Though ironic Halloween costumes can be amusing (Britney is pretty scary these days), we miss the days when this time of year was solely about ghosts, skeletons and, you know, the afterlife and stuff. That’s why we love Day of the Dead. The Mexican holiday will never veer from its morbid aesthetic. And while its focus on the deceased might be kinda creepy to some, it’s always celebratory, and often quite beautiful. Self Help Graphics’ Día de los Muertos annual gathering never ceases to be fun, festive and family friendly, with a full day of activities, including an art exhibit starting at 3 p.m., a children’s art workshop from 4 to 8 p.m., a dress-up procession starting a few blocks away (Cesar Chavez Avenue and Lorena Street) at 4 p.m. and an Aztec blessing ceremony at 6 p.m., followed by live Latin bands (hosted by KPFK’s Mark Torres) until 11 p.m. (Los Pochos, Umoverde and more). You can also bring items that represent departed loved ones to honor their memory on the giant altar. Self Help Graphics Art, 3802 E. Cesar Chavez Ave., E.L.A.; free. (323) 881-6444 or www.selfhelpgraphics.com.
SATURDAY, November 3
Hollywood & Highland sure has been throwing some humdinger special events lately, and Live Art 2007 is definitely one worth battling against the Saturday tourist traffic (at least parking is easy and cheap: $2 with validation). Local faves Midnight Movies play in the courtyard around 9 p.m., and before that there’s tons to look at, including painting and photography by artists Rory Wilson, Mark Owens, Michael Coleman and many more, most of it inspired by H&H’s gigantic elephant statue/mascot. Limited-edition prints will be sold with proceeds going to Reaching to Embrace Arts, which provides art supplies to schools. Not your average mall fare, even if most of the stores (pseudo-goth grotto Hot Topic, big-bucks buddy workshop Build a Bear, etc.) are. Hollywood & Highland Center, 6801 Hollywood Blvd., Hlywd.; Sat., Nov. 3, 1-10 p.m.; free. (323) 467-6412 or www.livelargehere.com.
SUNDAY, November 4
The Lafayette Complex in the East Village Arts District of downtown Long Beach is an art deco fan’s wet dream, and the second annual Walk Through Time tour is sure to fulfill the fantasies of any hardcore ’20s and ’30s architectural enthusiast. From noon to 5 p.m. you can view the fully restored grand lobby and tiled solarium in the main entrance, as well as more than a dozen splendid private units in all three of the complex’s different buildings. Expect the stroll to be a real flashback, with old-timey autos outside, live period jazz, a doorman and hotel clerk and even some “stylish guests in vintage attire” checking in. Lafayette Complex, 140 Linden Ave., Long Beach; Sun., Nov. 4, noon-5 p.m.; $20. (562) 590-9841.
MONDAY, November 5
Franki Chan’s the man in hip-kid land thanks to his popular indie/electro haven Check Yo Ponytail (now at the Echoplex), and Dim Mak’s Steve Aoki is a bona fide biggie — spinning everywhere. The two former Cinespace co-promoter/DJs split a while ago to do their own things, but we can’t help but fondly recall the party where they first joined forces: Fucking Awesome at the Beauty Bar. The night was actually created by scenester soul man Har Mar Superstar, and thanks to his friends and connections, it was a magnet for rock-star guests on the decks. Now that Chan and Har Mar have reemerged with Still Fucking Awesome on Mondays, a new wave of Cahuenga fever is sure to heat up. Beauty Bar, 1638 N. Cahuenga Blvd., Hlywd.; every Monday, 10 p.m.-2 a.m.; over 21; free. (323) 464-7676.
TUESDAY, November 6
There might not be tatted cholos hanging out or oldies blasting from the stereos or skimpily clad chicas posing on the hoods like at real car shows, but “La Vida Lowrider: Cruising the City of Angels” at the Petersen Automotive Museum does claim to be “the most comprehensive museum exhibit of its kind.” Building upon the Petersen’s popular 2000 show, “Arte y Estilo: The Lowriding Tradition,” this one explores the evolution of the lowriding demographic, with more cherried-out, award-winning rides (Ry Cooder’s ’53 Chevy ice cream truck, plus clusters of candy-colored Rivieras, Impalas and Lincolns) and other related “automobilia.” Petersen Automotive Museum, 6060 Wilshire Blvd., L.A.; show runs Oct. 27-June 8; Tues.-Sun. 10 a.m.-6 p.m.; $10 adults, $5 seniors/students, $3 ages 5-12, under 5 free. (323) 930-2277 or www.petersen.org.
