Vanity Fair Article Fully Typed

[Sheila Narasimhan]

HI HERE'S THE ARTICLE. MAKE YOUR OWN OPINIONS AND POST YOUR THOUGHTS IF
YOU LIKE. I APOLOGIZE FOR ALL TYPOS. TAKE CARE SHEILA (THIS THING IS LONG)

TOMMY BOY

" Even by the standards of the wild and wooly
music industry. Tommy Mottola, chairman of the $5.9 billion Sony Music
Entertainment, plays by his own rules. Robert Sam Anson spins the Motolla
story: his fanciful Mob voguing, the vengeful plans of his former mentor,
Walter Yetnikoff, and his Svengali-esque marriage to top Sony star 26 year
old Mariah Carey."

The book on Tommy Motolla begins with the blinds in his
office. They're really fairly ordinary as window coverings go: blood red
in color, thin in construction-not what you'd expect in a sanctun where
notables from Johnny Mathis to the member of Alice in Chains have
schmoozed. The blinds in fact posess only one distinguishing
characteristic: they are always drawn. Why this is so is a matter of
speculation. Some say it is to prevent Walter Yetnikoff-who used to be
Sony Music chief-from taking a shot at Tommy. others say that the blinds
are closed to prevent God from peeking at what Tommy is up to. But, since
Tommy says the only deity he revers is Billboard, no one much believes
that. Which leaves the Lake Tahoe hypothesis: At the conclusion of The
Godfather Part II, you'll recall, Michael Corleone, having disposed of all
his enemies, retreats to a lodge on Lake Tahoe, a body of water upon which
brother Fredo unwisely chooses to go fishing. You'll no doubt remember
what happens next. Just as you will recall-provided you loved the movie
as much as Tommy did-the condition of the blinds in the office where the
Don orders the hit. They were always drawn, too. As for some other
things, such as why the CEO of a $5.9 billion company company tucks a
nine-mm. Glock into his briefcase, and travels in an armor-plated limo
with a cop badge on the back, let's just say that the music business is
not as carefreee as selling Amway products. But back to Tommy's office
blinds, which, on this leaden day in New York, are, as usual, closed.
Beyond them, a violent storm is gathering which will pelt the Sony Corp
headquarters to a sodden fare-thee-well. In the gloom of the 32nd floor,
however, Tommy Motolla is smiling. According to the lates Soundcan, 5 of
the top 10 records in the US are Sony releases. Profits are up, market
share is increasing, and Tommy's masters in Tokyo have just awarded him a
new, 5 year contract worth $35 million. Tommy's wife isn't doing badly,
either. Her name is Mariah Carey, she is 26 years old and gorgeous, and
has sold more than 80 million records, making her husband, who is 22 years
her senior (this is wrong the age dif is 20 yrs) and the director of her
career, very happy. This is not however, why the chairman of Sony Music
is smiling. It is the joke he has just played on a reporter he was not
eager to entertain. What he did was switch identities with his PR man.
"I'm Dan Klores," Tommy said, shaking hands at the door. Then pointing to
the real Don Klores, he added "and this is Tommy Motolla." There are
laughs when the reporter falls for it, and laughs again-thinner this
time-when Tommy says, "You can always tell me. I'm the fat guy." His
middle is bulging the confines of his pressed linen safari jacket, and his
slicked-back black coif is thinning, too. He's sensitive about both,
friends say, as a middle aged man with an idolized young wife is apt to
be. Which may explain why Mariah's under wraps. "She won't be talking,"
Tommy announces, the smile evaporating. "It's not good for her. it's not
good for me, it's not good for the company." Whether Mrs. Motolla
participated in these calculations, he does not disclose. But from the
gossip-that she exits the big house in the suburbs only after checking
with Tommy, and then with a chase car always trailing-it seems unlikely.
Tommy in any case, isn't in a mood for domestic revelations. "I'm
uncomfortable doing anything like this," he says. "You wanna talk about
the business? O.K. Let's go. All day we'll talk, all night. But talking
about your life-it's like having some guy with a rocket launcher aiming at
you." He leans forward, eyes hooded, nails manicured to a fine sheen. In
the half-light, you can almost imagine you're in Tahoe. "What's the slant
of this?' Tommy Motolla demands. "What's this about?"

