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His knees are bad, he’s paunchy and puffy, and the former celebrity hairdresser has gray roots at least 2 inches long. At 79, Jon Peters no longer is the bad-boy seducer of women from Barbra Streisand to Pamela Anderson, the inspiration for the Warren Beatty film Shampoo, the wild-man character that Bradley Cooper portrayed with all the old bluster in Paul Thomas Anderson’s 2021 film Licorice Pizza.

But as he sits in a combination bed- and sitting room in his apartment in the Beverly Hills flats, he still spins out grand plans that may or may not be grounded in reality. Let no one say that Jon Peters no longer dreams big.

I had not seen or spoken to Jon in the more than 25 years since the publication of Hit & Run, the book that Nancy Griffin and I wrote about Sony’s ill-advised 1989 decision to hire him and his then-partner,...

Fifteen authors of books that were recently chosen for The Hollywood Reporter’s list of “The 100 Greatest Film Books of All Time” will convene on a panel — which is being advertised as “the greatest gathering of its kind ever” — this Saturday afternoon in Hollywood as part of AFI Fest.

The event, which will take place inside the historic Tcl Chinese Theater and will run from 4 p.m. -5:30p.m., is open to members of the public free of charge provided they reserve their tickets in advance via Fest.AFI.com/GreatestFilmBooks.

Participating in a discussion about the origins and impact of their books will be A. Scott Berg (Goldwyn: A Biography), Cameron Crowe (Conversations with Wilder), Nancy Griffin (Hit and Run: How Jon Peters and Peter Guber Took Sony for a Ride in Hollywood), Aljean Harmetz (The Making of The Wizard of Oz: Movie Magic and Studio Power...