#Universal Studios Hollywood 2024

[treasurechestmemories]

Universal Studios Hollywood Day 3 Part 2

[jackchampioncumpit]

Zackary Arthur attends the Opening Night of Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios Hollywood on September 05, 2024 in Universal City, California. 

[oakydeer]

First sketches of the season! I, for one, welcome our new skeletal overlords. 💀👑

[icelynodette]

Super Nintendo World 2024 Part 1

[msclaritea]

Shelving Movies for Fun and Profit

Destroying Movies for Fun and Profit

If you ask any director, screenwriter, actor, stunt performer, gaffer, editor, cameraperson or other Hollywood worker, they’ll likely tell you a variation on the same story: “My dream, ever since I was a little kid making home movies, was to one day grant Warner Bros. a deduction for a loss sustained upon the abandonment of property (reported on Form 4797).” Yes, little is more exciting for an aspiring filmmaker than the idea that—with a lot of dedication and a pinch of luck—their years of driving Lyfts and waiting tables could pay off, resulting in a star-studded line item that will be shelved forever so that a major studio can claim a tax write-off. Ah, the magic of the movies!

This practice is back in the news because the powers that be at WB have gone back to their original decision regarding the hybrid live-action/animated Looney Tunes movie Coyote vs. Acme. Despite the film testing well and generating plenty of buyer interest, a team of execs who haven’t seen the finished movie look like they’re going to “unceremoniously delete it” for tax purposes. Sorry, filmmakers, but apparently it actually looks better to stockholders if WB doesn’t actually put movies out. “Hollywood accounting” has its reputation for a reason, but it’s never been so obviously broken.

It might seem like Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav is a true innovator of idiocy, but the man behind the permanent shelving of movies like Batgirl and Scoob! Holiday Haunt is just ramping up a long tradition of burning art to save a quick buck.

After buying up DreamWorks, Universal decided to bury the musical-comedy Larrikins instead of selling it to Netflix. Universal president Jimmy Horowitz told Tim Minchin that “It’s schmuck insurance – if someone made a lot of money out of it, we’ll look like schmucks.” That mindset certainly applies here: Coyote vs. Acme is a creation from an earlier group of WB leaders, and would naturally be on the chopping block from a spiteful new C-suite who also happens to hate movies.

Even more relevant is a case from almost 100 years ago: Charlie Chaplin literally torched the film negatives of A Woman of the Sea back in 1933, in front of multiple witnesses, so that he could claim the movie as a loss for tax purposes.

The tax code may have changed since then, but the logic remains the same: Get rid of the movie so you can avoid all the final complications and lingering expenses associated with its “useful life.” If you cut that life short, pulling off an accounting assassination, you save a little immediate cash at the low, low cost of…art. It’s always been a crass practice, more often performed by resentful new regimes or moneygrubbers who’ve found themselves attracting the gaze of Sauron’s IRS. But now shelving movies, completed films that other companies want, is picking up steam as standard practice. Actually making things is such an outdated, small-time business model. It’s far more lucrative to remove things other people made.

For example, if Disney keeps all of its movies and TV shows on Disney+, it has to pay residuals to the people who made them. They’ve also spread out the costs of a movie like Crater (which was available to watch for a mere seven weeks during the summer of 2023) over the years that the movie will ostensibly be available to the public and, therefore, creating value for Disney. Remove these movies and shows from the streamer, or better yet, remove them permanently (like Disney did with Crater), and their value can be added to an impairment charge—basically, a claim to the tax man that something a company owns has become, suddenly, worthless.

Disney recorded a $1.5 billion impairment charge last year. As Julia Rock points out, this means that Disney is claiming something pretty odd: Both “that the assets were producing so little value that it’s cheaper to destroy them than to keep them and that the assets were worth $1.5 billion.” Huh. There’s no push for anyone to justify this contradiction. The IRS isn’t asking questions. It doesn’t matter if a movie is good, or bad, or somewhere in between. It doesn’t matter if it had the potential to one day be rediscovered as a cult classic. It certainly doesn’t matter that even the worst pieces of Z-grade trash are still worth preserving as cultural artifacts. As an aside, the HBO Original Fahrenheit 451 is still streaming on Max.

