts
A CD copy of The Business is available by calling 1.888.600.5279. Transcripts are not available.
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