Transcript: Hollywood vs. TikTok

Rob Long on today’s Madison Ave. dogfight and how the industry can win

This is Rob Long with Martini Shot for The Ankler.

A friend of mine pitched this show to me last week:

The set up is this: He and his wife both work outside the house, but with two young kids and childcare is expensive. So his mother-in-law helps out during the day to take care of the young kids. For free. Which is terrific.

Except: He and his wife are deeply committed Santa Monica progressives and his mother-in-law is a passionate Trump supporter, so every night they need to basically re-program their children from believing that Donald Trump belongs on Mount Rushmore and that Gavin Newsom works for the Chinese Communist Party and that the Covid vaccine will turn you into a robot.

“But, you know,” he said, “she may be crazy but the price is right.”

Let me clarify: my friend didn’t pitch this to me as a show. He’s a lawyer, actually. He just told me what’s really happening in his house, and I suspect he’s not unique. We all have someone in our family who may watch too much cable news, of either stripe.

I’m the one who turned it into a pitch. I’m the one who thinks — and I’m probably wrong, or too early, or way too late, because I’m always one of those — that what’s happening in the real world, in all of its gaudy, lurid glory is pretty great material. You just have to look around.

Here’s what I mean: