Category Archives: Hearne_Christopher
Hearne: KC Star Layoffs – Gloomy Day Points to Uncertain Future
The sad reality about this week’s announced layoffs at the Kansas City Star – that the end is not in sight…
Star publisher Mark Zieman, in an email to newspaper employees, cast the cuts Continue reading
Hearne: Butch Rigby Unloads Screenland Crossroads
Out with the old in Continue reading
Hearne: Leap Launches Bogus Parking Ticket Crusade Against Merriam Cop
He’s no longer mad as hell but he still isn’t gonna take it anymore…
Merriam councilman and Guitar Lamp maker Dan leap has done his homework and unleashed his protest window display. Now he’s raring to rumble with Merriam Police over a $115 parking ticket bestowed upon him at 7 p.m. on a Sunday night in front of his residence and business in downtown Merriam.
“You know, there’s been a ton of people coming by – I’ve got the picture of the cop on the sign in my window and in another big window I have a peep show going on,” Leap says. “And people think they might be tied together, so they stop and look through this three inch hole to see. It’s quite comical, watching people stop and bend over to look in and see and then laugh – I’ve got the peep hold pretty low.”
The latest on Leap’s $115 parking fine – which though issued to him was for a friend’s car who had parked it in the one hour zone: Continue reading
Hearne: Saving the World One Flush @ a Time
Even a losing effort by the Royals is more glamorous than the flushing of a toilet…
Arguably. That said, and understatements aside, Continue reading
Hearne: Grocery Store Ad Wars – Direct Mail vs. The Star
Think of it as a historic and monumental battle…
The stakes are high and the game is afoot over the future of grocery circular advertising in the Kansas City Star. When one thinks of major, heavy hitter newspaper advertisers, it’s hard to gaze any higher up the food chain than the ubiquitous grocery store flyers that I recycle upon contact with each and every week.
And just as the huge department stores that used to flood the Star with underwear ads have majorly dialed back their newspaper advertising, and classified ads have fled, area grocery chains are considering their options.
To better understand what is going on, check out the talking points in the pitch that follows – made by a prominent area direct mailer. It explains the purported advantages of Continue reading
Hearne: Slipping Circulation Fuels Ad Exodus at KC Star
The bottom line is the bottom line…
Slipping circulation and the decline in readership by key demographics at the Kansas City Star present a gloomy scenario that far exceeds the effects of the current economic bust. Like most media, revenues will improve when better times return but the ongoing shift by advertisers (and readers) to other delivery mechanisms will continue to erode profits at the newspaper, resulting in more and more cutbacks and downsizing.
It’s inevitable.
Think of it as a variation of what Star cartoonist Lee Judge told an assembly of locals at a KC Public Library talk shortly after he learned that he had been laid off by the newspaper along with myself and sports columnist Jeff Flanagan. Continue reading
Hearne: Star Poised to Take Huge Hits from Grocery Advertisers
Very simply, it’s a numbers game…
Inevitably the success or failure – let’s call it the future – of the Kansas City Star will be determined by the number of eyeballs it attracts. For advertisers.
Plain and simple.
The days of daily newspapers having essentially monopolies over news and information are long over. Long over. Make no mistake, they far and away still lead the media pack in terms of reaching the greatest number of people, but their reach has and continues to wane and it’s a trend not likely to change.
Classified advertising, for example, used to be a huge profit center for newspapers like the Star.
No mas.
Department stores like Dillards, Jones Store and Macy’s were incredibly big advertisers. Prior to their pronouncements years ago that they recognized the need to cutback on newspaper advertising and branch into other media.
Which brings us to grocery stores… Continue reading
Hearne: Stan Kessler’s Birthday Wilding Tonight Jardine’s
This just in…
The Cowtown’s hottest horn honker – trumpeter Continue reading
Hearne: The Lisa Lampanelli & Johnny Dare Lawn Jockey Story
Turns out the on-air love affair between Rock 98.9 FM Continue reading
Hearne: KC Star Layoffs Update – You Read ‘Em Here First
So many guessing games when it comes to the recently announced Continue reading
Hearne: KC Strip Week Three – Slow, Steady, Thongy
Memo to the skittish and the skeptical: the KC Strip party trolleys are still alive and kicking after three, mostly cool, wet weekends – oh and they’re here to stay….
So says organizer Wild Bill George.
“We are very pleased with the numbers and the growth,” George says. “Monthly passes keep selling and more locations are signing up. Summer will exceed our expectations.”
As for the digits to date, eh. The Strippers first weekend was a freebie for riders. Continue reading
Hearne: AMC Fork & Screen stomps Studio Movie Grill
Location, location, location…
In the wide world of high-end dining during first run movies, AMC’s Fork & Screen cleans the new Studio Movie Grill at Zona Rosa’s clock.
