Curator: Tony Friscia
The L.A. Screenings Veteran luncheon is held annually at the traditional InterContinental Hotel (formerly Park Hyatt).
The luncheon was started in 2005 as an informal event among the late Jim Marrinan, then a TV consultant; Gary Marenzi (who had just left Paramount) and VideoAge’s Dom Serafini. The following year it included Tony Friscia, who just had left Warner Bros. In subsequent years, Friscia coordinated the participation (and started keeping tabs), which at one point reached over 25 veteran TV executives.
Below is the year-by year photoplay report:
2021
Those we loved don’t go away
They walk beside us every day
Unseen, unheard but always near
Still loved, still missed & very dear
(By Richard Milnes)
The 17th annual Veterans Luncheon, like last year’s 16th edition, was celebrated virtually. Let us all hope that we will be able to resume the in-person event in May 2022, so that we can celebrate the “new” L.A. Screenings and honor our dearly departed Veterans with the in-person toasts they so richly deserve. Twenty-seven Veterans participated in last year’s virtual get-together. This year 33 Veterans raised a glass in their honor.
2020
https://www.videoageinternational.net/2020/11/25/watercooler/a-veteran-remembrance-friends-are-not-forgotten/
2020
Traditional Veterans’ Luncheon Kept Alive Virtually
The coronavirus did not spare the traditional Veterans’ Lunch at the canceled L.A. Screenings, so the veterans decided to stage a virtual 16th annual event in order to raise a glass to departed friends and lunch veterans, including Russ Kagan, Jim Marrinan, and industry veterans Larry Gershman, Justin Bodle, and Tetsu Uemura.
And now a few words from Tony Friscia…
For 15 uninterrupted years, a group of industry colleagues have gathered together to meet with old friends, make new ones, and casually and informally chitchat about family, life, business triumphs, and in the very rare instance, business failures. This lunch has been memorialized in a year-by-year photoplay report.
The lunch began in 2005 with three attendees, and had grown to 26 in 2019. Unfortunately, as the years rolled on, some of our old friends and colleagues left us.
As the unthinkable became reality, it became the tradition to commence each lunch with a toast to those who were no longer with us.
Regrettably, in 2020, the world was hit with a catastrophic event that upended life as we knew it. The Veterans Lunch was not immune to such a tragic episode.
However, that tragedy would not discourage nor deter the Veterans from paying homage to their friends. The Veterans decided to “raise a glass” and hold a virtual toast.
The numerous written remembrances and nostalgic recollections submitted by their fellow Veterans ran the gamut from the traditional religious and spiritual, to jousting over licensing terms. From inspiring us to do good deeds in their name and honor, to having us emulate their good deeds. From reminiscing about giving a first job to one, to receiving his first job from another, to having a long comradeship with a third. From a poem by a naval war hero to meeting at a club in the Elysian Fields to sip a rosé that had been well chilled. From keeping their memories alive, to keeping their memories as our blessing. From an “Alla salute!” in a foreign language to a simple “thank you.” From a son. Finally, as a fellow Veteran rightfully professed, soon we will all be together again, gathering around a lunch table celebrating those who left us a wee bit too early. Although they were all legends in our industry, they were most importantly our friends.