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Photograph by Mark Terrill / Associated Press
The Spelling mansion in 1993.
The Daily Mirror revisits the story of Aaron Spelling and his Holmby Hills mansion, which is for sale.
HE’S MADE TV WHAT IT IS TODAY
* Aaron Spelling is the most prolific producer in the history of
prime-time TV. Why doesn’t he just relax and retire to Fantasy Island?
September 8, 1996
For the Record
September 29, 1996
Editor’s note: In the story about Aaron Spelling, The Times did not
mean to imply that he engaged in illegal activity to obtain his wealth,
and The Times apologizes if anyone inferred that he was engaged in
illegal activity.
By Hilary de Vries, Hilary de Vries’ last article for the magazine was a profile of Jodie Foster
On
May 21, Aaron Spelling, vice chairman of Spelling Entertainment Group
Inc., prepared for the company’s annual stockholders’ meeting. A man of
few but precise rituals, Spelling traded in his customary casual attire
and reluctantly put on a white shirt and dove-gray silk suit. He
lunched in his office–the meal served on a silver tray, as usual, by a
uniformed butler–and afterward was driven from the company
headquarters on Wilshire Boulevard west to the Regent Beverly Wilshire
Hotel.
Ever since he took his company public in
1986–solidifying his reputation, if not his reality, as one of
Hollywood’s wealthiest, most enigmatic citizens–Spelling has dreaded
these meetings. A shy, reclusive man, he has never overcome his
distaste for rubbing shoulders with strangers. As much as he loves
producing television–and he does love it again, now that "Beverly
Hills, 90210" and "Melrose Place" have restored some of the luster from
Spelling’s heyday with "Charlie’s Angels," "Fantasy Island" and
"Dynasty"–he prefers to leave the business side to others: Lee Gabler,
his agent; E. Duke Vincent, his producing partner, and Sumner Redstone,
chairman of Viacom, Spelling’s parent company since 1994.
Hillside District Residents Oppose Mansion
Construction: Three houses would be razed to build a 41,000-square-foot home on Tower Road for an anonymous owner.
August 2, 1992
By G. JEANETTE AVENT, SPECIAL TO THE TIMES
BEVERLY
HILLS — Some of Beverly Hills’ usually publicity-shy stars came out
and joined their neighbors this week to protest the building of a
luxurious 59,000-square-foot estate.
Actor Jack Lemmon, former
Hollywood gossip maven Rona Barrett, real estate investor-developer
Stuart Ketchum, a spokesman for MCA President Sidney J. Sheinberg and
about 40 other residents of the city’s exclusive Hillside district sat
patiently during the two-hour public hearing Wednesday, waiting to
express their opposition to the proposed project.
The project
calls for demolition of three homes on the four-acre site at 1146 Tower
Road. Built in their place would be a 41,000-square-foot, two-story,
10-bedroom residence with a basement, copper roof and stone columns in
a neoclassical style. The structure would include a gymnasium, grand
ballroom, cinema, library, wine storage area, china vault and elevators.
Plans
include a guardhouse with six bedrooms for staff, a five-bedroom guest
villa, a tennis court, pool and covered parking for 25 vehicles.
Construction on the buildings, which total 59,000 square feet of floor
space, is set to start in May.
The residence would be almost
seven times as large as the average 6,000-square-foot home in Beverly
Hills–and more than 25 times the size of a standard 1,600-square-foot,
three-bedroom Los Angeles tract house.
Hillside resident Jack
Lemmon, speaking before an emotional and sometimes raucous crowd
opposed to the project, said: "We’re not just talking about a huge
edifice. We’re talking about Mt. Etna.
"Aaron Spelling’s house is like a pimple on the landscape compared to this house."
Spelling’s house, built on six acres in Holmby Hills, is 56,500 square feet. It took nearly five years to complete.
Lemmon said the trend toward building large houses "is turning this city into a rich man’s ghetto."
Other
residents raised concerns about the length and effects of the
construction: noise, dust and workers parking along narrow Tower Road.
