Say goodbye to Hollywood

Movin' on is a chance that you have to take/Any time you try to stay together/Say a word out of line/And you find that the friends you had/Are gone forever, forever." So sang Billy Joel in his '70s ballad "Say Goodbye to Hollywood," a song one editor at The Advocate put on repeat play on his iPod in the magazine's offices in late September.

That was the day The Advocate said goodbye to Hollywood. Just before this issue went into production the magazine left its home of nearly two decades, on Hollywood Boulevard across from Grauman's Chinese Theatre, for sleek new offices in a tower on Wilshire Boulevard--suspended 15 stories above ground somewhere between Beverly Hills and Miracle Mile.

If walls could talk, indeed: Many editors and contributors and even owners came and went from those Hollywood offices, including the legendary, late Richard Rouilard and the magazine's first woman editor in chief, Judy Wieder. The magazine weathered much of the AIDS crisis there, losing many friends and staffers, and it battled that upstart glossy Out magazine through most of the '90s, going glossy itself in 1992. Then in early 2000, The Advocate's owners bought Out and moved some of its staff into those Hollywood offices. And it was there that both magazines joined the PlanetOut family last November.

We're tempted to invent some allegorical significance for The Advocate's separation from Hollywood, its new beginning in its most upscale home to date. But no. We'll leave that to you, our readers, to judge for yourselves over the coming years.

One thing we're leaving" behind us with this issue is our editor in chief, Bruce C. Steele. After nearly four years at the helm and almost eight with the magazine, Bruce is signing off and heading for new challenges. It's hard to put into words how much we'll miss him. But our movement is immeasurably richer for Bruce's cool head and fierce heart. And we know he's just getting started.

It was Bruce, in fact, playing that Billy Joel song for the staff on moving day, knowing the lyrics applied in more than one way to the time at hand: "So many faces in and out of my life/Some will last/Some will be just now and then/Life is a series of hellos and goodbyes/I'm afraid it's time for goodbye again."

COPYRIGHT 2006 Liberation Publications, Inc.
COPYRIGHT 2007 Gale Group