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The news today that Hachette Filipacchi is shutting down Premiere Magazine after its April issue struck a bit of a personal chord for me. Not because I like the magazine--haven't read it in years--but because my very first industry job was an internship at Premiere in fall 1996.

I was in my last semester of grad school at NYU (Cinema Studies), and thought I wanted to work in magazine publishing, maybe become a movie critic. I was turned down by Entertainment Weekly, my first choice, but Leslie Weiller, head of Promotions and Marketing, hired me for her department. I was working for her, and for a guy named Artie Athas, and they were both really, really great to me. (Wonder where they are now?) Leslie in particular took time out to give me career advice, and I always genuinely looked forward to going to work every day.

Some memories:

The office was all abuzz one day when Holly Millea got a huge bouquet of flowers from Harvey Weinstein after a piece she wrote on one of their movies. Everybody, I mean everybody, was talking about it.

My main responsibility was collecting contest and free screening entries. This was before the internet, remember, so every week I had to go to the post office on 8th Avenue and check our PO box for all the postcards that had arrived. I boxed up the postcards and sent them to a company that generated random mailing lists by state for all the cities where we were sponsoring screenings. We had a certain number of passes for each city, so the "winners will be randomly chosen" part was all me--I peeled labels until I ran out of passes for each city.

One time, I sent a pass to my cousin in Seattle, but when she got it she called me to say "thanks, but I don't live in Miami." I FREAKED out--what if I sent Miami passes to Seattle or Seattle passes to Miami? I decided not to tell anyone, and after a few days when we didn't get a slew of angry callers, I figured I was off the hook.

I had to skip a week over Thanksgiving break to write my comprehensive exams. When I got back the next week, I headed to the post office as usual. I turned the key in the lock--no entries, just a note saying "come to the counter." This happened a lot--usually they'd give me one of those hampers filled with entries that I'd carry back to the office. This time, we were running a Ransom (Mel Gibson) screening and a contest. Instead of bringing out a little hamper, the postal worker wheeled out a gigantic cart, filled to overflowing with entries. I had to push the damn thing across 8th Avenue, back to 50th & Broadway. It was a cold, blustery day, and the wind was making it hard to push the cart, which was quite heavy. Plus, postcards were flying off the top--I guess that was more "winners will be chosen randomly" in action!

On my last day, Artie let me lay out 16 pages of the magazine with the advertising. That was pretty fun.

Oh, and I got my name in the masthead. I don't think I saved any of the issues, but Nicole Kidman was on one of the covers, I think.

My # 1 best story:
One day, the photocopier was broken, and I had to make a bunch of copies over in the neighboring magazine's office. As I was walking back, I saw a vision of male pulchritudinity the likes of which I have never seen in person before or since. I was staggered by this man's charisma, to the point where I could not look directly at him.

The magazine?
George.
The man?
John.
F.
Kennedy.
Jr.

So hot. RIP, John John. RIP, Premiere.