WEDNESDAY, November 7
Disney sensation Miley Cyrus, a.k.a. Hannah Montana, brings her Best of Both Worlds tour to Staples Center tonight, and though you probably don’t know her music if you’re past puberty, these tickets are the hottest in town — thanks to brokers who reportedly bought ’em all up and then charged outrageous prices (more than Van Halen, the Police and even the Stones!). The recent controversy has led many state governments to start looking into dubious broker practices. About time. If you aren’t one of the “lucky” ones who get to see the 15-year-old singer perform live (before she grows up, starts hanging out at Hollywood clubs and then has to go to rehab? We hope not), avoid this part of downtown or risk getting trapped inside a swirl of circling moms and pops in minivans. Staples Center, 1111 S. Figueroa St., dwntwn.; Wed., Nov. 7, 7 p.m. (213) 742-7300.
THURSDAY, November 8
Get cultured and a li’l cardio too at the Downtown Art Walk, a self-guided tour every second Thursday of the month, covering the area’s galleries and museums, including MOCA, L.A. Artcore Center, Los Angeles Center for Digital Art, Niche.LA Video Art, Infusion Gallery and Gary Leonard’s space, to name a few. There’s a lot to see, and you don’t even have to do it all on foot: A free DASH shuttle set up just for the Art Walk will loop throughout Gallery Row starting at 7 p.m., hosted by local historians Matt Goulet and Mike the Poet, author of “I Am Alive in Los Angeles.” Shuttle loop runs north on Main and south on Spring, from Second to Ninth streets, dwntwn.; Thurs., Nov. 8, noon-9 p.m.; free (individual museum fees may apply). Printable map at www.downtownartwalk.com
Friday, November 2, 2007
An American Realist
Although he plays a college professor in his latest film, Robert Redford was, by his own admission, never much of a student, consistently more interested in what was going on outside the classroom window than inside. But there’s one moment from Redford’s academic past that burns brightly in his memory. The year was 1950 and Redford was a junior-high student in Van Nuys, suffering through one of those standardized achievement tests that are the bane of every school kid’s existence. Suddenly, one particular section of the exam grabbed his attention. “There was this picture, and you had to figure out what was wrong with it,” Redford recalls. “The picture seemed to be totally perfect — a woman was standing on a porch with a broom, and a mailman who had just delivered the mail was talking to her. And I got so excited — I was going to find out what was wrong there!” Then Redford found the answer: The woman was wearing only one sock.
In the more than 50 years since that eureka moment, Robert Redford has stayed on the lookout for the subtle fissures in seemingly flawless façades, whether it be the American government’s veil of inviolability ( All the President’s Men), broadcast television’s carefully stage-managed reality (Quiz Show ) or the stiff upper lips of a tragedy-stricken suburban family (Ordinary People). Now, Redford is once again traversing the chasm between the American dream and the American reality in a new film, Lions for Lambs , that meets the War on Terror and a grab bag of other sociopolitical issues head-on, making for one of the year’s most provocative and polarizing moviegoing experiences.
Directed, produced by and starring Redford, Lions weaves an intricate tapestry of a failed America, beginning on an unnamed Southern California college campus, where a bright but slackerish student (newcomer Andrew Garfield) settles in for a conference with the political-science prof (Redford) who sees unrealized potential in the boy. At the same moment, in the corridors of Beltway power, a rising Republican senator (Tom Cruise) offers a seasoned reporter (Meryl Streep) an exclusive scoop about his new plan for winning the war in Afghanistan (and, by proxy, Iraq). Meanwhile, half a world away, where the senator’s strategy went into effect “10 minutes ago,” two U.S. soldiers find themselves stranded in enemy territory after their helicopter was shot down by Afghan insurgents. Providing a further point of connection, the soldiers are former students of the professor, whose advocacy of action over apathy led them to enlist in the first place.
