Blog
I’ve had the great fortune to work with Lawrence Moore & Associates on content for new Hollywood hotspot Sadie over the last couple of months, and it’s been an incredible experience. The staff is extremely talented and passionate about what they do, and the restaurant itself is gorgeous. I’ve helped out with some of the website copy (the history, overview and abbreviated executive team bios), in addition to writing the launch press release and extended bios for the executive team. One such bio is for Patrick Doherty, the General Manager of the restaurant, who has over 20 years of experience as a true, passionate host with a history spanning eateries such as Le Normandie, The Hotel Bel-Air and others.
Coverage of Sadie has appeared in Eater L.A., Black Book, Urban Daddy, Gayot, Thrillist, the Los Angeles Times, L.A. Weekly, Grubstreet L.A. and many others.
This release, written for Lawrence Moore & Associates, was a ton of fun to work on. The crew at 1886 Bar — specifically, Marcos Tello — are always amazing about providing great detail on their creative process surrounding their seasonal cocktail lists. This time out I wrote about their winter offerings, which included a theatrical but tasty drink called The Smoking Jacket, which called upon one of the bar staff’s fond memories of her Grandfather sipping whiskey and smoking a cigar (the drink was made with tobacco bitters and comes with edible ash made with vanilla, orange and cream).
The release resulted in coverage from outlets such as Grubstreet L.A., Thirsty In L.A., CBS and many others.
Here’s part two of my epic Kevin Smith interview.
Just over two weeks ago, I interviewed Kevin Smith in the bathroom of my hair salon. Which isn’t to say that I locked Kevin and I in the can of a public place — not the way you’re thinking, anyway. I was having one of those days where every appointment I’d scheduled was being re-jigged and blending into one another. So, making the best of what I had to work with, I took my digital recorder and my phone and locked myself in the quietest room of the salon, just in time for a 2:30 interview with Kevin. To date, I think it’s the strangest place I’ve done an interview. But it was also one of the best interviews.
Obviously, a large part of this is Kevin’s willingness to talk. He’s not afraid to speak his mind or answer anything you have to throw at him, and anyone who has seen his speaking engagements — either live or taped — knows that he gives you a lot of material to work with. So while my abbreviated interview with about his Red State event at The Wiltern this weekend already ran on AOL, I wanted to print the entire discussion here, because he had some really incredible insights to share. So here goes part one.
My piece on Source Code went up on AOL today (you can see it here.) Alas, they cut much of the input that I got from screenwriter Ben Ripley. He was one of my favorite interviews that day — which happened to be the day of the L.A. Marathon, also known as Monsoon Day. It was raining sideways, and by the time I made my appointment with him, the marathon was starting to draw to a close. We stood out on the balcony of his suite at the Four Seasons and watched all the street cleaners — at least 20 of them — laying in wait for the okay to go sweep up after the runners. But getting the opportunity to get a peek inside his brain and process was one of the highlights of my day.
Anyway, my interview with Ben was both fun and informative, so I’m posting it in its entirety here. Be forewarned — there are some spoiler-ish bits.
I loved Sucker Punch. I don’t care who knows it. I also don’t care that it currently has a 29% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. That’s pretty much all I have to say about it before it actually releases, ’cause I know I’m going to get all analytical on it and don’t want to spoil anything for anyone. So in the meantime, here’s the interview I did with Steve Shibuya, who wrote the screenplay with director Zack Snyder.
It doesn’t surprise me that Limitless was number one this weekend — I thought it was a pretty solid flick, from the writing to the directing to the acting. That said, as much as I enjoyed it, I wanted it to go further. But it definitely excites me that movies are digging into this kind of content now. And I feel pretty lucky to have interviewed director Neil Burger about his creative process. The piece ran on AOL last Friday, and alas, I wasn’t able to use all of his quotes — I only have so much room for each week. But there were some fun bits that I had to edit out and some insights he offered that I thought were interesting, so I figured I’d publish them here.