You can understand the uneasiness. All his professional life, people have
been asking questions about Thomas.D.Motolla Jr., ncluding, now and again,
agents of the F.B.I. And always they've wondered: How is it that a so-so
talent manager who used to call himself "Don Tommy" got to the top? The
questions keep on coming. Even now, with the Ahmets, Irvings, Dougs, and
Davids of the industry attesting to the sterlingness of his character,
Tommy and his methods are still the source of jitters. Its said that his
aquaintance with racketeers is more than passing; that he employs threats
as wellas cajolery; that he's even knowledgeable about a few racehorses
meeting untimely ends. Tommy denies all three. His marriage has not gone
unremarked, either. Depending on which enemy is doing the alleging, she
owes her career to him, he owes his job to her, and the arrangements that
has brought riches to both may not last forever. Especially if the
stories of Sony's principal assets(MC &TM) exchanging "fuck you's" and
hurling objects are true. Tommy denies them. And then there are the
goings-on at the office, where Tommy's been quoted as that if the Japanese
don't stop griping about profits and market share, he just might take
their shiny company away from them. Tommy emphatically denies it. In the
manner Mario Puzo novels, its all very complicated. And to begin sorting
it out requires back some-to the Bronx, specifically. Here, as Tommy
tells the tale, he was born into a "traditionally warm Italian family,"
headed by Thomas Motolla Sr., a downtown customs broker with rumoured
connections to, shall we say, unusual businessmen.

The Motollas, in any event, were music-lovers, and by the time they moved
to the middle-class suburb of New Rochelle, 8 year old Tommy was playing
the trumpet. Playing it so well, in fact, that he won a scholarship to a
private school. There were 2 hitches: one, Tommy didn't like playing the
trumpet; two, he didn't like going to school. The first was resolvedby a
switch to a guitar, an instrument Tommy calls "way cooler." The second
Tommy's parents tried to fix by packing him off to a military academyin New
Jersey. Only Tommy kept running away. Finally in what might be regarded
as the start of his negotiating career, Tommy cut his parents a deal:he'd
stay out f trouble if they let him come home. Like virtually all of
Tommy's contracts it worked out swell. Tommy grew helmet sideburns, took
up drag racing, joined a rock band (Saturday nights, they played the WMCA
"good Guys" sock hops), partied hearty. He became, in all so neat that
movie producer Lynda Obst-who used to sneak out her house in tony Harrison
to hang around him-remembers Tommy as the "baddest boy in New Rochelle."
Obst recalls another quality about Tommy: a hunger for places like
Harrison. "That was the pattern of the ambitious Italian guys" she says.
"If you wanted to get out, you ended up crossing the tracks and dating one
of the Jewish Harrison girls. That's what Tommy did. It was the first
sign that he was going to go somewhere." Tommy's girl was Lisa Clark, and
for a young charmer about to drop out of Hofstra to become the next Sal
Mineo, there could hardly have been a better catch. For Lisa's father,
Sam, was an entertainment -industry power, an arms-and-elbows macher who'd
come up from Tin Pan Alley to create ABC Records. He was also by all
accounts, no one to mess with. "That was a Mob business," an industry
veteran says of the jukeboxes, where Sam made his bones. "Not everyone in
it was a hood. If Sam wasn't tough, he wouldn't have survived." Along
with his muscles, Sam had dim views about his little girl's taking up with
one of the goyim. "Not a Jew?" he said, upon meeting Lisa's Catholic
date. "Not in this house." Tommy had no problem withthat. He converted
to Judaism and married Lisa in 1971. His acting career didn't proceed as
smoothly, however, and after bit parts in 4 forgettable films, Tommy
embarked on becoming the next Dion DiMucci. As the nasal voiced "T.D.
Valentine" ("The producer asked my initials, and it was Valentine's Day,"
Tommy explains), he cut 2 45's for Epic that moaned of evil women and the
traps of love. Both stiffed. Admits Tommy, "I was really mediocre." the
experience wasn't a total loss. While at Epic, Tommy begame friendly with
Sandy Linzer, a producer-songwriter whose pop hits-"Working my way back to
you" "Native New Yorker" and "Opus 17 (don't you worry bout me)' would
become fodder for K-tel commercials beyond counting. They were still
close when Tommy, now working as a song plugger for the music publisher
Chappell, came across a pair of singer-songwriters who billed themselve
Whole Oates. "They were like a couple of guy from Mars, "Tommy says of
his first encounter with "the short little guy," John, and the 6foot
6inch, platform shoed, lime-jacketed Daryl whose long blonde hair made him
"look like a woman from the torso up." But, oh, what music they made.
Part folk, part pop, part blue-eyed soul, it flat blew Tommy away. Sandy
was knocked out too, when he listened to the demo tape. The clunks at
Epic, however passed. Not to worry, Sandy told Tommy; from now on, they'd
pool their money and split it down the middle. Tommy began pulling his
weight when, with the promise of a record contract, he got Whole Oates to
drop their manager and sign with him. A lawyer friend of Sandy's named
Allen Grubman drew up the deal. For Tommy, who quickly became Allen's
even better friend, it was a doozy. he was to receive 25% of every gross
dollar that came in and, along with having his own expenses fully
reimbursed, own the name of the act, which switched to Hall and Oates.
Daryl Hall and John Oates made out less well. After 3 albums, they owed
the label Tommy found for them $230 000. A move to RCA substantially
improved their fortunes-not enough, though, to get Hall and Oates out from
behind the financial eight ball. With Tommy disbursing the funds and
overseeing the accounting, what had become the best-selling pop-rock duo
of all time had to borrow $250 000 to pay their taxes. More loans and
multi-million dollar advances followed , with Tommy raking in 25% off the
top every time. "Tommy was selling their future," says a former RCA
president. "It was his meal ticket, and Tommy likes to eat a lot." By the
time RCA dropped Hall&Oates, they were into the label for $7million and
had yet to collect a nickel in royalties or airplay fees.
Tommy, though was cruising Broadway, good pal Allen in the Limo seat
beside him. They were a strange duo: Tommy always toned the Bronx tale
slick; Allen-who'd begun as a lawyer for Veg-O-Matic-usually fat and
sloppy. Ambition, though, they had in common. Looking to expand
operations in 1975 they filed incorporation papers for Tommy's new
management company. It was christened Don Tommy Enterprises.

