larry-kirshbaum

Olbermann's Folly, Cuts at Condé, BusinessWeek Bids

cityfile · 08/04/09 01:27PM

Keith Olbermann took Times reporter Brian Stelter to task last night for reporting that News Corp. and GE had worked out a deal to tone down the rhetoric between MSNBC and Fox News. But he didn't disagree with everything Stelter reported. Conveniently, only the bad stuff about him was wrong. [NYM]
• More bad news for Olbermann: MSNBC now admits it made a mistake by not disclosing that Countdown fixture Richard Wolffe is a paid lobbyist. Naturally, Olbermann had absolutely no idea about any of this. [Politico, Salon]
• Condé Nast is shedding more staff. This time around it appears the media giant's receptionists will be paying the ultimate price. [Gawker, NYM]
• Reps for Bruce Wasserstein met with BusinessWeek execs yesterday to discuss a bid for the magazine. Joe Mansueto, the founder of Morningstar and owner of Fast Company, may be a potential bidder as well. [BW]

Happy Birthday

cityfile · 05/22/09 07:01AM

Naomi Campbell turns 39 today. Actress Ginnifer Goodwin is turning 31. Billionaire oilman T. Boone Pickens is 81. Real estate developer Joseph Sitt is 45. Society dermatologist Lisa Airan is turning 44. Artist Ghada Amer turns 46. Former CNN anchor Bernard Shaw is 69. Alison Eastwood, the actress and daughter of Clint, is turning 37. British tabloid staple, Katie Price, is turning 31. And America's Next Top Model: Cycle 7 winner Caridee English is 24 today. Weekend birthdays after the jump.

Star Trek's Debut, Playboy's Shift, New NYT Rumors

cityfile · 05/11/09 11:28AM

Star Trek reeled in $76 million at the box office this weekend. [WSJ]
• Metro is selling off its collection of free (and money-losing) newspapers to Seabay Media, a company controlled by Metro's former CEO. [WaPo]
Playboy says it's planning to make "radical changes" to the mag, and may raise prices as well as reduce the number of issues it prints every year. [Folio]
Jon Stewart is creating a two-hour special for the History Channel. [B&C]
• Lit agent Larry Kirshbaum is shopping a memoir by Rafael Nadal. [Crain's]
• More speculation the Sulzbergers will be forced to give up the Times. [NYP]
• Speaking of the Times, a San Francisco organization paid columnist Tom Friedman $75,000 for a speech he's given before (and which is online). [SFC]
• Brit chef Jamie Oliver and Ryan Seacrest are working on a new reality show for ABC that will "give healthy makeovers to an entire city." Be afraid. [THR]

The Recession's Latest Casualty: Picking Up the Check

cityfile · 02/11/09 10:55AM

Paging Miss Manners! The recession is now eroding the very cornerstone of our society's system of etiquette: the willingness to pay for a business lunch. Literary agent Larry Kirshbaum says that people have turned into such tightwads, he's often reduced to conducting business over lunch at a cheap diner instead of Michael's and that one "top publisher" wanted to take him to McDonald's. "People are really afraid to spend money," he reflects. "Anything that smacks of too much fun or self-indulgence is being frowned upon." Well, it's understandable. A few slimmer expense reports, and the demolishment of Western capitalism will reverse itself in no time.

Larry Kirshbaum

cityfile · 01/30/08 01:27PM

The former chief of Time Warner Books, Kirshbaum left the house shortly before its sale to French conglomerate Lagardère and its rebranding as Grand Central Publishing. He currently heads up his own small literary agency, LJK Literary Management.