Chris Lee and the Art of Dysfunction

Chris Lee, a senior entertainment reporter for New York Magazine, has mastered the art of dysfunction. “If you can write about that you can pay your mortgage forever,” Lee said.

His dysfunction radar has been fine-tuned after years on the entertainment beat. As a former hip hop beat reporter, he profiled Drake twice (but later joined #TeamKendrick). Marvel hatessss his guts after he exposed their alleged mistreatment of VFX workers. He has received many cease and desist letters from Hollywood lawyer Marty Singer, including when he uncovered the mess behind the scenes of ‘Don’t Worry Darling’. Lee even interviewed Daft Punk without their helmets....

Lee has reported on the craziness of both the music and entertainment industry as a staff writer at Entertainment Weekly, The Los Angeles Times and The Daily Beast. He has also been published at other outlets like Vanity Fair, The Hollywood Reporter and The New York Times.

“There are two groups [of people] in the industry: ‘dreamers’ and ‘businesspeople’” which is an inevitable collision course for disaster, Lee said, but also a sweet spot. “I didn't create the discontent; I'm just reporting it.”

His typical sources are movie executives, agents, managers, publicists – the people you don’t hear about. Over time, Lee has nurtured his relationships with them. Most sources approach him off the record to protect the sensitive nature of their tips.

Lee knows his negative stories do better traffic. “The objective is to get people to read it,” he said. “But you have to have integrity ... you’re not going to last if you don’t.”