Some worried about increased traffic to the house after it is completed.
Lesly
Shelton, whose family has lived on Tower Road since 1945, told the
board that the quality of life that drew residents to Beverly Hills is
being destroyed. "We’re killing the goose that laid the golden egg,"
she said.
Much of the audience’s consternation focused on the
question of who owns the property. The application identified the owner
as Quantieme Establishment.
Lawyer Murray Fischer, the owner’s
representative, said Quantieme Establishment is a foreign corporation
owned by an individual who lives in London and has maintained a
residence in Beverly Hills for 13 years.
Beverly Hills real
estate broker John Bruce Nelson said Thursday that he negotiated the
purchase of the three properties for London resident Robert Manoukian
for $9 million in 1988.
Manoukian has represented the Sultan of
Brunei in various real estate acquisitions and negotiated the sale of
the Beverly Hills Hotel to the sultan, Nelson said. The sultan is
reported to be the wealthiest person in the world. Brunei is a small,
oil-rich, predominantly Muslim country on the island of Borneo.
Manoukian is a resident of London and has two other homes in Beverly Hills, Nelson said.
After
the meeting before the Environmental Review Board, Fischer declined to
further identify the owner, citing security concerns. He stated
emphatically that the individual was not the Sultan of Brunei.
However,
a well-placed real estate source specializing in large estates told The
Times on Thursday that the estate and the home to be built on it are
intended for the sultan.
Fischer and the owner’s lawyer,
Terrence Everett, and architect, Robert Earl, sought to allay
neighbors’ concerns about the home.
Fischer said that there is a
current perception that big is automatically bad but that during the
1930s, ’40s and ’50s large estate properties were the norm.
The
property was consolidated into one lot when Quantieme Establishment
purchased the three adjacent lots in 1988 for slightly more than $9
million. Although individual owners could have bought the lots and
built one substantial home on each lot, Fischer said, the current owner
intends to build a park-like setting.
Contrary to public
speculation, Everett said there will be no pounding of piles for the
foundation, and 300 cubic yards of dirt will be trucked in–about 30 to
60 truckloads, depending on the size of the truck.
Responding to
concerns about workers parking on the narrow street, Everett said
construction workers will park on the premises or be shuttled from
another location.
Fischer said estimates call for the residence to be built in two years.
The
board, which determines whether projects require an environmental
impact report, will reopen the hearing for further public testimony at
2 p.m. Aug. 24. The project will be reviewed by the city Planning
Commission.
Noting the marked differences between the owner and
the property’s neighbors, commission Chairman Richard Putnam instructed
the groups to appoint representatives to try to resolve some of those
differences before the Aug. 24 meeting.
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"Have
you ever seen anything more boring?" Spelling groused, as he paused in
the hotel foyer to watch the stockholders shuffle into the Champagne
Suite. "I mean, my God, I’m even wearing a tie."
This year,
Spelling had more reason than ever to feel uneasy as he stood shielded
from the crowd by his PR people and his beefy, unsmiling security staff
just steps away. He was now 73, and while he had shaved his workweek
from five to four days, an inner ear infection left him feeling his age
more acutely. "It was the damnedest thing," he grumbled about his
convalescence. "I couldn’t write, couldn’t watch TV, so boring."
But
Spelling had more than age on his mind. For the past nine months,
Spelling Entertainment had been up for sale. Viacom’s hefty $1
billion-plus sticker price, however, had kept buyers at bay. No offer
had materialized–only a lot of speculative tire-kicking and skeptical
press. The stories infuriated Spelling–one of the few Hollywood
producers ever to have taken his company public–and resulted in the
embarrassing withdrawal of the sale. Now he was in the awkward position
of publicly defending the company he no longer owned but which still
bore his name. "The truth
is, the company has grown and grown,"
Spelling said later in his office. "I have this stupid worry that
shareholders bought stock because of me, people who pay my salary. But
the stock price? That bothers the hell out of me."
