John Penner has been writing and editing for the L.A. Times for three decades. A graduate of Cal State Long Beach, he also attended USC’s Graduate School of Film and Television and studied playwriting in Edward Albee’s master class at the University of Houston. He has lived and worked as a freelance journalist in Prague, after Czechoslovakia’s Velvet Revolution and coinciding with the election that resulted in the country splitting in two. Nowadays he is a copy editor on the Foreign and National Desk who writes occasionally about film, literature and theater. In 2021, he won the L.A. Press Club National Arts & Entertainment Journalism Award for Online Personality Profile, TV/Film Personalities, for his article “Milos Forman, Ivan Passer and their 73-Year Friendship.”
Latest From This Author
Why would someone journey across the country to watch a total eclipse? Because it’s more than just an astronomical rarity: It may be the best show in the universe.
April 6, 2024
Colorado River in Crisis is a series of stories, videos and podcasts in which Los Angeles Times journalists travel throughout the river’s watershed, from the headwaters in the Rocky Mountains to the river’s dry delta in Mexico.
April 14, 2023
How many films? Maybe 70? A cinephile’s obsession with the French master leads to a years-long hunt for VHS and DVDs, followed by the ultimate binge.
Sept. 15, 2022
Alvin recalls his long friendship with Gerald Locklin and the night in the 1970s the Long Beach State professor-poet let him teach class.
June 29, 2021
Gerald Locklin, who died of COVID-19 this year, was a poet-professor who helped shape West Coast literature and turn Long Beach into a poetry hub. A Times staff writer who was his student and others reflect on his influence.
June 29, 2021
Admired by Charles Bukowski and legions of Cal State Long Beach students
Feb. 26, 2021
Over half a century in two countries, with vastly different cultures and filmmaking languages, Passer directed a steady series of much-admired and often underappreciated films of economy, fidelity, humor and subtle beauty, among them “Intimate Lighting,” “Cutter’s Way,” “Stalin,” “Haunted Summer” and “Born to Win.”
Jan. 10, 2020
The great filmmaker Milos Forman never spoke about his defection. In fact, he never called it a defection.
Dec. 13, 2019
Czechoslovakia owes its unfortunate history to its lot as a main stage for the great conflicts of the 20th century.
Dec. 13, 2019
The friendship between Czech New Wave pioneers Milos Forman and Ivan Passer was crucial in the life of the man who directed ‘Amadeus’ and ‘One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.’
Dec. 13, 2019