Requiem for Anita Busch

In the movies,reporters are mostly made out to be sleazy louts (It Happened One Night) or bumbling fools (Absence of Malice). Hollywood moguls even portray good journalists (All the President’s Men) as egotistical, obsessive, not-very-nice people. Or maybe it’s just payback. After all, good journalists usually portray Hollywood moguls as egotistical, obsessive, not-very-nice people. Combine the two, and a good Hollywood journalist means a double dose of all those qualities that make a person insufferable.

 

That, in a nutshell, was veteran movie industry reporter Anita Busch.

 

“Was” is the operative word here because she has abandoned the profession she zealously plied for nearly 20 years. Not just because she was sniffing around a story that ended in her fearing for her life, not just because she burned her bridges at the major media outlets, but also because the LosAngelesTimesand the Hollywood press corps turned their backs on her when she came under what we now know was a genuine threat.

 

“She told me she’s never going to work as a journalist again,” one of her closest friends tells L.A. Weekly. “It’s not so much what happened to her but the whole way this went down. How she was treated left a sour taste.”

 

She is gone and, worse, she is near-forgotten, an inconspicuous end to an esteemed career. So I, for one, am going to apologize to Busch on behalf of everyone who covers Hollywood: Yes, we are at fault. Yes, we didn’t take this seriously at first, second or third. Yes, we made the mistake of putting personality before principle. Shame on us — especially now that this ongoing Hollywood puzzle is starting to fall into place.

 

On Friday, the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office announced that celebrity private eye Anthony Pellicano, already in prison on federal weapons and explosives counts, was charged with conspiracy and threatening Busch. The man he allegedly hired to do the dirty work, Alexander Proctor, already had been charged with one count of making criminal threats against Busch in a case filed in 2003. Still unclear is who hired Pellicano. Busch, who’s been in contact with the FBI and the D.A.’s Office all this time, has tantalizingly whispered to friends that her case could lead to a big Hollywood name.

 

Busch wouldn’t return my phone calls. (Though a guy called me anonymously and warned repeatedly, “You’re being monitored. Everything you say about Anita Busch.”) Also not talking to me was the literary agent for the novel she’s supposedly writing, and the lawyer for the civil lawsuit she filed two years after the incident against nearly everyone she claims was involved. Those who are in contact with her say she’s obsessed with every facet of the ongoing Pellicano taping scandal and talks about it constantly.

 

She also hasn’t worked for the LosAngelesTimesin years and left there disappointed that the paper’s management “didn’t back her up” more, according to one pal. “She didn’t find them as supportive as she would have liked. They turned the matter over to the Human Resources administrative people. This was very offensive to her.”

 

To refresh your memory, the long-time trade paper reporter-editor was newly hired as a contract writer by the LosAngelesTimeswhen she was threatened while working on a story about has-been action star Steven Seagal’s alleged ties to the mob. That’s when Anita in LaLaland fell down the rabbit hole and never came out again.

 

Separating fact from fantasy seemed impossible given the wacko stuff that happened that June 10, 2002, involving an actor, the Mafia, a hit man, a note that said “STOP,” a shatter mark on her car windshield — alleged shenanigans by Proctor and Pellicano. The street where she lived was evacuated so the bomb squad could investigate the contents of the mystery package left on her auto; it contained a dead fish and a rose but no explosive device. “People didn’t take it seriously because it sounded like a movie script,” another friend says. “That’s why few people felt sorry for her.”

 

Blame that on Busch herself and her reputation first as a Hollywood queen, and then as a drama queen. Over time, she went from the reporter relentlessly pursuing stories to reversing course and becomingthe story. She was schmoozing media writers for high-profile treatment in stories about Hollywood coverage, sitting for a portrait and profile in the LATwhen she became editor of TheHollywoodReporter,or slithering around in evening dress for an Ellemagazine feature on “Hollywood After Dark.” The dead fish experience was seen as just another peril to befall Anita: She’d had as many as Pauline over the years, culminating in the bottle of MSG she claimed was sent to her by Michael Ovitz because of her lethal allergy to the food additive.