Spelling’s
reservations aside, when the meeting got underway, it was clear that
defensiveness would not be necessary. Despite some mutterings,
shareholders nodded happily to news of Spelling’s renewed two-year
contract and the announcement that the new season’s program orders
would top 400 hours. As Spelling smilingly explained from the dais:
"That is more hours than in any year of our history." He has, as it
turns out, another hit on his hands. By meeting’s end, the gnomish,
snowy-haired producer is besieged by shareholders anxious to pump the
hand of the man Redstone expansively introduced as, "a man who needs no
introduction, my very good friend and an unparalleled voice in
entertainment."
*
Creating the impression of being a
peerless force in television may be Spelling’s canniest move–cleverer
even than his much-noted comeback after the cancellation of "Dynasty"
in 1989 put an end to his 18-year reign at ABC, once known as Aaron’s
Broadcasting Company. Beginning with Fox’s "Beverly Hills, 90210" in
1990 and "Melrose Place" two years later, and now supplying series and
movies to three of the four major networks as well as the fledgling WB,
Spelling has pulled off the kind of career second act seldom seen in
Hollywood.
Television is littered with the names of the once
powerful: from the legendary Norman Lear and Grant Tinker to more
recent casualties like Linda Bloodworth-Thomason and Diane English. For
one brief season, 1989-90, Spelling too looked like a dinosaur: all of
his hit series, including "Dynasty," were in ABC’s dumper; an unrenewed
contract; persona non grata at affiliates’ meetings. It was more than
personal failure. It was, as Variety made clear, the end of an era when
beautiful people in beautiful clothes in exotic locales were enough to
earn a berth in the Nielsen Top Ten.
But then, just as abruptly,
Spelling was back. "Beverly Hills, 90210" and "Melrose Place" were more
than hit series; they were, in TV’s meretricious way, history in the
making–the first dramas to win the elusive and coveted Gen-X viewer.
The "King of the Jiggle" had reinvented himself for a new generation.
"Aaron
came back because, like all truly talented people, he has the ability
to reinvent himself," observes Don Ohlmeyer, NBC West Coast president
and a former ABC executive.
"Spelling may not have the quality
of [Steven] Bochco, but he has proven he can get the younger
demographic," adds Chris Neel, an analyst with Media Edge, a New
York-based research company. "So he became hot again everywhere."
Yet
Spelling’s talent, evident this afternoon as he spins dross into gold
before his shareholders’ eyes, lies in producing more than hit series.
It is the ability to sustain the illusion of a single defining vision
over 40 years of broadcasting–making the efforts of hundreds,
specifically his various creative partners, seem the masterwork of one
man. If most of his 50-plus series fade to forgettable with astonishing
ease–think of "T. J. Hooker" and "Starsky and Hutch"–taken
collectively they can be read as a pop cultural history of late
20th-century America.
From the black-and-white "Dick Powell’s
Zane Grey Theater" in the 1950s to the cheesecake "Charlie’s Angels,"
created with Leonard Goldberg in the 1970s, to glitzy "Dynasty,"
created with Esther and Richard Shapiro in the ’80s, to the glossy
twentysomethings created by Darren Star on "90210" and "Melrose Place,"
Spelling not only kept pace with the Zeitgeist, but he became a master
at giving the public the image of itself it most wanted to see.
For
most of us, that meant Southern California, albeit a glossier version.
Even when their casts of nubile young actors populated other fantastic
corners of America, Spelling’s series captured the market on Southern
California decadence and made it one of Hollywood’s most popular
exports. Even a non-Spelling show like "Baywatch" owes its
international mega-hit status to the buffed facade of his California.
"Aaron has a legendary instinct for what the public wants to see," says producer and former Spelling partner Douglas Cramer.
"It’s
more than storytelling; there’s a look that Aaron gets with his shows,"
adds Jamie Kellner, head of the WB Television Network, home of
Spelling’s "Savannah." "It’s the glamour, the fashion, the detail that
audiences, especially women, love."