Simply put, Lions for Lambs (which screens as the opening-night attraction of the AFI Fest before opening nationwide on November 9) is a movie about people talking in a room. Or rather, four people talking in two rooms, hashing out political and personal ideologies while, on a mountaintop in Afghanistan, the lives of two men hang in the balance. Of course, what’s really at stake (in case you missed the point, which is pretty hard to do) is the future of our nation itself. It’s the sort of theatrical premise that wouldn’t have seemed out of place on one of the socially relevant 1960s television anthology series where Redford did some of his first screen acting. But if Lions for Lambs , which springs from the pen of 34-year-old screenwriter Matthew Michael Carnahan, is wordy and unsubtle in the extreme, it’s also that rare Hollywood movie that fully possesses the strength of its own convictions, and which pursues them with a commitment and intellectual rigor far removed from the reductive faux humanism of Rendition and In the Valley of Elah.
“In the current climate, audiences are accustomed to and seem to crave hard, visceral action films where you go inside the pores of the wound and everything’s moving at 150 miles per hour,” Redford says, offering a fairly succinct description of the other Carnahan-scripted political drama currently in release, The Kingdom.
It’s a rainy October morning in Boston, where the filmmaker is winding up a college promotional tour that has included stops at Berkeley and Harvard. And when he arrives (late, as is his custom) for our interview, there’s no mistaking the wiry figure in sweater, jeans and brown loafers being ushered through the lobby of the Ritz-Carlton hotel, no matter that the famous flaxen hair is mostly hidden beneath a Red Sox cap, the blazing blue eyes concealed behind aviator shades. For all his interest in the misleading surfaces of things, Redford himself is a failure at camouflage — an asset if you want to be one of the most recognizable movie stars on the planet and a liability if you want to be taken seriously as a film artist. More on that a bit later.
For now, though, our conversation centers on other matters. At first, Redford says, he wondered if Lions for Lambs might work better as a play. “Then I thought: Wait a minute. How many times are you going to get a script that’s really able to touch on some of the issues that concern you? The fact that they’re talking heads in a room is something you should embrace and figure out if you can make it dynamic enough. I started to see the film in a new way, and I got excited about it. I said, ‘I think I’ll take a chance on this.’”
Soon, Redford had two powerful allies willing to ante up with him — his Out of Africa co-star Streep, and Cruise, who saw Lions not just as a potential starring vehicle for himself, but as the perfect flagship production for the newly resurrected United Artists studio, which Cruise and producing partner Paula Wagner assumed control of last year. “Just the idea that Tom was interested in it was the first thing that intrigued me,” says Redford, noting that the senator character was originally written as both older and African-American, something of a Colin Powell surrogate. “Then I started to think about the qualities that Tom exhibited on film, which were intensity, a kind of all-American energy and an appealing youthfulness. And I began to see him in the skin of this guy who’s fundamentally going to be running for office all the time .”
In the more than 50 years since that eureka moment, Robert Redford has stayed on the lookout for the subtle fissures in seemingly flawless façades, whether it be the American government’s veil of inviolability ( All the President’s Men), broadcast television’s carefully stage-managed reality (Quiz Show ) or the stiff upper lips of a tragedy-stricken suburban family (Ordinary People). Now, Redford is once again traversing the chasm between the American dream and the American reality in a new film, Lions for Lambs , that meets the War on Terror and a grab bag of other sociopolitical issues head-on, making for one of the year’s most provocative and polarizing moviegoing experiences.
Directed, produced by and starring Redford, Lions weaves an intricate tapestry of a failed America, beginning on an unnamed Southern California college campus, where a bright but slackerish student (newcomer Andrew Garfield) settles in for a conference with the political-science prof (Redford) who sees unrealized potential in the boy. At the same moment, in the corridors of Beltway power, a rising Republican senator (Tom Cruise) offers a seasoned reporter (Meryl Streep) an exclusive scoop about his new plan for winning the war in Afghanistan (and, by proxy, Iraq). Meanwhile, half a world away, where the senator’s strategy went into effect “10 minutes ago,” two U.S. soldiers find themselves stranded in enemy territory after their helicopter was shot down by Afghan insurgents. Providing a further point of connection, the soldiers are former students of the professor, whose advocacy of action over apathy led them to enlist in the first place.
Simply put, Lions for Lambs (which screens as the opening-night attraction of the AFI Fest before opening nationwide on November 9) is a movie about people talking in a room. Or rather, four people talking in two rooms, hashing out political and personal ideologies while, on a mountaintop in Afghanistan, the lives of two men hang in the balance. Of course, what’s really at stake (in case you missed the point, which is pretty hard to do) is the future of our nation itself. It’s the sort of theatrical premise that wouldn’t have seemed out of place on one of the socially relevant 1960s television anthology series where Redford did some of his first screen acting. But if Lions for Lambs , which springs from the pen of 34-year-old screenwriter Matthew Michael Carnahan, is wordy and unsubtle in the extreme, it’s also that rare Hollywood movie that fully possesses the strength of its own convictions, and which pursues them with a commitment and intellectual rigor far removed from the reductive faux humanism of Rendition and In the Valley of Elah.
“In the current climate, audiences are accustomed to and seem to crave hard, visceral action films where you go inside the pores of the wound and everything’s moving at 150 miles per hour,” Redford says, offering a fairly succinct description of the other Carnahan-scripted political drama currently in release, The Kingdom.
It’s a rainy October morning in Boston, where the filmmaker is winding up a college promotional tour that has included stops at Berkeley and Harvard. And when he arrives (late, as is his custom) for our interview, there’s no mistaking the wiry figure in sweater, jeans and brown loafers being ushered through the lobby of the Ritz-Carlton hotel, no matter that the famous flaxen hair is mostly hidden beneath a Red Sox cap, the blazing blue eyes concealed behind aviator shades. For all his interest in the misleading surfaces of things, Redford himself is a failure at camouflage — an asset if you want to be one of the most recognizable movie stars on the planet and a liability if you want to be taken seriously as a film artist. More on that a bit later.
For now, though, our conversation centers on other matters. At first, Redford says, he wondered if Lions for Lambs might work better as a play. “Then I thought: Wait a minute. How many times are you going to get a script that’s really able to touch on some of the issues that concern you? The fact that they’re talking heads in a room is something you should embrace and figure out if you can make it dynamic enough. I started to see the film in a new way, and I got excited about it. I said, ‘I think I’ll take a chance on this.’”
Soon, Redford had two powerful allies willing to ante up with him — his Out of Africa co-star Streep, and Cruise, who saw Lions not just as a potential starring vehicle for himself, but as the perfect flagship production for the newly resurrected United Artists studio, which Cruise and producing partner Paula Wagner assumed control of last year. “Just the idea that Tom was interested in it was the first thing that intrigued me,” says Redford, noting that the senator character was originally written as both older and African-American, something of a Colin Powell surrogate. “Then I started to think about the qualities that Tom exhibited on film, which were intensity, a kind of all-American energy and an appealing youthfulness. And I began to see him in the skin of this guy who’s fundamentally going to be running for office all the time .”
Outsourcing off Los Angeles
What if you could outsource to a company that offered the cost savings of an India-based outsourcing firm, but whose facilities were just a few hours away?
That’s the premise of three entrepreneurs in San Diego, who are in the final throes of launching a company that will offer software development off the coast of California—three miles outside Los Angeles, to be specific.
The three plan to buy a used cruise ship and station it close enough for a half-hour water taxi ride to shore, but far enough to avoid H1B jurisdiction. According to CEO David Cook, who was a tanker ship captain before going into IT ten years ago, project pricing “will be comparable to a distant-shore firm.”
By stationing the ship in international waters, the company, called SeaCode, will be able to remain close to U.S. clients while picking and choosing IT talent from around the world—something that tightening H1B visa requirements have made difficult in the U.S.
Depending on your point of view, it may also allow them to pay less than the rate a team of U.S. developers would command.
That assumes that the talent is willing to live on a ship, of course, which may not be as tough as it sounds. Cook says the ship will retain all of its cruise ship facilities and will feed and house workers in style. During off hours, programming teams can partake of the ship’s recreational facilities or head for the lights of L.A. on a water taxi, since each worker will be required to have a U.S. tourist visa, Cook says.