And sure, you can say that you didn’t want to watch those movies anyways. Kid movies! Superheroes! Cartoons, yuck. I get it, you’re tough and cool. But one day, this will happen to something that you were looking forward to. It will happen to something that would have moved you. Something you’d have remembered fondly, something that would’ve turned your day around. But even if you’re the most jaded, anti-art, movie-hating curmudgeon, you should remember that, released or not, you’re helping pay for this scheme anyways.

“When intertwined with public funding through state and federal tax incentives, the practice of movie and television write-downs represents a troubling exploitation of taxpayer funds,” writes tax attorney Andrew Leahey. “Coupled with rapidly expanding state tax incentives, it represents a multibillion-dollar Rube Goldberg machine that culminates in a nickel being pulled from your pocket, strapped to an Acme rocket, and fired directly into the bank accounts of movie studios.”

Every loophole taken by these studios doesn’t just rob us of art. It burns the work of countless artists. It steals from our quality of life by monkeying around with our broken tax system, allowing our most powerful corporations to skip out on their bills. It picks the remaining shreds of flesh off the bones of our culture, all to further fatten a few vultures at the top.

Politicians like Texas Representative Joaquin Castro are calling for the government to “review this conduct,” but the only people who seem to have the power here are those actually creating the movies. They can boycott the guilty studios, and we can support them, but there are so few left that aren’t exploiting this practice to its most predatory extremes. Cooking the books has always been a Hollywood practice. Burning them is new.

Jacob Oller is Movies Editor at Paste Magazine. You can follow him on Twitter at @jacoboller.

For all the latest movie news, reviews, lists and features, follow @PasteMovies.

It's too bad that this Paste article was written by a Leftist, who let their biases show, ie pushing Castro, and the 'Sauron's IRS'. But otherwise, it is spot on. What the studios are doing to Intellectual Properties is a SIN. It's cruel, it's greedy and so fucking unnecessary. Just how much money do these studios and their shareholders, NEED? I better not find out that the Supernatural Planet Series was destroyed.

[henrykathman]

The Miraculous Horror of Stop Motion

From the same artform that brought you Coraline and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, comes three stories that evoke the existential fear of art.

Original Music by Molly Noise

Bibliography below

Atrocity Guide. “The Animators Who’ve Spent 40 Years on a Single Film.” YouTube, 9 Oct. 2021, www.youtube.com/watch?v=73hip3pz0Xs&pp=ygUMdGhlIG92ZXJjb2F0. Accessed 19 June 2024.

Brubaker, Charles. “The Japanese Studios of Rankin/Bass.” Cartoon Research, Jerry Beck, 14 Apr. 2014, cartoonresearch.com/index.php/the-japanese-studios-of-rankinbass/.

Bute, Paris. “Introduction to “a Rankin/Bass Retrospective from a New Perspective.”” Citizen Jane, Stephens College, 19 Nov. 2021, www.citizenjane.org/home/cwwicd2ucb2fvs64kgfaocfykjhaum. Accessed 19 June 2024.

Crome, Althea. “Coraline.” Althea Crome | Micro Knitter, 2012, www.altheacrome.com/coraline. Accessed 19 June 2024.

Harold Halibut. Directed by Onat Hekimoğlu, Slow Bros., 16 Apr. 2024.

Hekimoglu, Onat, and Gabriel Schmitz. “Unite Berlin 2018 - Harold Halibut and Making a Stop Motion Game.” Unity, YouTube, 6 Aug. 2018, youtu.be/9usssSQc0wQ. Accessed 6 May 2023.

Jon "Sikamikanico" Clarke. “The Making of Harold Halibut.” XboxEra, YouTube, 21 Mar. 2024, youtu.be/WMyxM9t3o7A. Accessed 19 June 2024.

LAIKA Studios. “Sweater and Gloves: Knitting Coraline by Hand.” YouTube, 11 July 2017, youtu.be/zUvkfcGR-7U. Accessed 19 June 2024.

Mad God Productions. “Phil Tippett’s “Mad God.”” Kickstarter, 17 May 2012, www.kickstarter.com/projects/madgod/phil-tippetts-mad-god/posts.

