My Rating: 9 of 10
Summary
Terrific biography about David Geffen, one of the great Hollywood moguls in the modern age. Part of required reading if you’re interested in a career in Hollywood as an executive.
Favorite parts:
- The Hustle. Geffen was fired from at least 6 industry jobs before he got into William Morris Agency. He lied about going to UCLA, then steals the letter from UCLA that would have outted him.
- The Operator. With 20% strategy and 80% sheer will, he put himself into deals where he captured enormous upside with virtually no downside. One exception: he put up his homes as collateral to finance and produce a film called Personal Best. He nearly lost everything.
- The Man. For someone who had so much wealth, he seemed unhappy and unsatisfied for a great deal of his life.
Related articles
- How Hollywood Can Save Itself
- How to Break Into Hollywood
- Notes from Powerhouse: The Untold Story of CAA
Notes
Many people in the audience had begun to cry, yet, to Geffens’ disgust, Linkletter brazenly warmed up the crowd as if it were business as usual. “Well, folks, the show must go on,” Linkletter said in addressing the audience. When a man cheered inappropriately, Geffen’s fury was unleashed. He lunged forward and took a swing at the man. He was fired immediately, his career at CBS over after just a few months. Out of money, Geffen headed home once again to Borough Park.
—
Eager to make and impression and be promoted, Geffen offered up unsolicited critiques of the show’s scripts. HIs boss was not amused and he was fired unceremoniously after just two weeks on the job. Geffen was devastated that he had blown yet another opportunity. As he packed up his few belongings, Alixe Gordin, the show’s casting director, stopped by to offer her condolences. Gordin ad grown fond of Geffen and gave him some advice.
Calling in a favor at an agency she did business with, Gordin got Geffen an interview at the Ashley Famous Agency, a midsize firm that represented such stars as Ingrid Bergman and Yul Brynner. Geffen saw Al Ashley, the brother of agency chief Ted Asshley. Al raised his eyebrows when he reviewed Geffen’s resume. Having filled it out truthfully, Geffen declared that he had not graduated from college. The resume also showed, of course, that he had bounced around from job to job since high school.
“My God, this wouldn’t indicate that you’d succeed at anything,” Al Ashley said, kicking Geffen out of his office.
—
After hearing that Lefkowitz, who was fifty-six, came to work on Saturdays, Geffen decided he would, too. For weeks, Geffen stalked Lefkowitz, whose office was on the twentieth floor, until one Saturday the two stood together waiting for the elevator. Geffen introduced himself and struck up a conversation. Lefkowitz, impressed with this display of unbridled ambition, asked him if he would join him for a sandwich at the Carnegie Deli, around the corner on Seventh Avenue. Geffen flattered the executive and begged him to regale him with stories about the entertainment business.
Lefkowitz liked Geffen and was impressed by both his doggedness and his appropriately reverential manner. He soon introduced him to his wife, Sally, and they sometimes invited David to join them for dinner at their apartment on Central Park West or for a night out at the theater. The other young men in the mailroom were stunned to find that Geffen was not lying when he said he had formed a friendship with the president. (pg. 40)
—
Shukat and Geffen sat side by side just outside of Griefer’s office. Although Shukat was essentially Geffen’s supervisor, he felt threatened by Geffen and was envious of his drive. Shukat stopped into the office one night well after business hours and was stunned to find Geffen there, making deals on the telephone. “I saw this actor, he’s great, and I’m going to try to get him to be seen for that show you were talking about,” Shukat overheard Geffen say. Shukat himself had barely started to sign clients.
—
Born Elliot Rabinowitz, Roberts had dropped out of two colleges after graduating from high school, changed his name, and decided to pursue a career as an actor. The big roles did not come, though, and his biggest audiences were the people who took the studio tours he led as a page at NBC. He eventually gave up acting and joined the William Morris mailroom at the suggestion of Hal Ray. Although he was not as swift as Geffen, he was nevertheless a hustler, and he had an outrageous sense of humor. David took Roberts under his wing, instructing him to meet him at the office at 6:30 A.M.
