Acerbic and widely read entertainment writer and blogger Nikki Finke passed away last Sunday in Boca Raton, Florida. Finke was known for breaking Hollywood news, angering moguls, and launching the blog Deadline Hollywood Daily (now simply Deadline) in 2006. Age-wise, she was 68.
A close friend of the family, Madelyn Hammond, revealed her passing, stating simply that she had suffered from an extended illness. Ms. Finke began her career as a journalist for The Associated Press in 1975 after working as a staff assistant with in Washington office of Representatives Edward I.
Koch, a New York Democrat who would go on to become mayor of New York City. In the early 1980s, she began working for The Dallas Morning News, and she later contributed to Newsweek, The Los Angeles Times, and LA Weekly, where she began writing a column titled Deadline Hollywood in 2002.
She combined reportage with gossip in a vibrant, no-holds-barred style, whether she was breaking the news about the Oscars’ host or describing the interactions between actors and agents or analysing the deal-making of senior executives for the Deadline website.
Childhood And Adolescence Of Nikki Finke
Many in Hollywood did not like Ms. Finke because of her direct manner. However, the Long Island native’s consistent stream of exclusives demonstrated her significant sway amongst industry executives, agents, and publicists.
The magazine Forbes named her one of “the world’s most powerful women” in 2010.
Ms. Finke was unrepentant, and she did not modify her style even for the most famous actors or the highest-ranking studio officials. And they play hard, she explained to the New York Times in 2015. The challenge prompted the response, “I just had to act tough, too.”
Instead of making connections at events like red carpet premieres and cocktail parties, she mostly worked from her West Los Angeles apartment.
However, she was able to harshly criticise CEOs whose decisions she disagreed with from her isolated perch. She once used a curse word to describe then-NBC Universal president Jeff Zucker: “among the most [obsequious] incompetents to manage a entertainment corporation.”
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It’s not my fault!” she exclaimed to the New Yorker in 2009. “The cruelty just seems to pour out of my hands!”
Jay Penske’s Penske Media Corp. bought Deadline Hollywood in 2009, and it later bought Variety and the Hollywood Journalist. Ms. Finke and Penske frequently got into fights, especially after he bought the Deadline competitors.
After months of public squabbling, she finally quit the site in 2013, but she was still paid to consult until the following year. He tried to buy my silence, Ms. Finke recalled. Unfortunately, we have to decline your offer.
“At her finest, Nikki Finke embraced the spirit of journalism and was never hesitant to communicate the hard realities with an incisive manner and an intriguing spark,” Penske said in a statement released on Sunday. She spoke the truth in a direct and unapologetic manner. Nikki was never simple, but she is still one of the most remarkable people I’ve ever met.
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Ms. Finke dabbled in other fields after she left entertainment journalism but never went back. While she once vowed to relaunch NikkiFinke.com as a solo venture, it is believed that the terms of her contract with Penske prevent her from writing about the entertainment industry for the next decade.
Instead, she unveiled the website HollywoodDementia.com, which featured made-up stories about the entertainment industry.
Sands Point, situated on the north coast on Long Island, is where Ms. Finke spent her childhood. The New York Times states that her father started a lighting business in New Jersey. A sister is among the living.
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Ms. Finke engaged Jeffrey Greenberg after she graduated from Wellesley College and immediately began working as a journalist. After divorcing, she began a career as a journalist, contributing to publications like the AP, Newsweek, LA Times, NY Post, and NY Observer.
A 2011 HBO pilot titled Tilda Watski, starring Diane Keaton as a reclusive journalist, was similarly based on her.
“Trust me, I never set out and for [Deadline] or me to be as contentious as we are,” she said in a 2016 essay commemorating the magazine’s tenth anniversary.
As I’ve said elsewhere, “I was instead taking the counsel of my mentor, the famous publisher Peter Kaplan, who warned me repeatedly, “You’re best when angry;” “Write what you actually know;” and “Tell the truth about Hollywood.”
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Conclusion
The seasoned reporter made a name for herself with her dogged pursuit of the truth and her titillating revelations about Hollywood’s A-listers. Her trademark opening line for stories that turned out to be genuine was always “toldja.”
