It’s been quite a week. In the first week of our launch, TheWrap broke two major stories and wrote a dozen other solid pieces, along with Hollyblogs from producers, screenwriters and actor-directors and news from our columnists.
By our second and third day, we were already being cited around the world for our break on Michael Jackson and a lawsuit over “Thriller” by Andrew Gumbel. Not just the L.A. Times, but Newsday, E! Online, Yahoo, The Guardian, The New York Daily News, Imdb.com, HuffingtonPost and Defamer picked up the story cited us, not to mention Spanish-language and French outlets in South America and Europe and myriad Michael Jackson blogs.
We made a bigger impact inside Hollywood with an exclusive interview with the controversial and increasingly isolated president of the Screen Actors Guild Alan Rosenberg. That newsbreak, with the accompanying interview, catapulted TheWrap into Patrick Goldstein’s blog at the LATimes, Breitbart, Defamer, Gawker, LA Observed, lots of SAG-related blogs.
Neil Hassman commented at sagwatch.net:
January 30, 2009 at 08:15
“I can tell you this – Alan’s “letter”, interview and YouTube video are the talk of LA. In the cleaner’s, grocery store, bank, gym…not all the entertainment community, either (though out here it’s all inter-related).
And there was this off HuffPo by Jonathan Handel: “In an extraordinary interview with The Wrap, SAG President Alan Rosenberg said that "actors are frightened little children," and referred to his opponents–a majority of the SAG board–as "liars and manipulators." Rosenberg also said of himself that "my life sucks…”
And on Friday, we were hailed as “the best and the brightest” in a lengthy profile in TechNewsWorld.
We’re delighted to have Hollywood insiders stepping up to write blogs – we already have a half-dozen for next week- and tips are flowing in, as are comments, observations, criticism, requests, and compliments. Thanks for all of it.
Most gratifying has been the public response to TheWrap, after so many months of preparing the site in private. Our email list for First Take jumped by 400 names, and we’ve gotten dozens of general comments thanking us for the site. Here’s a couple:
From Tom Chen, Shout! Factory: Congrats Sharon on The Wrap. A colleague of mine fwded the site to me; and I have been reading it. It is now my daily online destination for industry news for both film & TV.
From Freddie Fillers: Congratulations to Sharon and all of the rest of you guys for pulling off this endeavor! This site is a breath of fresh, cyber entertainment news air. Kudos for all of the Web 2.0 functionality that you have engineered into the site as well. Best wishes for your continued success!
Michael Sugar sent a message using the contact form:
I run the management division at Anonymous Content, and I primarily focus
on filmmakers and writers. Just came across this site— don’t know why
it’s taken me so damn long– and it’s REALLY great.
So far, so good. We know we have a very long race to run here, and lots of improvements to make, but I know I speak for our staff when I say we are so happy to be out in the world and interacting with and building this community. Thanks for continuing to spread the word in your network. As always, comments and feedback most welcome.
Up next week: TheWrap gets an electronic billboard on Sunset Boulevard! We’ll send an image once we’ve got one.
Very best,
Sharon.
