My Hopeful "Ted" Talk (aka my Ted Hope Takeover)

ICYMI, here's what I wrote on Ted Hope's Substack a couple weeks ago

[A few weeks ago, I was honored that film producer Ted Hope invited me to take over his “Hope for Film” Substack. I’m still new to Substack and tried to “re-stack” it. Not sure if I did it right. So in case you never saw it, here’s what I wrote… If nothing else, it’s a good introduction to me, what I’m reading & watching, and my mission statement on my own Substack…]

Howdy, I’m Dan Mirvish. Some of you may know me as the director of such films as 18½, Bernard and Huey, Between Us, Open House or Omaha (the movie). Or perhaps you’ve read my book (or listened to the audiobook) The Cheerful Subversive’s Guide to Independent Filmmaking, 2nd Ed. As a non-fiction writer, I’ve also written dozens of articles for Filmmaker Magazine, Variety other film publications and even a half-page travel article in the New York Times once. I’ve also guest lectured at over 70 film schools and universities and recently have been teaching more regularly at Chapman University, the proud #4 film school in America. Most of you have undoubtedly never seen any of my movies, read my books or articles, or attended my lectures, but maybe have heard of the film festival I co-founded, Slamdance, which I’m proud to say has showcased, and occasionally shaped, a generation of filmmakers over the last 30 plus years.

More recently, and very much inspired by Ted Hope himself, I’ve also recently started a Substack. Awkwardly titled “Hollytics/Pollywood,” my Substack allows me occasionally to muse on the mysterious intersection between the film industry and the world of politics. This might take the form of big national stories (like my unique take on Trump and his “100% movie tariff”) but it might just as likely be (at least in the future) about what local SoCal communities like my own Culver City can do to promote local filmmaking without just relying on state tax credits. Then again, I’ve also written recently about how Trump’s attacks on academia, and academia’s fight back (see Harvard and the AAC&U letter signed by over 650 college and university professors in support of academic freedom) intersects with the world of film schools (only about half of the top film schools are at institutions that have signed the AAC&U letter).

My own background makes me somewhat unique in the world of film, and especially film journalism, in that before I went to grad film school at USC (note: one of the schools that hasn’t signed the AAC&U letter), I was a history and poli sci major, and worked in DC, first at The Washington Monthly magazine and then as a speechwriter to U.S. Senator Tom Harkin from Iowa. More recently I co-wrote (with Eitan Gorlin) the novel I Am Martin Eisenstadt: One Man’s (wildly inappropriate) Adventures with the Last Republicans about a fictional pundit who claimed to be an advisor to the McCain campaign in 2008. And my most recent film, 18½ (with Willa Fitzgerald and John Magaro) is a speculative historical fiction thriller/comedy very much centered on Watergate (with Bruce Campbell as the voice of Nixon, naturally).

What I found during the rollout of 18½ is that there’s almost no “entertainment journalists” (an oxymoron in the best of days) who specifically cover the confluence of politics and Hollywood. Ted Johnson (formerly Variety, now at Deadline) and Nell Minow at RogerEbert.com are about the only notable exceptions. While the old axiom that Washington is “Hollywood for ugly people” is still probably true, Hollywood is quickly learning that with a demagogue like Trump in power, we’re facing our biggest threat to creative freedom since the McCarthy era of the Blacklist. I’m old enough to have known people deeply affected by the Blacklist, including controversial member of The Hollywood Ten, Eddie Dmytryk, who was a professor of mine at USC. And the late Jules Feiffer (whom I got to know well when directing his script for our film Bernard and Huey) still felt deeply betrayed from the time he attended Clifford Odets’ testimony to the House Un-American Activities Committee.

As is often said, history may not repeat itself, but it definitely rhymes. If we don’t remember how our Hollywood institutions responded to McCarthyism 70 years ago (spoiler alert: not well), then we are doomed to repeat those same mistakes. Trump is coming for Hollywood, and the film industry needs to anticipate the attacks and fight back.

With that said, here are a few things I read and watch…

1) Substacks!

I’m still a newbie to the Substack community and honestly not too clear on how it all works. Other than Ted’s excellent daily missives here, I mostly subscribe to film friends’ Substacks like 8 Above with Jon Reiss, Revision Mode by Kat O’Brien, The Sound Report by Avi Zev Weider (with amazing recent pics from Greenland!) and John Bleasdale Writes on Film. If someone’s got recommendations for more, please let me know.

