Former editor of The New York Times Magazine Hugo Lindgren will spend the next three months editing The Hollywood Reporter.
The news, which was first announced in a tweet by the recently promoted editorial director, Janice Min, was dutifully reported by The New York Times this afternoon.
Mr. Lindgren spent three years as the editor of the Times Magazine before announcing that he was leaving in November. His departure prompted Executive Editor Jill Abramson to rethink the Times‘ approach to its Sunday magazine section.
The New York Times reporting on its former magazine editor’s new three-month-long job editing a magazine has the potential to be quite awkward.
But in reality, it only sounds moderately to rather awkward:
Reached by telephone, Mr. Lindgren said he was already in Los Angeles but would not begin officially until the end of January. He said his plan for now was just to “help Janice out in any way that I can.” He also would not speculate on whether this could turn into a full-time job. There were no plans for him to stay for more than the three months, he said.
It’s not at all surprising that, in a phone call with his old colleague for a story at the paper that until recently was his employer, Mr. Lindgren declined to speculate about whether his interim job could get extended.
But Mr. Lindgren was much more talkative when his new employer asked him for quotes for an internal memo about his hire, which The Hollywood Reporter posted in its story about the hire:
Though the words “New York” appear frequently in the titles of the publications where he has served, don’t worry. He knows his way around Hollywood. In his own words, “My claim to fame in Hollywood is that my name was once mentioned in an episode of Friends. My favorite movie changes all the time. Right now, I’d probably have to say Frozen. Like everybody, I binge-watch television, most recently the excellent French crime show Spiral.”
