Diane Ladd Adds Voice To MPTF Protest

COMMENTS (13)

• “Hitler’s unforgivable hellish holocaust” – Umm, is it just me, or doesn’t it seem a bit much to be raising the spectre of the holocaust when discussing the regrettable events taking place in regards to Motion Picture Home and their elderly clientele. I understand that this is a very stressful and sad thing to have happen, but Ms. Ladd, Auschwitz it ain’t. Some sense of proportion might be helpful. This is an example of the kind of histrionics that make actors look like wacko’s.

  Comment by WTF!!! — Thursday June 18, 2009 @ 8:46am PDT  Reply to this post

• I’m all for saving the home, but did she just compare its closing to the holocaust? Godwin’s Law, Diane. Discussion’s over, you lose.

  Comment by Dennitzio — Thursday June 18, 2009 @ 9:31am PDT  Reply to this post

• Yes, Ms. Ladd may have gone over the top in her comparison to the holocaust – but I understand her frustration. When you constantly hear comments like “regrettable” and “it’s too bad” you get the sense that people can’t be bothered. Society is moving closer and closer to ostracizing what it doesn’t want to look at. Rather than embracing end-of-life, today’s society is in denial and these folks are the ones paying the price.

  Comment by KB — Thursday June 18, 2009 @ 10:17am PDT  Reply to this post

• The MPTF Long-Term Care closure, as Diane Ladd states is one of the most “atrocious occurrences that has ever been allowed to take place in this industry!” It’s way too easy to invoke Godwin’s Law in order to dismiss Ms. Ladd’s condemnation of the MPTF Board’s actions.

  We should not forget that in Hitler’s Germany many people denied the facts of the holocaust even as their friends and neighbors were arbitrarily rounded up and sent away. Sometimes we can’t see what’s happening right in front of our eyes. It’s glibly easy to dismiss the core of Ms. Ladd’s statement and sweep the targeting of old, sick, and vulnerable seniors at the Motion Picture Home under the carpet until they become us or those we love — and then what?

  In a community that stands up for social justice causes all over the world its vital to not forget the importance of humanity and social justice in our back yard. Thank you Diane Ladd for inviting the entertainment community to get involved in this issue that touches all of us.

  Comment by Dean Butler — Thursday June 18, 2009 @ 11:10am PDT  Reply to this post

• I said this the first time around, it’s beyond shameful that a town full of hundred-millionaires and up can’t scrape 10-20 million together to keep this facility up and running in style. Next time a politician comes to town with his hand out, give him/her a miss and make your money really count.

  Here’s a tip for coping in these troubled economic times – consider downsizing to an 8000 sq ft home rather than going for the 12000 sq ft model. Think of the savings and how much less energy you’ll use! Still a hundred times more than a regular family, but you get the idea.

  Comment by Joe Melnick — Thursday June 18, 2009 @ 1:06pm PDT  Reply to this post

• This whole thing is absolutely criminal. These people PAID FOR THIS CARE, and they’re being robbed of their once-guaranteed retirement and health care.

  I am furious about this injustice. Fucking greed. It’s killing this town, and this planet.

  Comment by Luzid — Thursday June 18, 2009 @ 2:05pm PDT  Reply to this post

• This is Jeffery Kastenbergs fault. As I have said before, if Lew Wasserman were still alive, he ould have stopped this. Shame on all who are behind this.