2) Non-Penske Film News

The Penske monopoly of the film trades (Variety, The Hollywood Reporter, Deadline and IndieWire), not to mention their ownership stakes in SXSW and The Golden Globes, makes reading anything from those publications always slightly dubious about the subtext (and yes, I’ve written for several of them myself, though largely in the pre-Penske era). It’s an odd monopoly that sometimes takes the form of one trade writing clickbait that impugns their own sister publication. There are plenty of great journalists and critics who write for the Penskes and pride themselves on their editorial independence. But it’s nice to get a non-Penske take on the industry and for that, I usually turn to Richard Rushfield’s The Ankler. One other under-the-radar trade I’ve recently discoverd is Media Play News, which largely covers streaming, VOD and other home entertainment.

3) Indie Film News

For indie film news, I usually turn to my friends at Filmmaker Magazine (where I’m a frequent contributor). Publisher and pal Scott Macaulay sends out a weekly newsletter and I know if it’s important to the world of indie film, Scott will mention it one way or another (and yes, he may start Substacking soon, too - watch this space). Another good pal, Brian Newman, has a must-read weekly newsletter called Sub-Genre that I subscribe to (it’s like a Substack, but not a Substack?). Other great venerable sources of indie and other film news and reviews are FilmThreat (led by my old friends Chris Gore and Alan Ng - who have a blast on their YouTube feed, podcast and truly indie AwardsThis awards - their passion for film is infectious). And MovieMaker Magazine has successfully kept reinventing itself and has done some fantastic annual lists on festivals in particular. Honestly, I used to spend more time listening to filmmaking and political podcasts when I used Stitcher, but when it went under a year or two ago, I lost a lot of my feeds. I use Spotify now, but I’m still trying to find things on it. A couple of my fave film pods are Making Movies is Hard by Liz Manashil and Alrik Bursell, and Noam Kroll’s Show Don’t Tell: Micro-Budget Filmmaking. Noam’s instagram also has some consistently great tips on filmmaking.

4) Political Podcasts and News

I’m sure we all have our own sources of political news that corresponds to a bell curve of our personal political proclivities, biases and algorythmic preferences. For me, I particularly enjoy dipping into the nation’s punditocracy (some of whom I know from my DC years) through listening to podcasts and reading Bluesky posts by folks like Talking Feds (Harry Litman), Main Justice (Andrew Weissmann and Mary McCord), Impolitic (with my old pal John Heilemann), Pod Save America, MeidasTouch, Bulwark, and the range from Tara Palmeri’s The Red Letter to Allison Gill’s various podcasts. And of course, I do (occasionally) read The Washington Monthly where I still stay in touch with some of the editors.

5) IMDb Trivia Pages

Up until now, most of my sources and media are pretty predictable. If you read Ted’s Substack, you probably have a pretty similar film and political media diet to my own. Where I may differ slightly is that for regular movie watching, I turn on Turner Classic Movies (TCM). At my house, we still get basic cable and until Criterion Channel returns my email from ghosting me in a conversation four years ago, I’m not inclined to subscribe to them. The fun part about watching TCM is I’m still catching up on classic (and often not-really-classic, but still old and obscure) movies from the silent era up to the 80s. Where that’s also led me is straight to the trivia pages on IMDb, which have a shocking number of fun facts about even the most oddball films. What I’ve also known is that unlike Wikipedia, for example, the Trivia pages of IMDb are essentially unmoderated, unsourced and they welcome any ridiculous submission from anyone with the time and inclination to submit them. (On Eyes Wide Shut you might learn: “At fifty-nine minutes into the film, Nick Nightingale writes the password "Fidelio" on a napkin with a Lamy Swift Rollerball pen.”) That also means that filmmakers themselves shouldn’t forget to update their own IMDb Trivia pages in a continuing effort to contextualize and comment on their own film legacies. For example, everyone curious where I get my hats will want to check out the 18½ trivia page.

Huge thanks to Ted for letting me take over his Substack for the day! For more on me, go to DanMirvish.com or follow me on Instagram or Bluesky. Cha!