This reporting is featured in this week’s edition of Confider, the newsletter pulling back the curtain on the media. Subscribe here and send your questions, tips, and complaints here.
Once revered as an award-winning publication that punched above its weight, Los Angeles magazine is starting to lose its luster under the ownership of celebrity attorneys Mark Geragos and Ben Meiselas and the new management of publisher Chris Gialanella.
Since their media arm Engine Vision Media took hold of the magazine and its various Golden State sister publications last year, current and former staffers told Confider, a host of troubling issues have befallen the new management.
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Since the exit of editor-in-chief Maer Roshan, who steered the magazine into buzzy, hard-edged journalism and a greater social-media presence, our sources complained the mag has begun to blur the lines between editorial and advertising, especially to promote the interests of the famed attorney duo and their publisher. For example, multiple insiders said, since moving Los Angeles’ headquarters to Geragos-owned offices in an old firehouse, new management has seemed preoccupied with ticketed events at the restaurant housed in the same building. A recent edition of the magazine’s Daily Brief newsletter, for instance, largely centered on promoting the Engine Co. 28 Restaurant, which is owned by Geragos.
The publisher, however, told Confider that the newsletter “promotes relevant content to our audience in Los Angeles,” and since the restaurant and building are “historic landmarks,” the magazine celebrated the property’s 110th anniversary with a party featuring ’80s pop star Rick Springfield. “This is false… We will not blur any lines between advertising and editorial in the delivery of articles in our magazines,” Gialenella told Confider in a statement.
Los Angeles insiders also told us that the new ownership plans to transform the magazine’s celebrated Dining Guide into an advertorial that will feature restaurants paying for the privilege of being featured—something Gialenella didn’t exactly deny.
“We look at dozens of proposals every week to determine the best path for future success… The new ownership has been auditing all aspects of the business to make it successful addressing the past failures of those who are no longer involved with this business,” he said. “Now that the business is on a path to success, we understand that makes certain people upset.”
That seemed to be a pointed shot at Roshan, whom the new ownership kicked to the curb this spring and eventually replaced with current EIC Shirley Halperin. Roshan, for his part, told Confider that while “Geragos and Meiselas are obviously entitled to run the magazine as they wish,” the attorney duo has “steadily slashed away at the values” of the 63-year-old institution.
He then took a swing at the pair by hinting at Geragos’ one-time partnership with disgraced lawyer and convicted felon Michael Avenatti and Meiselas’ controversial #Resistance content mill MeidasTouch. “For all their talk of reinventing Los Angeles, their early performance has been less than inspiring. Traffic is reportedly way down. Cancellations are up. Longtime contributors are departing in droves,” Roshan said in a statement. “Bluster and bullying are useful tactics for a mob lawyer or a Trump-baiting Twitter personality. But they’re less effective when you’re responsible for running a respected media entity.”
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As Confider began to look into complaints about the new management at Los Angeles, we also learned that the company has refused to pay various freelancers in a timely manner—or, in some cases, at all.
Only after Confider reached out about these disputes did the magazine begin paying out some of the claims. Such was the case with Steve Erickson, an award-winning author who has written the magazine’s monthly film and television column since 2001.
Erickson told Confider last week that he was “two columns & [$4,000] behind in being compensated,” employing a Trump reference to jab at the magazine. “A publisher like Mr. Geragos who doesn’t pay his writers is like a disgraced ex-president who doesn’t pay his lawyers. Pretty soon he doesn’t have any,” Erickson wrote in an email to us.
Once Confider reached out to Los Angeles last week, the magazine went scorched earth. It claimed it did not quietly expand its freelance payment window from 30 to 60 days—despite a July 13 email from Halperin to Erickson, obtained and reviewed by Confider, saying just that; that management was simply conducting an “extensive audit” of the company, causing payment delays but also averting layoffs; and that Erickson’s payments were current aside from one invoice.
On Tuesday, the magazine’s attorney threatened Erickson with a defamation lawsuit over his comments to Confider, even as a remaining $2,000 payment was made that same day.
Multiple people familiar with the situation told Confider that, since its outreach, the magazine has scrambled to pay out thousands of dollars’ worth of outstanding payments to freelancers. (Gialanella denied this in a statement and said payments are made weekly.) But still, some freelancers have yet to see a dollar.
As part of its defense, the magazine provided Confider with an email it claimed showed how an editor hired a writer to attend events for stories that were never written, and yet it was still billed for the reporter’s services. That episode, it said, showed why the magazine needed to complete its audit before making payments. However, that writer—a freelancer who wrote and helped edit multiple stories for the magazine—never invoiced the magazine for attending the events, according to invoices obtained and reviewed by Confider. Instead, they submitted two invoices in March for the stories and editing work, one of which was still outstanding.
When the writer reached out to Gialanella about the delayed payment, he called and grilled them. The writer then reached out to their editor—Kevin Dolak, who worked as the magazine’s executive editor for digital as a freelancer before he was dismissed in April—who sent an email to Gialanella and Geragos last month defending the writer and demanding they pay out multiple freelancers.
“This is an embarrassing and downright deplorable business practice that will torch the magazine’s reputation in the industry if it continues,” Dolak wrote in the June 6 email, which was obtained and reviewed by Confider. Dolak told Confider he received no response from Gialanella or Geragos.
When approached for comment, Los Angeles brass seemed to point the finger at Roshan and previous ownership over the magazine’s issues with freelancers, referencing a lawsuit from former editor Joseph Kapsch, who alleged that previous management misclassified his employment status as an independent contractor.
Confider sources, meanwhile, said Kapsch, who worked closely with Halperin at The Hollywood Reporter, will return to the magazine as its digital executive editor (Dolak’s former job) once a settlement is reached.
In a statement to Confider, Kapsch praised the magazine’s new ownership and editor Halperin, saying “anyone working for her or alongside her should be grateful.”
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