The offshore-on-a-ship concept isn’t the only radical idea here. The ship’s 600 or so developers and project managers will form assorted around-the-clock development teams. When one shift finishes, the next shift will pick up the same project. That unusual arrangement will allow the company to finish jobs in half the time typically allocated while maintaining equivalent quality and control. “A key part of the plan is having everyone together there on the ship,” Cook says. “We call them pods and pod leaders. The pods all live in the same area in the ship, work at the same time, go ashore together. It’s a natural function of what happens on a ship.”
The idea, which came to light two weeks ago in a blog entry at Sourcingmag.com, a Web site that covers IT outsourcing, has generated some predictable heat. Longtime IT columnist John Dvorak disparaged the idea as an “Indian slave ship” in his blog (http://www.dvorak.org/blog/?p=1767), then posted a contribution from a reader showing the ship as a giant golf course (http://www.dvorak.org/blog/?m=20050408).
At first blush, admits COO Roger Green, it sounds like they’re trying to avoid U.S. taxes, regulations and pay rates. Not so, he maintains. SeaCode will be a U.S. corporation, and the ship will fall under a number of state and federal regulations. Green, who has managed outsourcing projects before, says just 10 percent of every dollar spent will go to paying developers—most of whom will probably be non-U.S. citizens. Remaining expenses will overhead—for equipment and supplies, fuel and other costs—all purchased in the U.S., the three say.
How much will developers be paid? That will depend on skill set, not country of origin. Cook says they aren’t interested in competing for “low-level, Visual Basic-type” work, but rather, enterprise-type projects that require advanced coding and project management skills. That may well mean hiring U.S. workers for some of the slots, the three say, workers who will be paid at a rate comparable to what they’d earn in the U.S.
For non-U.S. developers, “The take-home money [will be] the same as if someone was working as an H1B inside this country,” Cook says.
“We’ll pay for your skills,” Cook says. The rate may not be competitive for an L.A. developer “in the lower-level ranks,” he says, “but as you become a manager, absolutely.” As for non-U.S. workers, “you’re going to find [wages] far higher than the country you’re from. You’re getting paid so well that Indian [workers] will be able to go home and pay cash for a house.”
The team programming concept comes naturally to the three, since two of the founders, Cook and CTO Joe Conway, have worked on ships. There, they say, it’s natural to hand tasks, even highly complex ones, off to the next shift. Conway, who has a broad and deep background in software development, says he did that repeatedly aboard Navy nuclear subs at an earlier point in his career.
Cook also says that SeaCode will be able to hire many highly talented women developers, who because of social norms often have difficulty finding work in third-world countries. “If you go to India, some incredibly talented women [developers] have a very difficult time getting a job.” In contrast, Cook says, his company specifically plans to hire some percentage of women to take advantage of that overlooked talent pool.
The company will use microwave and U.S. providers for phone and Internet access, thus addressing a common outsourcing concern: ownership of intellectual property. Under international law, Cook says, the first point of contact with land determines whose laws will apply. “One of reasons we’re doing things this way is so U.S law will apply.”
Another common outsourcing concern, security, is also addressed, he says. Physical access to the ship is clearly limited, and any code transmitted moves immediately onto secure U.S. Internet lines.
The company has secured funding and is ready to launch once they sign on the first client, Green says. At that point, they’ll move quickly to secure the ship (a used cruise ship goes for $10 million to $300 million, Cook says), hire the right team and get started. At this point, they’re just three to six months from having a team aboard writing code, Green says.
That’s the premise of three entrepreneurs in San Diego, who are in the final throes of launching a company that will offer software development off the coast of California—three miles outside Los Angeles, to be specific.
The three plan to buy a used cruise ship and station it close enough for a half-hour water taxi ride to shore, but far enough to avoid H1B jurisdiction. According to CEO David Cook, who was a tanker ship captain before going into IT ten years ago, project pricing “will be comparable to a distant-shore firm.”
By stationing the ship in international waters, the company, called SeaCode, will be able to remain close to U.S. clients while picking and choosing IT talent from around the world—something that tightening H1B visa requirements have made difficult in the U.S.
Depending on your point of view, it may also allow them to pay less than the rate a team of U.S. developers would command.
That assumes that the talent is willing to live on a ship, of course, which may not be as tough as it sounds. Cook says the ship will retain all of its cruise ship facilities and will feed and house workers in style. During off hours, programming teams can partake of the ship’s recreational facilities or head for the lights of L.A. on a water taxi, since each worker will be required to have a U.S. tourist visa, Cook says.