  Comment by Brion — Thursday June 18, 2009 @ 3:13pm PDT  Reply to this post

• Clearly there is no comparison to the scale/scope of the holocaust, and I doubt Ms Ladd meant to compare it as such. On the other hand, what difference do words mean to the sick and elderly resident at the Motion Picture Long Term Care Facility who dies from fear, stress, transfer trauma if brought on by the actions of the Motion Picture Fund Leadership. Ms Ladd’s statement that 5 of 16 elderly transferred out over the past few months have died doesn’t do justice to a certain fact. Actually, 5 of 13 MediCal patients transferred out of the Motion Picture Home have died in a few short months – nearly 40%. The sick, old people at the “Home” continue to be traumatized [recently, the MPTF put big signs in the residential areas where the elderly residents from the Home congregate, advertising a parking lot sale for beds, tv's, tables, with giant words "EVERYTHING MUST BE SOLD." This caused yet another panic among alert elderly - they thought they were going to be thrown out on the day of this sale [which "coincidentally" was for the types of items in their rooms - the only items that are a part of their world now]. Is it an atrocity if “Guardians” of the most needy and helpless residents on the Campus know or should know that their decisions/behavior will result in the mental anguish, and death in many cases of those sick and elderly? One elderly resident of the Home who recently died was a “survivor” of the Holocaust. Shortly after the MPTF Board’s announcement of the Motion Picture Homes’s closure, this aged survivor overheard that their name was going to be placed on a “list” with other residents who were to be sent out of the “Home.” This elderly resident told a spouse “don’t go to any meetings, it’s the Germans.” You wanna hear another one – the one about the old man in the wheel chair who eager Fund “workers” were pushing to move out to some place far away, far away from his home at the Motion Picture Long Term Care facility. Well, he cried and peed in his pants when he started to talk about the impending move. He ultimately fought off being moved at this time – but the anguish. Does it get much worse? Unfortunately, yes. It seems a “sin” that men and women in the Industry who make movies about “man’s inhumanity to man” are standing around as if it doesn’t matter in real life in real time.
  People like Steven Spielberg and David Geffen who have a relationship to the Motion Picture Home should know better – we used to look up to them. We don’t understand what’s going on in their heads. How can men like this and so many other men and women in the Industry sit out this horror show currently taking place in their own back yard. How can they be “silent.” Do you get the comparisons? Do you get the irony. All of you celebrities and “stars” out there who have lent your good name to the “Night Before” fund raising Gala [to raise money for everything at the Motion Picture Fund EXCEPT keeping the Home open]. Wake up – you have good intentions but you are being used to the point of being complicit in the ruination of the weakest and oldest human beings on the Motion Picture Fund Campus and the honorable 80 year plus mission of the Motion Picture Fund to take care of the most sick and needy in our Industry. Act NOW to stop the evil behavior, this evil action. It’s not about money – it’s an Agenda to get rid of the sickest people on the Campus and embrace healthy and wealthy who have aged “successfully.” The Motion Picture Fund COO Seth Ellis said it all in Nursing Home Magazine, 2007: “We want this Campus to be a place for elders to live their best lives, not a place that looks at sickness, but looks at the key ingredients of successful aging.” [After all, if there were a real financial crisis, why would you ONLY target the sickest and oldest? Wouldn’t you protect them and cut other things first? Maybe just some salaries and benefits like President Tillman’s fairly new package of $800,000 plus, perhaps charge more than $25 per month for a membership at the giant, brand new multi-million dollar swimming pool, fitness and wellness center (with travertine, brazilian hardwood floors)- can you imagine the “losses” here? Sherry Lansing, MPTF Leaders recently took you on a tour. Did they show you the people who are going to be thrown out. Did they let you talk to them about their pain or was it just the new swimming pool and fitness center? You are a wonderful human being. Can’t you see through this? Why won’t the MPTF Leadership allow fund raising and donations to keep the Home open, as compared to “forbidding” fund raising and donations to keep Long Term Care open. Thank you Diane Ladd [and thank you Elliot Gould, John Schneider, and David Carradine) for caring about the helpless human beings who have died, and those who are damaged but still alive (for the moment), and about the future of the Home for the tens of thousands in the Industry who will need it one day and instead will find themselves at some cesspool of a Nursing Home in the Valley or downtown LA. Thank you for not being afraid to speak out.
  Comment by S Bernard

  Comment by S Bernard — Thursday June 18, 2009 @ 4:10pm PDT  Reply to this post

• —-Fund COO Seth Ellis said it all in Nursing Home Magazine, 2007: “We want this Campus to be a place for elders to live their best lives, not a place that looks at sickness, but looks at the key ingredients of successful aging.”

  – This reads like ageism to me. Sounds like they are being punished for not aging in the proper way.

  Comment by Kat O'Brien — Friday June 19, 2009 @ 4:51am PDT  Reply to this post

• The “coincidence” that this situation seemed to go public when Bernie Madoff was exposed seems to point to something else going on beneath the surface. All those high profile voices who weren’t afraid to go public during the “Yes” Vote campaign are now suspiciously silent here! Where are Tom, Sally, George, Steve, David and the rest now?! Who is ordering them to keep their mouths shut or else?!

  Comment by Anonymous — Friday June 19, 2009 @ 10:16am PDT  Reply to this post

• Katzenberg will be known for only one thing.

  Destroying the Motion Picture & Television Fund. The “archhhhhhhhhhh-itecht” who planned to get rid of all the sick old people.

  Comment by michael — Friday June 19, 2009 @ 11:49am PDT  Reply to this post

• This pisses me off to no end… thanks Nikki keep posting. Ive posted this all over facebook… and I want this to spread like wildfire… maybe the Cult members like Tom Cruise and those other weirdos would like to step up… or do they not believe in critical care and old people?
  just sickening. barf on you elitist supreme moguls

  Comment by patty cake — Monday June 22, 2009 @ 5:24am PDT  Reply to this post

• I have great idea. Why doesn’t Micheal Moore push himself away from the table and do a documentary about what has happened with the Home? Oh that’s right, it’s not about some political thing that he can make up all kinds of stuff about, this is in the old back yard and may offend some of the $$$people that he sucks up to. I’m sure that he could twist some more facts to make it the Fault of the Republicans. No awards for something like this!
  Maybe newly elected Senator Al Franken can get some of the stimulous money that has been allocated for Hollywood to purchase film (We all know that thru creative bookkeeping Hollywood is barely surviving)and have that help the Home. Oh that’s right, he will probably spend the next couple of years attending instructional classes on how to be a Senator!

  Comment by Larry — Monday July 6, 2009 @ 4:56am PDT  Reply to this post