Theories for Tommy's choice of corporate moniker abound. One of the more
popular contends that it had something to do with his enlarging circle of
chums, who by now included Morris Levy (owner of the Northeast's largest
chain of record stores and a longtime associate of the Genovese crime
family) as well as Father Louis Gigante, an oft investigated Bronx priest
who says he introduced Tommy to his brother Vincent, better know as Mob
boss "Vinnie the Chin." Where Tommy fitted in this firmament was debated.
Some such as later client John Mellencamp, thought Tommy's friends-like his
exulting at an act's listing him on liner notes as"capo di tutti capi"-were
merely accoutrements in a wiseguy act. Yeah, Tommy had John Gotti's move of
slipping his hand into his jacket down cold, and, yeah Sire records chief
Seymour Stein liked to call him "Tommy Mazola" after his gold chains and
purple leather jackets. But Tommy a mafiaso? mellencamp laughs: "He
couldn't whip sit with an eggbeater." Others weren't so sure, which was
fine by Tommy. "Hey" he says, "if that gives me the edge, O.K. All I want
to do is win, man. Period." That at the very least, Tommy palyed the thug
role well is widely remembered. "he was capable-more that capable-of
doing what had to be done, even if it was unpleasant," says publicist
Rchard Gersh, who had Tommy as a client after the young music man switched
the name of his management company from Don Tommy to the more decorous
Champion Entertainment. "If there were people who Tommy had to get rid of,
he would do it without a second thought. He'd just say,"we're making a
change. You're out.' Right away, I had the feeling that this guy was
going to be very successful in the entertainment industry." Sandy Linzer
thought so, too. Clients were even writing songs about "little Gino," as
a Hall and Oates number called him, telling the world, in the words of
"Cherchez La Femme," by Dr.Buzzard's Original Savanah Band, that 'Tommy
Motolla lives on the road." A partner like that was to be treasured, and
Sandy did. "I loved the guy," he said, "and I knew that he loved me." The
love got lost in 1984, when Linzer learned he'd been cut out of Champion.
According to court papers, Grubman pointed the finger ar Tommy, claiming
that even though he was Linzer's friend and attorney he'd had no choice
but to ice him. Tommy, who settled the whole business out of court,
didn't miss a beat. "Things happen in this business," he says. "You get
hot, you get cold. Sandy got cold."