Olson, Mathew. “Report: Michel Ancel Accused of Abusive, Disruptive Practices on beyond Good & Evil 2.” VG247, 25 Sept. 2020, www.vg247.com/report-michel-ancel-accused-of-abusive-disruptive-practices-on-beyond-good-evil-2. Accessed 19 June 2024.

Ono, Kosei. “Tadahito Mochinaga: The Japanese Animator Who Lived in Two Worlds.” Animation World Network, AWN, Inc, 1 Dec. 1999, www.awn.com/animationworld/tadahito-mochinaga-japanese-animator-who-lived-two-worlds.

Orland, Kyle. “Claptrap Voice Actor Accuses Gearbox CEO of Assault, Underpayment.” Ars Technica, 7 May 2019, arstechnica.com/gaming/2019/05/claptrap-voice-actor-accuses-gearbox-ceo-of-assault-underpayment/. Accessed 19 June 2024.

Pilling, Jayne. A Reader In Animation Studies. Indiana University Press, 1998. Project MUSE muse.jhu.edu/book/40033.

Prehistoric Beast. Directed by Phil Tippett, Tippett Studios, 1984. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlaXIRTjNfo

Randles, Jonathan. “VFX Studio with Star Wars, Jurassic Park Credits Goes Bankrupt.” Bloomberg Law, 1 May 2024, news.bloomberglaw.com/bankruptcy-law/vfx-studio-with-star-wars-jurassic-park-credits-goes-bankrupt. Accessed 19 June 2024.

Shanley, Patrick. “Gearbox Software CEO Accused of Contempt in Latest Filing.” The Hollywood Reporter, 27 Aug. 2019, www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/digital/gearbox-software-ceo-accused-contempt-latest-filing-1235064/. Accessed 19 June 2024.

The Making of “Jurassic Park.” Directed by John Schultz, Amblin Entertainment, 1995. https://youtu.be/8r01mk6F_Pk

The Making of Mad God. Directed by Maya Tippett, Shudder, 2021. https://youtu.be/sfUOHh0xmwc

The Tale of the Fox. Directed by Irene Starewicz and Ladislas Starevich, UFA GmbH, 10 Apr. 1941. https://youtu.be/Us_Pn6Q1dBQ

Wikipedia contributors. "List of films with longest production time." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 12 Jun. 2024. Web. 19 Jun. 2024.

Wikipedia contributors. "List of media notable for being in development hell." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 19 Jun. 2024. Web. 19 Jun. 2024.

Wikipedia contributors. "List of Rankin/Bass Productions films." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 9 Jun. 2024. Web. 19 Jun. 2024.

Wikipedia contributors. "Tadahito Mochinaga." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 28 Nov. 2023. Web. 19 Jun. 2024.

Wilson, Josh. “Phil Tippett: 24 Frames per Second < the Fabulist Words & Art.” The Fabulist Words & Art, 5 Nov. 2021, fabulistmagazine.com/24-frames-per-second-the-phil-tippett-interview/.

Worse than the Demon. Directed by Maya Tippett, Shudder, 2013. https://youtu.be/ghKqvDNRe4c

[jbaileyfansite]

Interview with Entertainment Tonight (2024)

Welcome to Jurassic Park, Jonathan Bailey. 

On Monday, the 36-year-old actor talked with ET from the season 3 premiere of Bridgerton in New Yorkand confirmed that he will soon be heading up Jurassic World 4, the latest installment in the beloved franchise which celebrated its 30th anniversary just last year. 

"I will be visiting Jurassic Park," Bailey shared exclusively with ET, jokingly adding, "I'm playing a dinosaur."

For the Fellow Travelers star, the new gig -- which comes from the mind of the original Jurassic Park writer David Koepp and Rogue One director Gareth Edwards -- is a full-circle moment as he shares that one of his earliest memories includes seeing the Steven Spielberg hit on the big screen when he was a kid. 

"I remember going with my family," he said. "It was the first cinema trip we all went on together. I've got three older sisters so I went when I was like 5."

As for plot details and confirmation on his cast members -- rumored to include Scarlett Johansson and The Lincoln Lawyer star Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, according to Deadline -- the actor kept tight-lipped, but shared that he is feeling ready to take up the mantle and carry on the cinematic legacy left by the previous cast.

