VARIETY TO FOLD ON MARCH 26

Last Tuesday, Feburary 26, it was announced in Los Angeles that the last issue of Daily Variety would be published on March 18th. That issue, under the paper’s new management, Penske Media, which purchased Variety last October, will mark the end not only of the Hollywood sheet founded by Sime Silverman in 1933, but also of the current Weekly Variety. A new weekly, also bearing the Variety logo, will replace the current weekly. The first issue of the new publication, printed in a 13 ½ x 10 ½ inch format, will appear on March 26th. It will be run by a triumvirate of editors who will be in charge of film, TV and digital content, respectively.

In addition to the imminent scuttling of the currently-printed editions of Variety and Daily Variety, Penske has already dropped the online “paywall” on Variety’s website, meaning that access to it is now free, compared to a former official yearly fee of $349, though print subscribers obtained access for $99. In addition to Variety Penske also owns the highly successful online blog Deadline Hollywood edited by Nikki Finke.

ON MARCH 15 THE SIMESITE WILL BE POSTING A SPECIAL “OBITUARY” SECTION FOR THE DEMISE OF VARIETY, WHICH WILL INCLUDE CONTRIBUTIONS FROM A SELECTION OF EX MUGGS.

End

Calling all Muggs

**SEND IN YOUR COMMENTS ON THE IMMINENT DEMISE OF VARIETY.**

On March 15, 2013, Simesite will be posting a Special Memorial Section on the demise of Variety. The final issue of the Daily will be published on March 18 and the Weekly will be totally redesigned. If you wish to contribute any comments, articles, or observations on this historical occasion – as short or as long as you like – kindly send them for posting on our Site by March 13 to:
pbesas@hotmail.com

Year’s End Wrap Late Show: Bruce Alderman

January 28, 2013.
See end of Year-end Simesite wrap section below.

Nostalgia pix from Down Under

by admin
Posted on January 28, 2013December 11, 2020
Muggs

Jan 28, 2013

Former Sydney bureau chief, Blake Murdoch, has kindly sent us the following batch of old photos that he came across recently. We felt they might be of interest to share with all the muggs and Simesite followers, so we have posted them.
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Year-end Simesite wrap

by admin
Posted on January 2, 2013January 29, 2013
Muggs

Jan 2, 2013

It has now been nearly a quarter of a century since Syd sold Variety and we moved out of the venerable 46th Street building. And a little over ten years since Roger Watkins and I, during a luncheon in a small London eaterie, decided it would be a good idea to start a web page dedicated to keeping the muggs in touch with each other. I had originally suggested a quarterly newsletter, but Roger was way ahead of me and suggested a web site and assured me that his son Ian would be glad to handle the technical side of the affair.

The result was that the Simesite (so named in honor of Sime Silverman) was launched on Dec. 16, 2003, purposely timed to be 98 years after the first edition of Variety hit the newsstands in Gotham.
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