Yet the irony remains. Not
Spelling’s comeback itself–the 1996-97 season is filled with rebound
ratings winners Bill Cosby, Ted Danson and Michael J. Fox–but that it
happened in an industry so ambivalent about his legacy. More than any
other producer, Spelling shaped television and our responses to it. But
because his image has been that of a panderer–despite his critically
acclaimed series "Family," and his two Emmy award-winning movies "And
the Band Played On" and "Day One"–many in Hollywood came to think less
of the medium of which he was a master. Spelling’s success defined TV’s
second-class citizenship in the heart of the film industry, and his
lack of hypocrisy–he has called his series "mind candy"–remains an
affront to Hollywood’s pious conviction that it creates art rather than
kitsch.
"It’s that huge elite snobbery between television and
film," says director Joel Schumacher, a close friend of Spelling’s. "I
actually have acquaintances who say to me, ‘Joel, why are you friends
of the Spellings?’ I mean, eat s- – -. I would hate to have lived
through this era of Hollywood without knowing Aaron Spelling."
Spelling’s
position in Hollywood is such that his resume, (at 3,000 episodes, the
Guinness Book of Records lists him as the most prolific producer in
history), his wealth (estimated at $310 million in 1994), his
Hearst-sized house (56,000 square feet), even his family (wife Candy
and children Tori and Randy) bear a whiff of the unseemly, the
suggestion that his gains have been ill-gotten. "He lives like a pasha
while foisting that garbage on the American people," grouses one
television producer, daring to voice, albeit anonymously, a common
industry view.
"There is good and there is bad Spelling," says
Tom Shales, the Washington Post’s Pulitzer Prize-winning TV critic.
"But there is never great Spelling, only degrees of terribleness."
Spelling
has many powerful defenders, but even he does not dispute that he has
many more detractors. "I don’t think I’ll ever get their respect," he
shrugs. He is keenly aware that his longevity has as much to do with
fundamental changes in broadcasting–the establishment of the Fox
network, the growth of cable and foreign markets among them–as his own
talents. But that disdain explains why Spelling is something of a
recluse, why he keeps his Emmy awards in his home bowling alley rather
than his office, why he chooses his few friends with such care–chief
among them MCA head Lew Wasserman, Bill Haber, his former agent at CAA,
and now Sumner Redstone–and why he continues to look to the public as
the ultimate arbiter of his worth. Spelling was once, briefly, an
actor, and it is still the audience that he craves. As he characterizes
it even now, "The worst time in my life was when ‘Dynasty’ was canceled
and Variety ran that headline ‘Aaron Spelling’s Dynasty is Dead,’ " he
says in his gravelly voice. "And there were no quotation marks around
‘Dynasty.’ "
*
It is the third week in may, a few days
before memorial day but high noon in the television industry–when
ratings sweeps coincide with annual network announcements of fall
schedules. On the face of it, Spelling would seem to be one of the
losers. In the past few days, he has learned that two series have been
canceled: Fox’s "Kindred: The Embraced" and NBC’s "Malibu Shores" the
latter a much-hyped clone of "90210." And neither of his pilots, "Wolf
Pack," a detective drama for CBS, and "Bullet Hearts," a cop show for
Fox, have made the schedule. With "Savannah" his only hit since
"Melrose Place"–and even that series, together with "90210," has
slipped in the ratings–Spelling’s reentry into prime time appears to
be stalled.
"Spelling still has no real network penetration,"
says Betsy Frank, a TV analyst with Zenith Media. "He remains most
successful developing programming for young, youth-oriented networks
like Fox and the WB."
But here in his office, five floors above
Wilshire Boulevard, laconically puffing on his pipe, Spelling is far
from downbeat. "Dick Powell, my first mentor, taught me one thing: that
the only positive in our business is the negative," he says, smoke
wreathing his massive suite, the size of which, someone once said,
equals "the average 7-Eleven." "And Dick was saying that when there
were only three networks, before cable, before all of it. Look, today I
got a check for ‘The Love Boat.’ Do you know how old ‘Love Boat’ is?
