More Career Lessons from Hollywood -- amNY.com

February 4, 2008

Career Lessons from Hollywood

Leaving an old job on good terms

Once upon a time, Fox's "Prison Break" was about, well, a prison break. Now, three seasons in, structural engineer Michael Scofield (Wentworth Miller) has plotted his framed brother's escape, become a fugitive, and wound up back in the clink. Suffice to say, whether breaking out of prison our out of a dead-end job, a clean record is a must.

January 28, 2008

Career Lessons from Hollywood

Dividing work how they do on TV

For most New Yorkers, strange sounds and otherworldly drafts are just a part of the high price of living in the city. For the teams of investigators on Sci-Fi Channel's "Ghost Hunters International" and WE tv's "Rescue Mediums," such factors might also indicate the presence of a supernatural squatter, who quite frankly needs to start kicking in half the rent.

January 21, 2008

Career Lessons from Hollywood

Getting tips for work from Sundance films

Filmmakers are flocking to the Sundance Film Festival for a flurry of films and snow. Thereafter, they will likely migrate back to warmer climates, where stacks of fellowship applications for advanced film studies surely awaits them.

January 7, 2008

Career Lessons from Hollywood

Work pointers from 'Hannah Montana'

On the Disney Channel's hit tween show, "Hannah Montana," fictional Malibu millionaire Miley Stewart (Miley Cyrus) is pop star "Hannah Montana" by night, and a normal (so to speak) teenager by day. Sure, Aunt Dolly (Dolly Parton) takes her shopping and Dad (Billy Ray Cyrus) is a one-time country star, but somehow no one at Miley's school has caught on that she's the teen dream in plastic pants pasted in their lockers.

December 24, 2007

Career Lessons from Hollywood

How much criticism is too much?

After three seasons of "Hell's Kitchen" and the recently wrapped up "Kitchen Nightmares," viewers are somehow still intrigued by Chef Gordon Ramsay's epic fuming. True, Ramsay is a superstar griller, with two Michelin stars and countless bleeps to his credit. However, his constructive criticism is always a bit over salted.

December 10, 2007

Career Lessons from Hollywood

Some office lessons from movies

Who could have guessed that a musical about a serial killer would be one of the most highly anticipated films of the holiday season? Tim Burton's "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street" banks on the viewing public's enjoyment of watching untrustworthy colleagues processed into savory meat pies (an indulgent treat on par with the blackest blood puddings).

December 3, 2007

Career Lessons from Hollywood

Holiday party do's and don'ts, courtesy of TV

With a "Hot Santa" contest scheduled on NBC's "Las Vegas" and a yuletide "Deal or No Deal," 'tis the season for the networks to push ill-advised holiday cheer in an attempt acknowledge the season and keep to business as usual.

November 26, 2007

Career Lessons from Hollywood

A lesson in optimism from "Project Runway"

The fourth season contestants of Bravo's "Project Runway" have their work cut out for them. Past cycles have shown that the competing would-be designers sometimes fold under the intense pressure. Typically, the first designers cast off are not necessarily the least talented, just the least optimistic.

November 19, 2007

Career Lessons from Hollywood

Multitaskers' downfall

Poor Ugly Betty. What doesn't ABC's favorite brace-face, Betty Suarez, put up with as assistant to the editor in chief of Mode?

November 5, 2007

Career Lessons from Hollywood

Networking lessons from Denzel

Knowing when to cut out the middle man and apply targeted networking strategies is the key to becoming a successful executive. It is also the key to becoming a successful drug king pin, as evidenced in Ridley Scott's "American Gangster," the true story of suave Harlem drug czar/civic leader, Frank Lucas (Denzel Washington), whose ruthless work ethic and a to-die-for rolodex was enough to succeed in a tight market.

October 8, 2007

Career Lessons from Hollywood

Mind your own business

Veiled threats over half-eaten yogurt containers, toothy smiles and cheap plaid kilts paired with $1200 boots are the premise of the CW's teen-dramedy, Gossip Girl. In the office, as in the glittery world of Gossip Girl, gossip is simultaneously a way of keeping tabs on what's going on, as well as a destructive force.

October 1, 2007

Career Lessons from Hollywood

Target your networking for blockbuster results

Through October 14, the New York Film Festival will run a lineup of 28 films at Frederick P. Rose Hall, home of jazz at Lincoln Center. Unlike other premieres, ruled by fashion stylists and actor shenanigans, the focus will be on the real stars: The directors.

September 24, 2007

Career Lessons from Hollywood

Why love and work shouldn't mix

This Thursday, the seriously distracted doctors of Grey's Anatomy return. While they risk contacting contagious diseases from their patients, they also risk entering into a series of sexual harassment lawsuits from their constant canoodling.

September 17, 2007

Career Lessons from Hollywood

Accepting honors in the workplace with class

The Emmys are always fun, but hardly as interesting as last week's Creative Arts Primetime Emmys (aka, the awards ceremony too controversial/boring for primetime). Kathy Griffin's ribald acceptance speech for Best Reality Show riled up censors and caused the Catholic Defamation League to work over-time.

September 10, 2007

Career Lessons from Hollywood

Learning from a beauty queen's YouTube flub

The questions asked on Miss Teen USA may be significantly easier than any found on "Are you smarter than a 5th grader," but that doesn't mean there's no room for error. Just consider Miss Teen South Carolina's 30 second sound-bite, which was so mystifyingly incoherent, it seemed to bend the rules of time and space.

August 20, 2007

Career Lessons from Hollywood

Learning to dance through office politics

In the 80s, a dance off was an open-and-shut case. To be number one, you simply smirked your way through a genius pop-n-lock routine your competitor couldn't reproduce.

August 13, 2007

Career Lessons from Hollywood

Making open office setups work

Sharing workspace is never pleasant, even if your co-workers look like Catherine Zeta-Jones and Aaron Eckhart. A point made in the new romantic comedy, "No Reservations," where space restrictions cause tension so thick, it can only be cut with a Ginsu knife.

August 6, 2007

Career Lessons from Hollywood

How 'Harry Potter' can help your career

J.K. Rowling neatly tied up all the loose ends in her final book, "Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows," but looking back on the Harry Potter series, the slew of serial killers, werewolves, and psychopaths leashed on Hogwarts all seemed the result of a slew of Human Resources glitches.

July 23, 2007

Career Lessons from Hollywood

Exorcize those work demons

Fox's reality cooking show, "Hell's Kitchen" does not sugar-coat anything, save the crème brulee, and even that's a bit scorched.

July 16, 2007

Career Lessons from Hollywood

Applying dating lessons to the job hunt

Whether you find NBC's new reality dating show, "Age of Love," tacky or enthralling, you have to give the network credit for pointing out a seldom-referred to dilemma in the dating world, in short, the competition between 20-something and 40-something women for the tiny pool of successful 30-something men.