A Farewell Curiosity

London, Feb.20, 2026

It was back in 1969 when Variety mugg Jack Pitman (Pit) got the go-ahead to relocate from the 46th Street digs of the paper to the London office on the top floor of 49 St. James’s Street. There Jack would cover the legit scene in Blighty.

As a farewell gesture in New York, some of the staff scribbled their “best wishes” on a Variety issue, which is here posted. This curiosity was come across yesterday by Jack’s son, Seb, who wonders if anyone can identify any of the scribes that signed the item in question. For my part (PB) none of the signatures rings a bell. Should anyone out there be able to identify the sigs, you can reach Seb at diseboo@yahoo.com. 

30

Latinoland remembered

By Peter Besas

Madrid, June 5, 2025

The following are my reminiscences of how the first Variety Latin-American section evolved in 1975 -1976. The story may be of some interest to those who want to cast a nostalgic glance back at how some aspects of the paper worked at that time and the people, now defunct, who played a part in the old Silverman era.  

Normally, Simesite is a place for short items, remembrances, obituaries, news concerning the activities of surviving muggs, as the scribes of the paper were jocularly called. However, given the capacity of our webpage, I felt that the following fifty plus pages, which it seems to me would not be of sufficient interest in a printed format, might easily find an appreciative audience on Simesite.

I have named the sections as follows (each section is a separate article on the site):

The Hotel Suisse in Cannes, May 1975

The Croisette and the origins of the Film Festival

Variety’s modus operandi,/Variety in Cannes

Syd’s “Go Ahead”/Variety’s International Expansion

Off to Latinoland

Rio and Buenos Aires

Heading Northwards to New York

Preparations in Madrid

In Sime’s Lair

Valley Stream

Should anyone wish to make any comments or observations on the following, please send them to: 

peterbesas@yahoo.com

If you’d rather download and read the article off line, it’s available here as a PDF:

Latinoland article - downloadable PDF