Candy found a channel where it was on five days a week, and another
where it was on six days a week. I thought we were being ripped off,
but then we got this seven-figure check, and I don’t mean a small
seven-figure check."
Ever since taking his company public,
becoming, like Dick Clark, one of the few producers able to turn a
string of hit series into its own source of capital, Spelling has known
that successful television is more than hit ratings and prime-time
lineups. He recognizes what the networks and studios have long
known–that TV is software, able to generate streams of revenue far
beyond a single night’s airing. In that light, the Spelling company’s
lineup is nothing short of a smash–8,000 hours domestic and 18,000
hours internationally. With new orders for 400 hours this season–"7th
Heaven," a family drama for WB, and "Sunset Beach," on NBC, Spelling’s
first daytime soap–the syndication pipeline will be primed again,
generating what Sumner Redstone characterizes as "millions of dollars
in the next year alone."
"Spelling," confirms Jessica Reif, a Merrill Lynch media analyst, "is a cash cow."
As
a holding company, Spelling Entertainment Group Inc. also has
programming from Worldvision–the company’s in-house distributorship
once owned by ABC–as well as Republic Pictures, a vast library of
pre-1974 NBC series as well as such films as "It’s a Wonderful Life"
and "Basic Instinct." But Spelling’s shows, a total of 3,000 episodes,
are big, consistent earners. "Beverly Hills, 90210" plays in 90
countries. "Melrose Place" is shown in 80, not including domestic
syndication that began on the E! channel in August. Even a series like
"Models Inc.," a failed "Melrose Place" spinoff, continues to sell in
France. As John Ryan, president of Worldvision, puts it: "With
Spelling, broadcasters know they are buying a brand name."
Sitting
here with his pipe and his signature "My Favorite Martian" haircut,
Spelling looks as distinctive as a logo. When he speaks, leaning
forward to knock the ashes from his pipe, his voice is raspy, heavy
with smoke and the leavings of his hard Texas twang. It’s a sharp
contrast to his non-cowboy-sized frame; his frail thinness is not quite
disguised by his billowy nylon warmup suit.
Spelling points out
that he has always been slight. As a child, the story goes–the
youngest of five children of Pearl and David Spelling, Russian and
Polish Jewish immigrants who settled in Dallas during the early part of
the century–he had a nervous breakdown and spent a year in bed. As an
actor during his early years in Hollywood, he played villains and
losers in TV Westerns like "Gunsmoke." "I mean, I weighed all of 118
pounds and had these big eyes," he recalls. "I think I played every
kind of dipsomaniac, sex maniac there was."
It’s one reason that
he made the transition into producing. "I was very comfortable," he
rasps, "because a producer is not in front of the camera." Now, fame
has eroded that anonymity. "I don’t know what it is, but Candy and I
can’t go anywhere. I can’t even take the elevator in my medical
building without a doctor asking me for my autograph."
That
anything should intrude on Spelling’s life now seems a violation of the
first order. He has refused to fly since his Air Force years. With the
exception of an annual trip to Las Vegas to indulge Candy’s passion for
gambling, Spelling doesn’t travel. If he goes anywhere, it is by train
or chauffeur-driven limousine and almost always with an armed guard. He
lives with two 24-hour guards at home, the kind of shuttered existence
where even his children have to sign in and out. "We’ve had letters and
threats," Spelling explains. "They’re aimed at me, but saying the
horrible things they would do to Tori and Randy."
He divides his
time between his massive house in Holmby Hills, the site of the former
Bing Crosby estate, where no working journalist has yet crossed the
threshold–"I’m sorry about that," he says–and his office, where he
works late, editing a script into the early evening while the butler
shuttles in and out with cut-glass tumblers. "Aaron can seem frail, but
in business he is far from frail," says Redstone. "I know if I call his
office at 7 in the evening, he is always there."
