This website reports on the unfinished business of Los Angeles’ Cinefamily, and on the importance of institutional responsibility. Years after the collapse, Cinefamily’s Board of Directors continues to avoid accountability. We offer original reporting and commentary based on primary sources.
An October 2023 lawsuit filed by a former employee of Louis Black — of the Austin Chronicle, SXSW, and the Cinefamily Board of Directors — accuses Black of sexual assault and and forced labor. These and other charges are nearly identical to those made against other Cinefamily Directors in 2017.
Read MoreCinefamily founder and board member Sammy Harkham took a break between stints of film programming at his theater on Fairfax to write about Hollywood men behaving badly. We take a closer look at Sammy’s graphic novel and his broken promises of creating a safe and responsible workplace.
Read MoreWhat does Dan and Sammy Harkhams’ Cinefamily have in common with some of the most beloved brands of the 1980s? Ongoing allegations of workplace abuses, sexual improprieties, and board coverups — well into the 21st century.
Read MoreIn which we present a condensed history of Cinefamily and accountability and Cinefamily Accountability. Featuring Dan and Sammy Harkham and their Board of Directors, that one guy who traumatized everyone (and needed a bath), and Brain Dead Studios. Also we try to answer: so what are we doing here again?
Read MoreShortly before the October 2021 New People’s Cinema Club in New York, Cinefamily Accountability reported on connections between the “anti-woke” film festival and Cinefamily’s Hadrian Belove. New reporting details how the NPCC ended in tragedy.
Read MoreWe hope that Brain Dead Studios offers a more safe and responsible work environment than the one that the Harkhams oversaw at Cinefamily.
Read MoreIt would be inaccurate reporting to say that the L.A. Planning Commission unanimously found Dan Harkham to be a bad person. But only a little?
Read MoreFormer Cinefamily Executive Director Hadrian Belove is linked to the upcoming New York film festival New People’s Cinema Club, and to a newly-formed California nonprofit called Children's Cinema Resource. But why does it seem like everyone’s trying to hide these connections?
Read MoreNearly a year to the day after being overwhelmingly opposed at the local neighborhood council, Dan Harkham’s hotel project gets pulled from the City Planning Commission agenda.
Read MoreAfter months of pandemic-related shutdown, cinema-going in Los Angeles is ramping back up, and films are once more being shown commercially at the Silent Movie Theater. And once more, operations resume with another change in branding: the space is now called “Brain Dead Studios,” following its brief run as Fairfax Cinema and, before that, Cinefamily.
Read MoreMore than three hours into a neighborhood council meeting, community support for a proposed Harkham hotel project in Pico Robertson turned into opposition.
Read MoreA hazy survey of a hazy landscape.
Read MoreDan Harkham’s proposed hotel is going to the South Robertson Neighborhood Council for a vote. Will his track record at Cinefamily endear him to the community?
Read MoreAfter agreeing to talk with this website, Fairfax Cinema changed course. Then the anonymous Tweets began. Are the Harkhams falling back on an old playbook?
Read MoreRather than oversee Cinefamily or Fairfax Cinema, Dan Harkham develops hotels. What can we learn from a 20-year old dispute involving a Harkham strike, rabbis marching with bitter herbs, and a hotel rebranding?
Read MoreFairness for workers is a constant, never-ending struggle. Will Fairfax Cinema engage in the same shady practices Cinefamily allegedly engaged in? These practices may or may not be newly-illegal in California…
Read MoreAfter more than two years of planning, Dan and Sammy Harkham’s Fairfax Cinema opened its doors to the public on December 25, 2019. The new staff report having to address old business.
Read MoreDan Harkham is trying to open a theater and a hotel at the same time. This website unearths a Cinefamily Employee Handbook. How do those two things connect?
Focus, and ask again.
Read MoreAccording to The Hollywood Reporter, Fairfax Cinema—the rebranded Cinefamily entity—will open next week with a 35mm run of “Uncut Gems,” the new Safdie Brothers movie starring Adam Sandler. Yet inaccuracies in THR reporting left readers scratching their heads, and roiling anger over the Cinefamily scandal spilled into social media and may have caused the filmmakers to rethink their plans.
Read More![(Another) Cinefamily Board Member Accused of Sexual Assault [2023]](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5d859da3ebd96315b08954f5/1699988711942-SW9VYIV2GWA2E79O2RNA/louis+black.jpg)
![Harkham Hotel Project Dealt Another Setback [Updated 9/9/21]](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5d859da3ebd96315b08954f5/1626122694147-BRNPAWJKEUKFI24HT71H/bev+press+delay.jpg)
![“Uncut Gems” [Was] to Open Cinefamily / Fairfax on Christmas 2019 [Updated]](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5d859da3ebd96315b08954f5/1576697160012-KX13QRW4X6J7UEUUJL2N/sandler.jpg)