Drama at the Hollywood Reporter

The Hollywood Reporter is starting to look like one of those doomed film projects the trade paper sometimes covers: Marquee stars are bailing out, the actors union is raising a stink and negative buzz is building to a crescendo.

The discord at the Reporter spilled into the national media when veteran labor writer David Robb resigned last week after management refused to publish his story about a Reporter colleague’s relationship with certain movie producers.

The trade paper reported Monday that its society columnist, George Christy, is the subject of an inquiry by the Screen Actors Guild into whether he performed in movies in which he received screen credits, entitling him to health and pension benefits from the union.

Christy maintains he did nothing wrong.

Robb’s departure--and the subsequent resignations this week of the paper’s well-respected editor, Anita Busch, and Beth Laski, executive film editor--are raising questions about the Reporter’s commitment to ethical standards.

The Reporter article, which appeared Monday in a lower corner on Page 4, relied largely on a letter from SAG to several production companies, including Motion Picture Corp. of America, notifying them that the union had initiated an audit of several films that gave screen credits to Christy.

The columnist is credited with appearing in more than a dozen films.

Christy, in a brief interview Wednesday, said, “I’m a clean person. I really feel I’m being victimized here. . . . This has gotten completely out of hand.”

Christy said Robb’s stories were generated by “misguided journalistic envy.”

Christy said he had acted in each of the movies in which he received a credit, but he said some of his scenes had been left on the cutting-room floor. He also said he had appeared in “some crowd scenes” in which viewers may have had a hard time spotting him.

Hollywood Reporter Publisher Robert Dowling did not return numerous phone calls seeking comment.

Late Wednesday, the Reporter’s publicist released a statement from Carolyn Scopio, director of human resources for the paper’s parent company, BPI Communications Inc., saying: “This is strictly a human resource and employment law issue. We believe in protecting the due process rights of all of our employees.”

But journalism experts suggest the controversy raises ethical issues as well.

“If you’re going to be a serious trade publication, you have to behave in a serious way,” said Tom Goldstein, dean of Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism.

“If, in fact, [ethical lapses] were going on, it should be disclosed in some fashion. Otherwise, the assumption is that everyone might be making ‘special arrangements.’ It harms the credibility of the enterprise,” Goldstein said.

Inside the Reporter’s offices, tensions over the Christy affair had been rising since at least February, when Dowling did not run an earlier story about Christy written by Robb, according to several sources within the paper who asked not to be identified.

Indeed, Christy has been a sensitive subject since 1993, when SAG sued him and MPCA, claiming the company inflated his earnings in order to qualify him for union benefits. The lawsuit was settled for an undisclosed sum.

According to an account Robb published Wednesday on the Inside.com Web site, Dowling refused to run Robb’s February story reporting that Christy had been filing his columns from Santa Monica office space provided free by one of MPCA’s former partners, producer Steve Stabler. Christy acknowledges that he used the office.

Christy has mentioned Stabler in his columns 11 times over the last two years. Stabler and former partner Brad Krevoy declined to be quoted for this story.

Robb wrote in his Inside.com account that Dowling demanded that Robb turn over his notes, which the reporter refused to do.

Christy was suspended by the paper for about two weeks, Robb wrote on the Web site. Christy said a confidentiality agreement prevented him from discussing the issue.

When Christy returned to work, Robb said he learned later, he went to work at a desk in the offices of 2K Media, an MPCA owner.

Christy said Wednesday, “I didn’t think that was a problem. These are friends of mine. I don’t think it’s a conflict.”

Dowling directed Robb to stick to his beat covering SAG, which had been bracing for intense contract negotiations with Hollywood studios, according to the Inside.com account and a source at the paper. Robb later obtained a copy of the letter SAG had sent to certain production companies asking for time sheets and other records documenting that Christy worked in movies for which he received screen credits.

Robb showed the letter to Busch, the editor, who instructed him to draft a story, according to Robb’s Web site report.

But when Dowling learned the story was being written, he said he would refuse to run it, three sources at the paper said. Days later, feeling slighted and concerned about his own legal liability, Robb said, he cleared out his desk and left.

“I respect Dowling. I think he’s a good man. But I think he has a blind spot for George Christy [and] that he knew this would hurt the paper,” Robb said. “When there’s a cancer, you have to take care of it or it’ll spread.”

Bad blood began to spread instead. After word leaked out about Robb’s exit, Dowling told the Associated Press that Robb “had lost his objectivity on this issue and was no longer adhering to the Hollywood Reporter’s standards of journalistic, ethical and professional conduct.”

Busch said that quote prompted her to quit.

“I’m really disillusioned about everything I’ve seen,” she said. “I don’t like Dowling’s spin on deciding to go after Dave’s ethics and standards. That was morally wrong to me.”

Monday’s Hollywood Reporter story went so far as to identify another studio, CineTel Films, that had received a SAG inquiry letter about a pay-TV movie, “Militia,” on which Christy received a credit.

In his Internet report, Robb wrote that Christy received an assortment of gifts from industry executives.

Christy, a 26-year veteran of the paper, adamantly denies receiving expensive gifts.

“This is a gift-giving industry, [but] I’ve never gotten anything major,” said Christy. He did acknowledge accepting a few free limousine rides to studio events, but only after clearing everything with his supervisor.

“I documented every hors d’oeuvre,” he said. “Most importantly, nothing I have received has ever swayed my coverage, positive or negative.”

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Not So Great: Controversy swirling around reported ethical lapses by Hollywood Reporter gossip columnist George Christy has prompted the trade paper’s editor, Anita Busch, to quit in protest.