It is why
Spelling’s work environment is less an executive suite than a den. One
wall is punctuated by a row of oil paintings, landscapes mostly–"I
have no idea what they are," Spelling says absently–but the rest of
the decor is family room circa 1968: photographs of Candy, Tori and
Randy on a side table, an enormous fish tank built into the wall over
one of the sofas, and a pinball machine Candy had custom-made one
Christmas that pumps out the theme music of "The Love Boat" and
"Dynasty" interspersed with family greetings: "I love you, Daddy . . .
. I love you, honey." Spelling laughs as he flicks off the machine.
"The company that makes these usually does them in batches of 1,500,
but Candy got him to make just two."
One comes to realize, if
one spends any time with Spelling, that a certain lack of irony colors
his outlook–his views about television, children, his marriage–and
nowhere is it more evident than in his attitudes toward wealth. Like
all those stories about Candy clipping coupons and Tori furnishing her
Wilshire Boulevard condo with flea market finds, Spelling has his own
ticks. "Candy and I both like to fish when we’re out at our little–and
I do mean little–house at the beach," he says. "If we catch anything,
the cook does it up and we give it to our Hispanic maid. I get a great
pleasure knowing she doesn’t have to buy dinner that night."
It
is what colleagues have learned to call "Aaron’s Jesus complex," says
one former employee. "It’s contrived, but not phony." Like the time
Spelling bundled Tori and Randy into his limo and drove across the
Mexican border to show them real poverty. Like how Spelling regrets
that his mother, the wife of a tailor, died before seeing his house,
the one with 123 rooms, the bowling alley and the fish pond. "I’d give
anything for my mother to see the house now," he says. "She’d say,
‘What, you rented this for the day? Come on, you don’t have to impress
me.’ I swear to you, that’s exactly what she’d say."
It is the
same belief system Spelling brings to television. "Aaron really
believes he’s performing a service with his shows," says a former
colleague, "that he is giving people an escape from the misery of their
lives." And Spelling does not disagree: "We never know what
entertainment does, how it affects people, but I bet if you went down
the street and asked people–not in Beverly Hills–but ethnic groups,
who can’t afford to go to the theater, can’t even afford HBO, ‘What
does television mean in your life?’ you’d be shocked at the answer." *
While
the common theory of Spelling’s fascination with glitz dates from his
own background–"born in a house in Dallas that cost $6,000 with
wall-to-wall people and one bathroom," a story like many he recounts in
his autobiography, "A Prime-Time Life" –there certainly seems to have
been a business argument to such a view. From his first hit series in
1963, "Burke’s Law," which starred Gene Barry as the debonair
millionaire detective Amos Burke, to "Charlie’s Angels," "The Love
Boat," "Fantasy Island" and even his lesser hits, "Hart to Hart,"
"Hotel," and "90210," where a ZIP Code is the ultimate status symbol,
money has been the dominant theme. "What Aaron does really well," says
WB’s Jamie Kellner, "is that whole wealthy-family thing." Adds Joel
Schumacher, who directed Spelling’s "2000 Malibu Road," "Aaron knows we
like to watch rich people fight with each other."
The premise,
evident in some form in almost all Spelling’s series, reached its
height with "Dynasty" in 1981. A rip-off of "Dallas," the prime-time
soap starred John Forsythe, Joan Collins and Linda Evans as wealthy
Coloradans who swapped spouses and mineral rights with abandon.