The offshore-on-a-ship concept isn’t the only radical idea here. The ship’s 600 or so developers and project managers will form assorted around-the-clock development teams. When one shift finishes, the next shift will pick up the same project. That unusual arrangement will allow the company to finish jobs in half the time typically allocated while maintaining equivalent quality and control. “A key part of the plan is having everyone together there on the ship,” Cook says. “We call them pods and pod leaders. The pods all live in the same area in the ship, work at the same time, go ashore together. It’s a natural function of what happens on a ship.”
The idea, which came to light two weeks ago in a blog entry at Sourcingmag.com, a Web site that covers IT outsourcing, has generated some predictable heat. Longtime IT columnist John Dvorak disparaged the idea as an “Indian slave ship” in his blog (http://www.dvorak.org/blog/?p=1767), then posted a contribution from a reader showing the ship as a giant golf course (http://www.dvorak.org/blog/?m=20050408).
At first blush, admits COO Roger Green, it sounds like they’re trying to avoid U.S. taxes, regulations and pay rates. Not so, he maintains. SeaCode will be a U.S. corporation, and the ship will fall under a number of state and federal regulations. Green, who has managed outsourcing projects before, says just 10 percent of every dollar spent will go to paying developers—most of whom will probably be non-U.S. citizens. Remaining expenses will overhead—for equipment and supplies, fuel and other costs—all purchased in the U.S., the three say.
How much will developers be paid? That will depend on skill set, not country of origin. Cook says they aren’t interested in competing for “low-level, Visual Basic-type” work, but rather, enterprise-type projects that require advanced coding and project management skills. That may well mean hiring U.S. workers for some of the slots, the three say, workers who will be paid at a rate comparable to what they’d earn in the U.S.
For non-U.S. developers, “The take-home money [will be] the same as if someone was working as an H1B inside this country,” Cook says.
“We’ll pay for your skills,” Cook says. The rate may not be competitive for an L.A. developer “in the lower-level ranks,” he says, “but as you become a manager, absolutely.” As for non-U.S. workers, “you’re going to find [wages] far higher than the country you’re from. You’re getting paid so well that Indian [workers] will be able to go home and pay cash for a house.”
The team programming concept comes naturally to the three, since two of the founders, Cook and CTO Joe Conway, have worked on ships. There, they say, it’s natural to hand tasks, even highly complex ones, off to the next shift. Conway, who has a broad and deep background in software development, says he did that repeatedly aboard Navy nuclear subs at an earlier point in his career.
Cook also says that SeaCode will be able to hire many highly talented women developers, who because of social norms often have difficulty finding work in third-world countries. “If you go to India, some incredibly talented women [developers] have a very difficult time getting a job.” In contrast, Cook says, his company specifically plans to hire some percentage of women to take advantage of that overlooked talent pool.
The company will use microwave and U.S. providers for phone and Internet access, thus addressing a common outsourcing concern: ownership of intellectual property. Under international law, Cook says, the first point of contact with land determines whose laws will apply. “One of reasons we’re doing things this way is so U.S law will apply.”
Another common outsourcing concern, security, is also addressed, he says. Physical access to the ship is clearly limited, and any code transmitted moves immediately onto secure U.S. Internet lines.
The company has secured funding and is ready to launch once they sign on the first client, Green says. At that point, they’ll move quickly to secure the ship (a used cruise ship goes for $10 million to $300 million, Cook says), hire the right team and get started. At this point, they’re just three to six months from having a team aboard writing code, Green says.
Los Angeles Understand
Even before O.J. drove the Bronco or "The Terminator" became governor, Frank Lloyd Wright said, "Tip the world over on its side and everything loose will land in Los Angeles."
The Los Angeles metro area has been a "boomtown" since the completion of the transcontinental railroad in 1876, first attracting "the folks" from the Midwest with a blessedly warm and dry climate--and becoming a gateway to a remarkable diversity of immigration from throughout the Pacific Rim and Latin America.