“David, no one’s there,” Roberts said.
Geffen responded with a knowing glance. “That’s why we will be.” He showed Roberts how he had taught himself the rudiments of deal making by studying memos and opening the mail. (pg. 54)
—
But it was Geffen’s continuing work in the TV department that continued to earn him a higher salary and modest bonuses at the Morris office. At the end of 1967, Nat Lefkowitz handed him yet another hundred-dollar raise, taking his weekly salary above four hundred dollars. Geffen expanded his wardrobe from Meledandri and coached his secretary, a young man named Peter Lampick, on the virtues of fine dressing.
But Geffen’s dislike for the TV business was growing. He resented the tiresome duties of his job and passed some of them along to the eager Lampack. More and more, Geffen felt he should quit the Morris office and form his own management company around Laura Nyro. That way he would not have to take guff from anyone and would have the freedom to call his own shots. Conveniently, he also would not have to hide his music-publishing role any longer. (pg. 82)
—
In late 1967, Ashley sold his agency for thirteen million dollars to Kinney Service, which was in the parking-lot and funeral-home businesses. Kinney was run by the owner’s son-in-law, a suave dealmaker named Steven J. Ross, a tall and handsome man who had grown up in the Flatbush section of Brooklyn. Years later, as chairman of Warner Communications, Ross was the man directly responsible for the transactions that were to make Geffen a billionaire.
Even as Geffen joined Ashley Famous, Ted Ashley was secretly helping Ross come up with a plan to make an even bigger move into Hollywood. Ross wanted to buy Warner Bros., and Ashley had the connections to help him meet the players there.
—
In September 1971, the four men signed contracts for publishing and recording. Whereas Amos Records had controlled 100 percent of its artists’ publishing rights, Geffen kept only half for himself. Indeed, it was his standard deal for the time: Geffen argued that any money the group made from their music publishing ought to be cross-collateralized against their recording advance as insurance for the label against a poorly selling record. The four artists, none of whom was represented by a lawyer, willingly signed the new deals and viewed them as fair. (pg. 160)
—
Asylum Records and Geffen Roberts had become the most successful start-up record label and management enterprise, respectively, that people in the music business could remember. Geffen had succeeded because of an innate ability to strategize and understand the path to big success. Whereas most people could not see beyond the immediate tasks at hand, Geffen had a vision of what the brass ring looked like and was able to figure out when to make his grab in order to get it. Almost everything he did was part of a carefully plotted strategic plan, parts of which were extremely complicated.
But it was also his remarkable energy level, unfathomable work ethic, and an ironclad determination to win that catapulted him to the top. Perhaps frightened of failing at life, David Geffen simply had to succeed, and he was not going to let anything or anyone stand in his way. He was going to use every resource at his disposal, including his often badgering interpersonal style, in order to score. It was a combination that made him unstoppable almost every time out. (pgs. 173-174)
—
Instead, Geffen continued, the company needed to focus on what it really know: how to design and market the Calvin Klein brand name. “Calvin, you should only be focusing on aesthetics,” Geffen said. “You should just be designing the clothes and overseeing the marketing and advertising.”
Geffen reprimanded Klein and Schwartz for excesses they could not afford. Among other things, he told them to sell their company jet, which cost them $2.5 million a year to maintain. He also told Klein to fire his chief financial officer and helped him hire Richard Martin, a top executive at Price Waterhouse, the accounting firm he himself used. Here was the “fixer” in action: David Geffen was now involved in the kind of problem solving that energized him more than anything else.
He then made an extraordinary offer to purchase all the company’s outstanding junk-bond debt, which had a face value of sixty-two million dollars. The company did not even have enough money to cover its next payment of fifteen million, but Geffen said he would cover the entire bill so that it would have some breathing room.
Klein was stunned. He did not want to accept Geffen’s offer, as he was fearful of exposing him to the risks and problems associated with his company. But he did not have a choice; it was made painfully clear to him that either Geffen bought the bonds or the company would have to file for bankruptcy. (pg. 481)
—