"I am really excited," Bailey continued. "For so many of us, I know it's just like an iconic cinematic experience."

The confirmation comes just one day after he teased his involvement in the new project with a cheeky post on Instagram, complete with a photo of him on the Jurassic World water ride at Universal Studios Hollywood.

In the photo, Bailey is seen throwing up peace signs and wearing sunglasses during a visit to the theme park from over a month ago as the photo is timestamped on April 9. He also included a video of a glass of water on a table shaking, a reference to scenes from the original film.

"Hold onto your butts. 🦕," the actor wrote in the caption. 

The last film in the franchise, Jurassic World: Dominion, debuted in June 2022 and starred Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard and DeWanda Wise, as well as the original Jurassic Park crew including Laura Dern, Sam Neill and Bailey's Wicked co-star, Jeff Goldblum. Deadline reports that none of the reboot actors are expected to return for the fourth installment in the franchise. 

Bailey is having a hot year after the release of Fellow Travelers -- which scored him a Critics Choice Award for Best Supporting Actor in a Miniseries -- his casting in Netflix's Heartstopper, the forthcoming release of Bridgerton season 3 and his starring role as Fiyero in Wicked alongside Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo. 

He stayed similarly quiet on the film adaptation of the Broadway hit, which releases in theaters on Nov. 27, joking with ET that he shows anyone who asks the final cut, including his on-screen family members and friends in Bridgerton. 

"Yeah, I show everyone the whole film," he quipped. "I don't -- I haven't seen it." 

Source

[mariacallous]

Hollywood has an inclusivity problem. How is this possible, in 2024, you wonder, when films like King Richard or Sound of Metal or Everything Everywhere All at Once—all nominated for Best Picture Oscars—suggest otherwise. They are films rich in story, dimension, and purpose. They are also exceptions to a long-established rule: White men still run Hollywood. Women remain almost entirely shut out, compared to their male colleagues, while disabled and Black actors are underrepresented in all major employment arenas for theatrical film, according to UCLA’s most recent Hollywood diversity report.

In the face of this, Kamala Avila-Salmon wants better for Hollywood and its storytellers. Avila-Salmon is the head of inclusive content at Lionsgate Motion Picture Group, where she began her stint in 2020 and has since leveraged her experience as a marketing savant (she has held top-level roles at RCA, Universal Pictures, Google, and Facebook) to shift how the studio makes movies. At Lionsgate, her main directive is simple: to create a creative economy that allows for more attentive storytelling. Stories of magnitude and conviction, yes, but also ones with as much reach as possible. It begins, she tells me, by having an “audience-first” mindset.

This month she launched Story Spark, an online tool that helps creatives understand the limits of their scripts and hiring choices by pushing for inclusivity in all aspects (it resembles a BuzzFeed-style multiple-choice questionnaire). As AI threatens a shrinking workforce and streaming upends traditional viewership, Avila-Salmon believes Story Spark can be a bridge to a healthier future for Hollywood. “Story Spark isn’t telling you if the movie is good,” she jokes when we chat over Zoom. “I have no idea.” You don’t upload a script. There is no secret counsel of industry insiders judging your work behind the scenes. Story Spark is simply meant to challenge writers and filmmakers to create their most audacious work possible. And, yes, there will be plenty of notes.

[suchspiritedwords]

60th Anniversary Studio Tour

Universal Studios Hollywood | April 18 2024

[freelanceexorcist]

I just can’t believe this.

From Variety, 4/1/2024:

Tom Cruise Cast As Sephiroth in Live Action Final Fantasy VII

Hollywood, CA - Tom Cruise has been cast to play the iconic antagonist Sephiroth in the upcoming live action movie based on the popular video game franchise. The announcement was made at a joint press conference held by executives from Universal Studios and Square Enix.

Filming is scheduled to begin in June of 2024 at multiple locations.

Cruise’s representatives declined to comment when asked how the actor could realistically pull off playing a character that was a foot taller than him and half his age, mumbling something about Jack Reacher as they left the meeting.

Source

[treasurechestmemories]

Universal Studios Hollywood 2024 Part 2

[jackchampioncumpit]

Mason Thames attends the Opening Night of Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios Hollywood on September 05, 2024 in Universal City, California.

