Little has changed in the movie business from three decades ago when nepotism, sexual harassment and racism ran rampant. 3,837 words. Illustrations by Mark Fearing.
Hollywood — Fall/Winter 1988
The sign on the door read: CAPITOL PICTURES, OFFICE OF THE CHAIRMAN.
The Chairman, Leo Moody, often joked that when the Board of Directors finally got around to shit-canning him, they’d save money by not having to change a name.
I was sitting in Moody’s outer office, across from his long time assistant Marie Liotta, who was at her desk sorting the morning mail.
From inside Leo’s office we could hear him hollering into the phone.
"He shouldn’t be doing that," Marie said to me.
"Doing what?"
"Yelling like that. You know he had surgery."
"What surgery?"
"Vanity surgery. He had his neck done."
I didn’t say anything.
done business together in past, since Manning was a powerful lawyer whose roster of A-list clients could set a deal in motion and often helped close it. He was regarded as a combative litigator, but also as a top-notch negotiator – something not always said about powerful entertainment attorneys.
bright future. He did corporate work and mostly real estate transactions. There wasn’t a lot of law involved, but he had to deal with an ever-changing cast of characters. It was about who had control, who had leverage, who had cash, who had financing. No two deals were alike, and it was Rick’s job to stand up for his clients when others were behaving badly and to smooth out issues when his clients were the ones behaving badly.
