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When we saw that both the LAT and Variety (note their nifty graphic at left) had stories today about legendary entertainment lawyer Barry Hirsch's bucking of a forced retirement to start his own firm (and taking along a number of high-profile clients, like Julia Roberts and Sofia Coppola), our heads immediately began to throb. Entertainment lawyers? They're like agents with the blackened hearts removed. So we contacted Defamer's legal correspondent to sort everything out for us, which he/she did, at length, no doubt tagging some studio for the billable hours spent on the e-mail:

Why do entertainment lawyers command such astronomical fees? Partly to fund their insatiable coke habits, partly to pay for the ensuing rehab demanded by senior partners, but mostly to cover the cost of reprinting the firm's letterhead over and over and over again.

One particular firm in Century City has changed its moniker at least three times in the past few months, adding and dropping partners like Madonna and J-Lo at a swingers party. I'd like to name the firm, but I can't—not because of any confidentiality clause, mind you, but because I simply can't figure out what the name of the firm actually is anymore. Armstrong Hirsch Levin Jackoway Tyerman Wertheimer Austen Mandelbaum & Morris would be the perpetual name, if, like O'Melveny & Myers, the firm kept former (or dead) partners on the bill. But when Barry Hirsch left to start his own multisurnamed entity today, his poor former company had to go through the motions yet again, updating cover pages and issuing another round of announcements in the trades.

Hirsch's departure looks like just another case of the younger lions slaying the leader of the pride to establish a new supremacy, or of Eskimo children banishing their grandparents to the wilderness. Usually, law partners bolt a firm only after they finally figure out how much bigger their share would be if Jake Bloom wasn't around. But here that's not the case, at least not for Hirsch. Word is, according to Variety, that the 70+ year old Hirsch and his former partners were working out some sort of retirement/severance package, a thank-you for his 40+ years of client development. But Hirsch didn't think the thank-you was lucrative enough, so in full Jerry-Maguire-getting-fired style, he rounded up all the most loyal clients (the Coppola family, Julia Roberts) and skipped out. Sources tell me he didn't get all his clients, or even most of them. But he got enough to entice three of the firm's most respected and hard-nosed lawyers to jump ship with him - Bob Wallerstein, Howard Fishman, and David Matlof.

Did these three follow because of some devotion to Hirsch's character? I have my doubts. There are just too many other benefits. For instance, the supporting cast has been instantly catapulted to name-partner fame, fame that will no doubt be enhanced by sharing space with the Hirsch trademark. Also, Hirsch has only so much more time left as an active negotiator, and once he's gone the co-defecting trifecta will divide his client list among them. I bet they'll even keep his name on the letterhead after he leaves.

No matter how you shake it out, one kind of feels bad for Barry Hirsch. He spent decades building one of the most formidable entertainment firms in the nation, and now it seems his progeny might be lining up to take advantage of the Old Man as best they can in his waning moments. His old partners edged him out and his new partners saw opportunity in the departure.