Although "Charlie’s Angels" remains Spelling’s biggest hit, "Dynasty"
more perfectly captured its decade. In its nine-year run, it made Joan
Collins a star, made costume designer Nolan Miller a household name and
helped power ABC from last to first in the ratings, capping Spelling’s
domination at the network. "People used to say ‘Dynasty’ would never
work," Spelling laughs. "But I know people want to watch rich people
deal with problems that money can’t solve; they want to laugh at the
rich and say, ‘Yeah, you deserve it, you rich mother; yeah, you people
are really sick.’ "
But as the ’80s waned, "Dynasty" began
slipping in the ratings, especially when ABC was faced with NBC’s new
powerhouse lineup headed by "The Cosby Show" and "Cheers." ABC had
acquired a new owner, Capital Cities, and TV as a whole was entering a
new era. Serial drama, Spelling’s forte and the staple of the networks
for more than a decade, was losing ground to the sitcom, whose rebirth
NBC was the first to exploit with "Cheers." And Spelling’s campy
sensibilities were being supplanted by gritty, quirky realism that
began with Steven Bochco’s "Hill Street Blues" and concluded with
Edward Zwick and Marshall Herskovitz’s "thirtysomething" and even David
Lynch’s "Twin Peaks." In 1989, two years after "The Colbys," the
"Dynasty" spinoff, failed, Brandon Stoddard, then ABC’s entertainment
president, pulled the plug on Spelling. "It was probably the low point
of our lives," recalls producing partner Duke Vincent. "In 18 months
we’d had seven shows on the air, and within a year they were canceled.
The new regime wanted to take the network in a totally different
direction, but it proved a bit shortsighted in the long run, because
within two years we did ‘90210.’ "
The arrival of "Beverly
Hills, 90210" in the nation’s cultural landscape has, in its six years,
acquired the stature of myth: the series launched creator Darren Star
("Central Park West"), relaunched Spelling as a producer, indirectly
led to the revival of Heather Locklear’s career (on the "90210"
spinoff, "Melrose Place") and made Tori Spelling (Donna on "90210") a
celebrity. It also cemented the reputation of Fox as a viable network,
what Chairman Peter Cher- nin calls "a very significant development in
the history of Fox." In reality, the series had a far more prosaic,
even happenstance beginning. "We’d been thinking about doing a
continuous drama set in high school for some time," says Kellner, at
the time a Fox programming executive. "And we had this young writer,
Darren Star, but our fear was that it would skew too young, so we
brought in Aaron."
Although a series about a group of wealthy,
status-conscious students at a fictitious Beverly Hills high school was
not an obvious Spelling vehicle, it did allow him to address some
social issues for the first time since his critically acclaimed series
"Family." "While you’re all having fun with ‘90210,’ " he says, "there
are a lot of issues we’ve tackled."
Whatever the merits of
"90210," however, they were not evident during the first six episodes.
Like most dramas, the series took weeks for its audience to build, a
scenario that was repeated two years later with "Melrose Place." Yet
with all the talk about Spelling’s comeback, the fact remains that the
series succeeded on Fox and not one of the three major networks.
"Drama
is what Aaron does best, but dramas are tricky for networks today
because they take time to find their audience," observes NBC’s
Ohlmeyer. "Fox has the luxury of being able to live with a 10 share,
something that a major network can’t."
Indeed, Spelling’s
success on Fox and his subsequent failure to land a prime-time hit on a
major network raise questions not only about his current standing but
also the issue that has dogged Spelling throughout his career–that he
is ultimately a salesman and not a creator. It is a testament to the
extent of his power that few of his former partners would speak for the
record, although it is no secret that Esther and Robert Shapiro,
Douglas Cramer and Darren Star have parted company with Spelling under
less than amicable circumstances. "Aaron loves to take credit for all
his shows, but look at the credits," says one former partner. "Not one
of them says ‘Created by Aaron Spelling.’ But we aren’t supposed to
complain, because this is the man who made us all fabulously wealthy."
"Aaron and I really hit it off," adds Star, "but there is no question that I created ‘90210’ and ‘Melrose Place.’ "
Those
who praise Spelling, however–and the list ranges from former employees
to network executives–cite Spelling’s strengths: his gifts as a
storyteller, his eye for actors and his scrupulous devotion to detail,
down to costumes and hairstyles. These are why, despite the failure of
"Malibu Shores," NBC’s Ohlmeyer scrapped four versions of a daytime
soap, including one developed in-house, to buy Spelling’s "Sunset
Beach," and why WB’s Kellner says, "I go to Aaron first." "Aaron is an
amazing guy," marvels Leslie Moonves, president of CBS Entertainment,
which will air Spelling’s TV movie "After Jimmy" later this month. "He
has the same passion as a 22-year-old on his first pilot. It’s like
it’s life-or-death with him, like he had 10 cents in the bank. That’s
why he’s been around for 40 years."
