E. G. Foutz

Going Once, Going Twice

The esteemed Hollywood filmmaker Allen Apollo Jakobsen died from a heart attack on a blue April morning. He was hardly fifty-nine. The obituary printed in The Atlantic highlighted his record for the highest harvest of Oscars and Golden Globes any director had ever made. The Huffington Post editorialized how Jakobsen had changed the face of cinema more than any other individual in the modern century. Vogue regaled the legend of a troubled Jewish kid who ran away from home to chase the stars. The New York Times’ obituary was not really an obituary at all, but a lukewarm applause, followed by the much more lucrative headline: Hollywood Legend’s Death Surfaces Over $15 Million in Gambling Debts.