[oakydeer]

ALL REVVED UP AND READY TO GO!!!

[msclaritea]

These award shows are dead. The same faces, with just a few new members of the Hollywood Gay Mafia thrown in for flavor. But it's just more of the same people. Bradley Cooper, AGAIN. Carey Mulligan, AGAIN. Emma Stone, AGAIN. Emily Blunt AGAIN. Mart Damon, AGAIN. These greedy fuckers all shut down mid-budget films, just to increase the chances for their own people. Any black people included, they're likely Gay, because big bad white men are afraid of black men who aren't. I'm so sick of this.

[blurban-form]

This is a summary of the article that appeared in Bloomberg BusinessWeek, April 3, 2024. I summarized it a fair bit to focus on what was interesting to me in the article. That said, this is still a long read.

Watch out, a couple of swear words in here.

Bluey may be acquired by Disney which would help Disney: 20% of all TV views on the streaming service Disney+ are “Bluey”. In the fourth quarter of 2023 (excluding movies). Americans watched 731 million hours of “Bluey”.

Brumm accepts an award for best children’s program from the Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts in 2019.Photographer: Brendon Thorne/AFI/Getty Images

Joe Brumm is 46, likes sports and surfing, and is brash and unpolished; he seems a little like James Dean in that he’s talented but uncomfortable with fame and having to follow Hollywood conventions and rules… It was noted that Joe Brumm had public relations minders/handlers with him from Disney and the BBC to watch what he said when he was interviewed.

Brumm’s influences include Simpsons, South Park, Peanuts, and Calvin and Hobbes. “Peanuts just meant so much to me growing up” said Brumm. He studied animation in the 2000s at the University of Brisbane and worked in London for the BBC before returning to Australia in 2010 to start Ludo animation.

He came up with Bluey himself, and it was a hard sell initially that the show would be targeting adults and children. He used a lot of his own experiences with his kids to come up with story ideas.

For a while there was the idea of making the show something like an R-rated version of “Peppa Pig”, but that idea was dropped because there was already a similar adult Australian sitcom about raising kids being piloted.

The Australian Broadcasting Company liked the concept of “Bluey” and provided Brumm with A$20,000 ($13,000 US) to create a pilot, which became “The Weekend” episode of Season 1, which was screened at the Asian Animation Summit in November 2016.

Bluey is created at Ludo’s headquarters in Brisbane rather than contracting out the animation overseas, which allows Brumm to continue to tweak episodes up until the last minute. If there’s something he doesn’t like them. He also uses local vocal talent.

The ABC and BBC put up A$6 million to complete the first season of “Bluey”. The BBC made it possible to do this, providing the lion’s share of funding in exchange for distribution and merchandising rights. Australia didn’t have the resources to make the show happen otherwise.

Brumm was very angry when an early critique of Bluey in 2018 said the show made fun of stay-at-home dads; Blumm said he thought to himself “go fuck yourself”.

Within seven months, Bluey was the most watched series ever on the ABC streaming service with 75 million plays of episodes, which led to the BBC commissioning a second season of the show.

Ludo was able to retain control the show, and Brumm was entitled to a share of the revenue.

By 2019, networks in the US were interested in Bluey: Nickelodeon wanted “Bluey”, but they were worried about the name, because it was too close to “Blue’s Clues”. Other networks wanted to change the accents of the characters, and this was a dealbreaker for Ludo and Brumm.

This created an opening for Jane Gould, who was at the time the executive vice president of research and scheduling at Disney’s general entertainment division, who had a comfort level with Bluey because she hailed from Brisbane, and she understood the desire of Brumm and Ludo to keep the show Australian. She didn’t think this was a problem, and she borrowed two episodes to test screen in the US; the kids and parents didn’t have a problem with the Australian aspects of the show. Disney acquired the rights from BBC Studios to air Bluey everywhere except Australia, New Zealand and China.

“Bluey” didn’t get the same marketing push as shows like “The Mandalorian” when Disney+ began broadcasting "Bluey" in June 2020, but soon begin to dominate viewership numbers, in part due to the COVID-19 pandemic. (There was a lot of families spending time watching television and they watched a lot of Bluey.)

