Premiere Magazine to cease publication after April '07 issue
 

from <i>New York Post - March 6. 2007</u>:

<b>PREMIERE HITS CUTTING ROOM FLOOR WITH APRIL ISSUE</b>
By KEITH J. KELLY
March 6, 2007 -- <i>Hachette Filipacchi Media is shutting down the print edition of movie magazine Premiere.
The Post broke the news that the magazine was on the block on Feb. 5.
Yesterday, Hachette Filipacchi CEO Jack Kliger met with Editor-in-Chief Peter Herbst around 3 p.m. for what was said to be a meeting over the magazine's latest cover. Instead, he got the bad news.
They then met with the full staff to give them the scoop.
The April edition will be the last. As with the closure of Elle Girl and Shock, the company said it would maintain an online version of the movie magazine.
Its monthly pace made it tough to cover the breathless celebrity scandals that fueled the weekly audience.
The company had conceded that it was "exploring strategic options" several weeks ago but was apparently unable to find a deep pocketed investor to keep the magazine afloat.</i>


Sorry to see this go - it's one of the few (if not only) mass-media movie magazines that's not paparazzi-driven.

Too much competition from online entertainment mags. I wouldnt be surprised if more magazines go under.

oh that's too bad. I currently am liking Fade In with the great photos.

I used to subscribe to it years ago, but the Internet has long since made it obsolete.

Ironically, I just got my offer in the mail to renew my subscription.

Basically, it's TV Guide and EW. Even Rolling Stone got the message and has moved towards more political and social commentary.

Ugh. I hate that tabloids are ruining the print industry, especially since you'd think: Why do magazines like Premiere go out of business and tabloids sell, when the tabloids are the kind of garbage you'd want/need to have as up-to-the-minute as possible, while there's nothing covered in Premiere that needs to be so immediate?

My subscription just ended in February and I didn't renew. I killed them!

Seriously, while I liked a lot of the articles, it seemed like the magazine didn't evolve with the times - it felt like the same magazine in 2007 that it was in 1997 and 1987. And as most have noted, the Internet made it redundant; Entertainment Weekly also does an excellent job covering movies and everything else and that filled my magazine needs nicely...

Dang. Just a few days ago, I started to appreciate Premiere Magazine. It's dedicated soley to movies while EW is cluttered with stuff I hardly care about. Sure, we've got the more geeky movie mags, but Premiere always seemed to be easily in reach.

Damn, I really enjoyed it :(

I'm saddned and outraged. I've been buying Premiere monthly for 16 years and I have many issues older than that. I've learned more from Premiere about the movie biz then anything else. Premiere besides Entertainment Weekly (which I love) has always had a special relationship with the film community. What with Actor's, actresses, director's producers. Sure it's made it's enemies too over the years (Arnold Schwarzenegger in which Premiere ran a story about His alleged sexual harrasment of female crew members on his films and use of drugs.) but I'm sure many are saddned by this. It's a big loss to me.

And this summer would have marked it's 20th anniversary too.

I just don't know.

I think this makes about 4-5 magazines I've subscribed to, gotten about 3 issues of, and then find out they're goners.

They typically make promises of refunds or switching you over to another magazine that never come true. :(

I'm with you JasonTHX. Sad. It was one of my favorite magazines, by far. Part of my fascination with film is because of it.

:rip: Premiere :(

Wow, been a subscriber to Premiere since maybe 1992, and it was definitely the best movie-only mag out there. Too bad. I was also a subcriber to Movieline until 4 or five years ago. Are they still around? Looks like EW will be one of my last surviving magazine subcriptions (17 years with them).

Movieline changed formats to be more of a fashion mag, and I canceled my subscription. But I think it's still around.

One of the few good movie magazines. :(

Same here.

So, can anyone recommend a good replacement aside from EW?

I recently ordered this as part of a Publisher's Clearinghouse entry. I've yet to receive my 1st issue. I believe it was 10/12 issues for $6.

It is still around and, unfortunately, I still have a subscription somehow. I flip through it, read a blurb here and there, then never look at it again. Aside from the fact it's become more about fashion and gossip, it's months behind the times when it arrives. They discuss movies that are coming out that have either already come out or had their release dates changed. And the photos are of events from months ago.

I liked Premiere. Didn't subscribe, but it was one I'd always pick up whenever I was at a Borders.

I used to like Total Movie Magazine (I think that's what it was called) but that went under on two different occasions, too.

I don't know about Total Movie Magazine, but there is a Total Film magazine. It's my next favorite to Premiere, and in all honesty an amazing magazine. It's UK based though, so a US subscription costs an arm, a leg, and probably a part of your neck. :(

EW is even...losing focus. I see more and more articles dedicated to rumors and gossip and crap and that annoys the hell out of me. I think EW should cut it out...the implication seems to be that it's important to the future of the magazine, but I kind of think EW has enough loyal subscribers that it's not going to go under if they don't cave to the whims of whoever it is that actually cares about celebrity gossip.

:shrug: I stopped reading <i>Premiere</i> almost 20 years ago, as soon as I discovered <i>Film Comment</i>.

Thank you...I completely agree...The latest issue features That damn Jennifer Hudson on the cover....What has she done....Co-starred in one movie and lost on a reality TV show???
This is very depressing news about Premiere magazine though...That was the only good film magazine in the U.S. that doesnt feature gossip and features articles and information about interesting film and features insightful writing on interesting people in the film industry...
This really sucks cause i just remewed my subscription and gave out 2 gift subscriptions to family for xmas gifts...

Yeah, I've seen that one, too. I think I've bought a few issues. About $6, if I remember correctly. But the one I'm thinking of was a different mag. It was supposed to be the guy's entertainment magazine. And it was pretty good. But they pulled it once to revamp it and it's return was short-lived.

I'm not so much liking the new layout myself. I mean, there are parts I enjoy, like the Spotlight section. But other features I can do without. Even longstanding ones such as The Hit List. Most of these writers aren't as funny or clever as they seem to think they are.

And I know it's "Entertainment" Weekly, but they've really started to concentrate on music more and more. I have nothing against music, but I started subscribing because of the coverage of films. If you're big on music, I'm sure you probably like their increased coverage. And I'm sure it's wise on their part to expand their horizons a bit so they don't end up like Premiere. But it's not my preference.

It's hit and miss for me. Which is okay, since it's weekly. The thing that bothers me most is their recurrent cover stories on the same shows (like Lost). It'd be nice if they put their money where their mouths are more often, and give some good, but underrated shows the cover every once in a while.

Ahh...bringing up Total Movie magazine. There were some classic threads back in the day dealing with this mag, which started out with a bang, folded 5 months later, came back with DVD's that didn't play, and folded again after 3 months.

Say what you want about the mag, but I for one loved the DVD's. They were usually loaded with movie trailers of upcoming films on their way to the theatre or DVD. In this day and age where hardly any movie comes with their trailer anymore, I would have loved the discs even more.

I was reading EMPIRE (from the UK) for a couple years. A lot of fan boy coverage (SW, LOTR, etc) but it was still a great read with honest interviews and in depth film reviews. Sadly since Tower Records went over i've yet to find a bookstore that imports the mag, and subscriptions cost $100+ a year.

EW can either bore me to death or be full of interesting articles. Thankfully it's a weekly mag.

Maxim publisher's started one a few years back called something like Maxim At The Movies. I remember seeing the first and maybe the second issue but nothing after that. It was a quarterly. Don't know if it's still out as I don't go into bookstores much anymore these days.