L.A. is a sprawling megalopolis; one could start in one end of L.A. and drive for more than two hours without leaving the county's influence. The metro area includes smaller cities, such as Santa Monica, Burbank, Pasadena and Long Beach, which were founded around the end of the nineteenth century and retain distinct identities. Geographically, there is very little logic as to what is part of the city of L.A.; for example, Hollywood is not a separate city--it is part of the City of Los Angeles--but adjacent West Hollywood and Beverly Hills are not part of the city.
The city's primary newspaper is the Los Angeles Times. The free LA Weekly comes out on Thursdays and is a good source for concerts and other local information. Local areas may have their own free papers as well.
The Los Angeles metro area has been a "boomtown" since the completion of the transcontinental railroad in 1876, first attracting "the folks" from the Midwest with a blessedly warm and dry climate--and becoming a gateway to a remarkable diversity of immigration from throughout the Pacific Rim and Latin America.
L.A. is a sprawling megalopolis; one could start in one end of L.A. and drive for more than two hours without leaving the county's influence. The metro area includes smaller cities, such as Santa Monica, Burbank, Pasadena and Long Beach, which were founded around the end of the nineteenth century and retain distinct identities. Geographically, there is very little logic as to what is part of the city of L.A.; for example, Hollywood is not a separate city--it is part of the City of Los Angeles--but adjacent West Hollywood and Beverly Hills are not part of the city.
The city's primary newspaper is the Los Angeles Times. The free LA Weekly comes out on Thursdays and is a good source for concerts and other local information. Local areas may have their own free papers as well.
City Preps Filming RFP Terms; Lots to Like for Downtowners
On the same day the Writers Guild is expected to go on strike, the City has released a Request for Proposals (RFP) for film permitting services currently performed by Film LA. While ongoing discussion of special filming conditions for Downtown seek to better refine how filming much respond to Downtown's changing nature, the terms of the RFP get at practical issues like notification and how complaints are handled.
Unlike the existing setup where Film LA handles all aspects of permitting, the RFP allows interested parties to submit bids on one or more of three service categories: permit coordination, notification and complaint referral. The results of a Request for Information (RFI) issued this summer identified 15 potential bidders for one or more of the components.
Those of us Downtown should absolutely applaud the City for what's found in this RFP. More after the jump...
Unlike the existing setup where Film LA handles all aspects of permitting, the RFP allows interested parties to submit bids on one or more of three service categories: permit coordination, notification and complaint referral. The results of a Request for Information (RFI) issued this summer identified 15 potential bidders for one or more of the components.
Those of us Downtown should absolutely applaud the City for what's found in this RFP. More after the jump...
Day of the Dead on a Dying Bridge
Saturday and Sunday Arte Calidad's Eighth Annual Festival De La Gente stretched across the historic Sixth Street Viaduct linking Downtown and Boyle Heights in what is declared as the nation's largest Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) celebration. This year's event marked the second in which Downtown organizations played a noticeable role, with organizers doing their part to forge a strong link between the two sides of the Los Angeles River.
Festival arrivals from the Eastside stumbled onto a giant block party, while those coming from the Downtown side got a different look. They saw a third of a mile of bridge span used as a parking lot before finally encountering artists booths, altars, and lowriders. The festival's main stage was set up in the intersection of 6th and Boyle, off the bridge and back onto real ground.
Festival arrivals from the Eastside stumbled onto a giant block party, while those coming from the Downtown side got a different look. They saw a third of a mile of bridge span used as a parking lot before finally encountering artists booths, altars, and lowriders. The festival's main stage was set up in the intersection of 6th and Boyle, off the bridge and back onto real ground.
Pershing Square Ice Rink Begins Its Setup
This week the foundations are getting set up for Pershing Square's annual ice rink, scheduled to make its season debut on November 15th. Skating runs until 10pm each night, seven days a week. One hour of skating will run you $6, with skates an extra $2.
If you haven't made it out to the ice before, it's certainly worth doing. Yes, the rink is small, but just consider how absurd it is to be on ice skates in the middle of Downtown Los Angeles. I think given that, we can excuse small. More information at Pershing Square's website.
If you haven't made it out to the ice before, it's certainly worth doing. Yes, the rink is small, but just consider how absurd it is to be on ice skates in the middle of Downtown Los Angeles. I think given that, we can excuse small. More information at Pershing Square's website.
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