From KCRW in Santa Monica and KCRW.com, I'm Kim Masters, and this is the business.

You listen, if you listen and learn, then you're going to be able to do anything you want next time.

Everybody takes his business, really, really, all right life.

He doesn't clean, please.

What's with him?

Oh, I'm afraid he's gone Hollywood.

This week on the business, the ups, the downs, the all-around.

It's the Hollywood year that was, with Cynthia Littleton of Variety and John Horn

of the Los Angeles Times. Stay close. It's the business from KCRW.

They say that 2009 was the year that working in Hollywood stopped being fun.

That may be a bit of an overstatement, but it's true that changes in technology and the way people are entertaining themselves have put the business into a bit of a tailspin,

with an added kick in that tail from the global recession. Today, we'll talk about the good, the bad, and the stuff

that no one's sure about yet on the Hollywood year that was. Call it mega banter with John Horn in the

Los Angeles Times and special guest banterer Cynthia Littleton, the deputy editor of Variety.

I think we can all agree that this was the darkest year, certainly for me covering this

business, the darkest year I've seen in the industry since I started in 19.

I would agree.

But I think there was a little light at the end of the tunnel toward November and December as the box office numbers went up.

But yeah, I think it was a difficult year all around.

What about you, Cynthia?

It was, I think what you had was a year where showbiz was not as recession proof as it has been in the past.

And even with the box office numbers going up, you saw media companies, you saw their

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