That approbation of network
heads nonetheless raises another set of questions, namely that of
Spelling’s own retirement. His real age is much debated–some estimates
place it at 76–and recently health problems have interrupted his work
schedule. "I keep losing weight, so I try to eat chocolate," Spelling
says, nodding at the bowls of chocolate–M&Ms, Hershey’s kisses,
kids’ snacks–strategically placed about the office. But from Redstone
on down, one quickly discovers that any discussion of Spelling’s future
seems akin to second-guessing Queen Elizabeth’s reign. "Oh, I wish
you’d been here on a typical day," Spelling says, fumbling with his
zippered leather pouch of tobacco. "If I were just vice chairman, I
would quit in a second. But I’m crazy–I still meet on every story
line, read every outline, give notes on every outline, every script. I
see every rough cut." "Will he ever retire?" asks Vincent, who seems in
a better position than most to know. "Not in my opinion," he adds.
"Aaron is basically a workaholic; this is what he does."
Even
Spelling’s closest friends seem to recognize the emotional paucity of a
life so closely tied to his work. "What’s he got if he retires?" asks
one acquaintance. "That big, empty house and Candy."
It’s as if,
after 40 years of spinning out fantasies for the rest of us, he has
mistakenly shortchanged himself. That in creating a mythic America,
where Aaron Spelling remains his best creation, he is reluctant to
write "The End." Even now, when he recaps his life, the facts seem to
matter less than the telling of them: that his father lost his job at
Sears because Spelling directed one of the first plays written by an
African American to be produced in Dallas; that he performed with the
Lunts in Europe during his Air Force years in World War II; that he was
the first Jewish cheerleader captain at Southern Methodist University;
that he was once partnered with Danny Thomas and, later, Lucille Ball.
It is the kind of life, as he says, "where if you have a dream and you
pursue your dream, you may not get all of it. But even a little part of
a dream, it’s better than harsh reality."
Some say it is more
than the poverty; rather it’s the remains of a more fundamental
prejudice that drive Spelling. "More than just being poor, it’s that
Aaron was a Jew in the South," says one close friend. "That
second-class citizenship is different from anything else in the
country, and that is something he never, ever talks about."
"I
didn’t have a name in school because my name was ‘Jewbaby,’ " says
Spelling, lending credence to a final theory that, beyond the poverty
and prejudice, he remains a lonely and isolated figure. His 25-year
marriage to Candy, his second wife, a former hand model, has endured
more than its share of gossip and innuendo–talk that it is little more
than a marriage of convenience. "How about it’s just nobody’s damn
business," snaps Schumacher. "These are people who’ve been married for
25 years in a town where people can’t stay together for 25 minutes."
Spelling’s
closest relationships seem to be with his children. His house, he
admits, is too big, "but Randy has people over all the time, and Tori
calls and says, ‘I’m bringing four people for dinner, is that OK?’ OK?
Yeah, it’s OK, it’s fantastic." The best two weeks of his life,
Spelling says, were the days that Tori spent convalescing at home after
the removal of wisdom teeth. "I didn’t want her to leave," he says, "I
kept telling her, ‘You don’t feel better, do you?’ "
Yet even
Spelling seems to recognize that a morning of feeding the fish in his
pond and a round of tennis with Randy do not a life make. "I guess if
the kids were married . . . ." he says, letting his voice trail off.
"Should I retire? Is there a reason to retire? I wish," he says, "I had
a reason to retire."
|
Photograph by John Malmin / Los Angeles Times
When cross-examined, she admitted to 10 marriages and said, “there might
Lou Gehrig’s decline was becoming evident, although the cause was still unknown.