The ABC didn’t have a problem with the off-colour humour in “Bluey”, like the use of the word “poo”, and seeing a pony poop in “Markets” and this had to be edited out. Brumm said he hated making these edits... Disney defended these edits saying they were trying to be respectful of different cultural sensitivities, and it’s noted that Disney has since released the uncensored versions of the episodes.

Brumm likes to control his creation. He was upset with some of the early prototypes of Bluey toys because Bandit didn’t look right, he looked like a fridge. He was also concerned that at the beginning that there was too much of a focus on Bluey herself and there weren’t enough toys of all the characters. This concern turned out to be accurate; people wanted toys of all of the characters in the show.

Brumm originally was not sure he wanted to do a second season of “Bluey”, fearing it might not be as good as the first. Brumm doesn’t want to repeat himself in terms of episodes. He wants to make sure that each season is better than the previous one. He was also worried that Bluey would have to stop when Brisbane shut down during the COVID-19 pandemic, but the show continued, with staff working from home.

The “Rain” episode was dialogue-free because Brumm wanted to take a break from writing dialogue at the time.

In Australia, the public and the media have publicly questioned why the ABC didn’t try harder to retain control of the profits from "Bluey" merchandise sales. There was an article in the “Australian Financial Review” that lamented that the ABC had let a gold mine slip through its fingers. It was thought that this decision was shortsighted, but the ABC responded saying they made the best deal at the time that they could. Disney has also been said to have made an error in passing on theme park rights and allowing BBC Studios to retain those rights; people go to Disney parks and ask why they can’t see Bluey there.

Disney isn’t releasing details on whether it’s explored buying “Bluey”, but Ludo says Bluey isn’t for sale, but this could change.

It is noted that there hasn’t been a clear announcement of a fourth season. Brumm has stated previously there will be a hiatus and he’s concerned about the children’s voices changing. His preference not to have to replace the voice actors, and he knows he can’t continue to draw upon his own kids experiences because they’ve grown up.

During the interview, Brumm’s handlers interjected and couldn’t said he couldn’t discuss the final episode.

Speaking anonymously, someone familiar with Disney’s “Bluey” dealings said that Brumm is trying to decide whether he’s comfortable letting other people write for the show, which would make it easier to continue to create episodes, and possibly smooth the way for a Disney acquisition in the future, as Disney would be reluctant to spend billions on a show with only three seasons of episodes.

Brumm said over email that he’s already collaborated on writing some additional episodes and ultimately it isn’t his decision who writes Bluey as he doesn’t own the show.

He thinks the final episode is magical and it sums up everything Bluey has tried to do in the last few years.

[hooked-on-elvis]

Elvis in Fort Worth, Texas, on January 11, 1958

Incredible footage colorization/restoration by 𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐅𝐈𝐘𝐎𝐔 𝐌𝐎𝐕𝐈𝐄𝐒 on Youtube.

I swear I felt I was watching a modern times interview, like our own time's artists. The original B&W footage is awesome by itself but this restoration is such a fantastic job I just had to share with you right after watching for the first time myself, since the video had been recently updated to Youtube (today, March 7, 2024, actually). I have to add that all that channel's content is fabulous. ♥

I'll share the original footage again, just in case you'd like to watch in B&W and without the music on the background:

Footage uploaded on Youtube channel "Elvis Presley News" | Original source: UNT (University of Texas) Digital Library. On their website: "Creation Information: Bookmark this section WBAP-TV (Television station : Fort Worth, Texas) January 11, 1958. This video is part of the collection entitled: KXAS-NBC 5 News Collection and was provided by the UNT Libraries Special Collections to the UNT Digital Library, a digital repository hosted by the UNT Libraries."

FOOTAGE INFO:

Elvis was at stopover in Fort Worth, Texas, on his way to Hollywood studios in Los Angeles, to begin filming 'King Creole'. On December 1957 Presley received his draft note from the Army. It's said he cut his sideburns shorter to look different for playing his character in King Creole tho, not because of the army.

In the interview above, there's a moment Elvis is asked about if he was worried cutting his famous sideburns off. He said "If it was a situation they'd cut them off and I never could have them anymore then I would worry about 'em, but I can grow it back."