Not even close…
AMC beats SMG hands down in all the major categories, save possibly one. Continue reading
Hearne on the Street: Jeff Beck tops Clapton, Jimmy Page – at Starlight Tonight!
It was the concert that never happened…
Seven short years ago then Grand Emporium main man Roger Naber booked re-formed British rock group The Yardbirds for summer show at the then-thriving midtown blues club.
I interviewed original Yardbirds drummer Jim McCarty by phone in London in advance of the show here, with plans to run the interview a little closer to the concert date. Which, as I recall, went promptly south owing to the fact that Naber had forgotten he’d promised to (still unconfirmed) date to another legendary British bluesman, John Mayall.
The interview never ran, but I still remember getting the money quote from McCarty at interview’s end.
Which of the Yardbirds three legendary lead guitarists did McCarty regard more highly, Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck or Jimmy Page? Continue reading
Hearne: Kansas City Star’s Jason Whitlock Goes Legit (or does he?)
You got it, you repackage it, you still got it…
With Kansas City Star layoffs just around the corner – you read about ’em here first on KC Confidential – it’s interesting to note that popular sports columnist Jason Whitlock will be practicing his craft in the newspaper’s Opinion section on a regular basis.
There are far fewer bodies at 18th and Grand these days already and filling the newspaper with content people care about is increasingly vital.
Not to mention difficult.
And with venerable nice guy-but-a-bit-wacko Opinion writer Lewis Diuguid defanged and demoted, the opening was there. Continue reading
Hearne: Queen of Mean Lisa Lampanelli on Kicking Butt, Her Love Life & Johnny Dare
Kinder gentler? No effing way!
Queen of Mean funny grrrl Lisa Lampanelli may have – at long last – found the dude of her dreams, but no way is she about to lighten up on the male species or any other of the many targets she infamously burns at the verbal stake.
“No, that’s the whole point,” Lampanelli says. “There’s so much in the world that annoys me. In fact, my act has even gotten more edgy because now I’ve got my own personal bodyguard.”
Translation: gone are the days when riled up or overly-enthusiastic comedy clubbers can backslap her or participate in sundry verbal indignities sans fear of repercussion.
Lampanelli and new bodyguard/beau Jimmy Big Balls hit the Uptown Theater Friday. Continue reading
Hearne: Romancing the ‘Stone – Cap Fed Park @ Sandstone 2010
They’re off!
Another summer, another season of greening up the local concert scene. Courtesy of venerable KC concert impresario Chris Fritz and the Capitol Federal Park at Sandstone.
“We’re going to do a little thing for Earth Day,” Fritz said, shortly before the venue’s kickoff concert with the Flaming Lips on Friday. “If we do 15 events, we’ll have one of the lowest carbon footprints of any entertainment venue in the country. We don’t have air-conditioning. We limit our water usage.”
The list goes on…
Wildest thing that happened last year – Season Two for Fritz new Bonner Springs Greenventure? Continue reading
Hearne on the Street: Gary Sinese Rocks Uptown
Great guy, really good cause, mediocre show…
Make no mistake. Actor Gary Sinise’s KC homecoming – in ’95 he starred in the locally lensed Truman -was triumphant. Around 700 or-so Cowtowners gathered at the Uptown Theater to catch Sinise’s Lt. Dan Band.
A good time for a good cause – Operation International Children – was pretty much had by all.
The powerfully backed Sinise, playing bass guitar, rocked the Uptown with one crowd-pleasing cover after another. Jimi Hendrix, Michael Jackson, Led Zeppelin – you get the picture.
Just one problem…
Somewhere along the line, the hipness quotient of the performance got way lost. Continue reading
Hearne: Rob Schneider Preps for New Movie at Stanford’s
About funny guy Rob Schneider’s opening night run Thursday at Stanford & Sons…
Turns out the sold out show and subsequent comedy club dates across the country the Saturday Night Live alum is engaging in is a prequel to a new comedy movie, Schneider is prepping for.
No HBO specials this time around…
“I’m going to do a movie actually because HBO specials are not so special anymore,” Schneider says. “It’s a movie that will have standup (comedy) in it. It’s all standup – like Richard Pryor’s movie.”
A few outtakes from Schneider’s roadshow to hone his comedy club chops” Continue reading
Hearne: Cinemark / Plaza Not the Only Youth Violence Victims
How quickly we forget…
The recent uproar over teen and young adult violence by blacks on the Plaza received the Mother of All Media Coverage, but it’s hardly a first. Pretty much everyone remembers the late night weekend struggles in Westport and at urban kid difficulties at four area movieplexes that the area has wrestled with off and the past 10 or so years.
AMC’s Ward Parkway Theater, for example, has struggled with kid crowds off and on for years.
How well, Ward Parkway neighbor Jeff Glazer knows… Continue reading
