Post Office Commemorates President Reagan as Activision Axes 'Guitar Hero'

As the celebration of the anniversary of President Ronald Reagan's 100th birthday (he was born February 6, 1911) continues to sweep through California, our local post office now has the Reagan Centennial Stamp.

On Thursday, a new Ronald Reagan "is forever” stamp was issued. Palisadians can send stamped correspondence with date of first issue cancellations at the post office Ronald and Nancy Reagan frequented, as the Pacific Palisades Post Office branch is a short drive from the Reagans' longtime home on Via Amalfi. 

Special postmark programs are planned at Reagan’s birthplace in Dixon, Illinois, and at the Reagan Library in Simi Valley.

'Hero' No More!

On Wednesday, it was announced that Activision has pulled the plug on its once-uber-popular Guitar Hero video-game franchise, a series that has sold more than 25 million units worldwide, and grossed $2 billion in the United States alone. 

These appear to be dark days for the Santa Monica-based Activision. Reports have hit the Internet of mass layoffs at Activision-owned developer Vicarious Visions, which created the Wii version of Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock. DJ Hero developer Freestyle Games has also been saddled with severe layoffs. United Front's open world game True Crime has also been cancelled.

In December 2010, Activision Publishing CEO Eric Hirshberg said that the Guitar Hero brand, and the music genre, had hit a wall after dismal sales of Warriors of Rock.

"It's no secret that not just Guitar Hero, but also Rock Band, and the music category in general, do not have the same mass appeal today that they did a few years ago," he said at the time.

Several top Activision executives reside in Pacific Palisades, including Laird Malamed, who has overseen the Guitar Hero franchise for most of its existence since Activision acquired the property. At press time, the Pacific Palisades Patch had not heard back from Malamed on the status of his role at Activision in light of this week's announcement.

As recently reported on the PaliPatch, Malamed’s mother,

Guitar Hero was first published in 2005 by RedOctane and Harmonix Music Systems.

‘Original Gidget’ Zuckerman Supports Book, Doc in Florida

Pacific Palisades resident Kathy Kohner Zuckerman, known as the original "Gidget" who spawned the book (which spawned the movies) and now a documentary, will be in Melbourne, Florida, on Saturday for the local premiere of her documentary, "An Accidental Icon."

The film and festivities take place at the Henegar Center. Tickets are $15 and VIP Reception and preferred seating is $50. The event starts with the VIP reception at 6 p.m. General admission is at 7 p.m. with the film at 7:45 p.m.  

The event, to help benefit the National Kidney Foundation, was created by local surfer, Dr. Lance Maki of Merritt Island, a longtime friend of Zuckerman's. Tickets are available online at www.thehenegar.org or at the box office. Call 723-8698 for details. There also will be $20 raffle tickets available.

'MAY-son Giraud?'

Eater LA reports that construction has officially begun on Maison Giraud, the restaurant created by former Anisette owner Alain Giraud that will replace the now-defunct Dante Palisades on Swarthmore Avenue, is due to open in May.

A “Beautiful Mind” in Pacific Palisades?

Recently, a play based on a brilliant Palisadian ran in the Boston area. “R. Buckminster Fuller: The History (and Mystery) of the Universe,” presented by American Repertory Theater at Loeb Drama Center in Cambridge, Massachussetts, ended its run on February 5.

The play focused on Fuller, the New England-born father of the geodesic dome whose preferred name for the planet was "Spaceship Earth."  

 Crafted after the celebrated lectures Fuller traveled the world to give, it starred Thomas Derrah as Fuller. D.W. Jacobs, who directed and wrote the script.

Fuller's daughter told a Boston newspaper that she appreciated that this play was part-musical.

“Another part of my father’s self would easily have been a song-and-dance man,’’ Fuller’s daughter, Allegra Fuller Snyder said in late 2010. Snyder lives in Pacific Palisades, where her parents had resided in their final years.