By then, anyways, Tommy and Allen had aquired a new best friend who could
do them a lot more good than Sandy. That was CBS records chairman Walter
Yetnikoff, boss of what was at that time the largest music company on the
planet. Brash, bumptious, foulmouthed, the self-proclaimed "King Of The
grooves" was a creature of outsize appetites: for"schmingling and
bingling," for deals, booze, for women, for drugs. It was his liking for
characters with similar backgrounds (Brooklyn-bred, Jewish, up from the
streets) that bonded Yetnikoff to Grubman, who introduced him to Tommy.
That friendship soon took, and in 1977, CBS announced a production deal
with Champion Entertainment. Tommy, however, neglected to inform RCA in
advance-a sizable oversight, given that RCA was home to Champion's major
acts. When with considerable pricliness, RCA pres. Bob Summer pointed
this out, Tommy went to Yetnikoff, who let him out of the deal. "From
that point on." Tommy told journalist Frederic Dannen, "I knew the kind of
guy Walter was. If he was your friend he was really and truly your
friend." They were all friends. Or so, for a long time, it seemed.
Knowing he could count on Grubman to keep the artists in line, Yetnikoff
steered the attorney more and more acts. "Steered" actually doesn't do
justice to the dimensions of Walter's assistance. In the case of Billy
Joel, "muscled" comes closer. As in Walter's (A) telling Billy he would
not deal with his current lawyer (B)informing him he could have anything
he reasonably wanted; and (C) pressing into his hand the telephone number
of Allen Grubman, Esq., who happened to do legal work for CBS Records as
well. Was there a conflict of interest? not for Grubman, who collected a
$750 000 fee. Tommy had no complaints, either. With an addition of
clients such as melencamp and Carly Simon and new friends including Rob De
Niro and Mike Ovitz, he was able to move Lisa nad their 2 kids to a
mansion on a golf course. Tommy didn't see the place much, however. he
was too busy being the pal of Walter Yetnikoff. Night after night they
would be together, sometimes at one of the Mob joints in Little Italy,
Tommy grinning at the curbside soldati. "Relax just a couple of civilians
coming in." Other times the buddies hit the Mayflower Hotel, off Columbus
circle, where Tommy had the key to Hall & Oates suite. A member of what
Walter called his" shiksa farm' would get the call, a bottle would be
cracked, and out wold come the cocaine-untouched by Tommy(" I was the guy
who was always in control," he says). Senior CBS officials knew of
"Walter's personal valet," as was dubbed and were not ecstatic. Their
pique swelled when Tommy was showed up ina 1986 NBC report on Mob
infiltration of the music industry. It increased further when Tommy
invested in a racehorse syndicate operated by the ubiquitous Morris Levy,
who was about to get slapped with a dime term on a federal extortion rap.
"There was always a sort of shadow about [Tommy]," says a key aide to
former CBS charman Laurence Tisch, " a consideration that he was not above
board." No one at CBS produced any evidence to back up the suspicions, nor
were any concerns relayed to Yetnikoff, who by 1986, had wearied of
battling tightfisted Tisch abd was scouting for a new owner. He found
one, finally, in Japanese electronics giant Sony, which, eager to add
software to its hardware, paid $2billion for CBS's record division in
January 1988. Hardly was theink dry on the sale papers when Yetnikoff
began sounding out Tommy about up heading up the US labels, a job held by
abrasive M.B.A named Al Teller. Though widely respected in the industry,
Teller had never been a Yetnikoff intime. He also lacked Tommy's street
experience, a commodity that CBS desperately needed. Tommy's outstanding
credential, though, was proximity. "Walter likes to surround himself with
cronies" former Sony of America Chairman Mickey Schuloff told a reporter.
"And Tommy was basically taking care of Walter. He would take him to
parties, he would take him home from parties. He was always there. That
is Tommy's greatest strength. He is great at managing people."

Tommy, for his part, had little to lose by joining CBS. While Champion had
fattened his wallet, its stars were rapidly fading. CBS, on the other
hand, was an unmined mother lode, with a 400 performer deep talent rester that
stretched from Bruce Springsteen, Michael Jackson, and Bob Dylan on one
end to Barbara Streisand, Michael Bolton, and Harry Connick Jr. on the
other. To be sure, the CBS labels, Columbia and Epic, had flaws -namely a
reputation for artist alienating arrogance. But then, Tommy was not
without his own little smudges. He knew from nothing, he admitted, about
such stuff as "budgets or board of directors." But hey, he said, "it's
really only all about music. Its not like a big rocketscientist kind of
philosophy or anything." So it wasn't, and 2 days after attending a
testimonial dinner for Teller, Tommy and Walter closed the deal. The
appointment boggled the industry. "Walter could have done better by
opening the L.A. phone book and choosing at random," one manager was quoted
as saying. The news also brought a quick call to Sony from a CBS corporate
officer. " Do you know this guy has a Mafia background?" a senior
executive quotes the CBS man as saying. "What are you doing tainting this
wonderful company you just bought from us with a guy who has a background
that could make the F.B.I cringe?" Rattled Sony contacted the
F.B.I.director William Sessions, requesting a quiet background check. The
response was a qualified O.K. 'The F.B.I said, 'No this guy is not somebody
who will start dealing with people we should worry about, but he has
friends who do,"says a former senior executive at Sony. "we said as long as
he's clean, we won't worry." And that was the basis on which we didn't."
Aware of the probe, Tommy quickly began assembling a coterie of executives
loyal to himself. Trading in the purple leathers for custom tailored
Armani's, he also stepped up the talent search, a quest that led to that
one memorable 1988 night to a party hosted by CBS blues artist Brenda K.
Starr. As the guest mingled, someone slipped him a demo tape which he
popped into the casette deck in the limo. He knew at once he could make
the kid a star. By the time he raced back to the party however, the
mystery vocalist had vanished. But fairy tales have happy endings, and
within a week Tommy found the Cinderella with the five octave pipes. She
turned out to be 18 year old Mariah Carey.

So at least goes the press release version. The truth is
more mundane. At the time of Tommy's 'discovery," Warner's chief Mo Ostin
had already offered Mariah a $300 00 advance. Notified of competing
blandishments, Yetnikoff authorized Tommy to immediately up the ante 50
grand. Another item which the official rendition omits is that when
Mariah showed up in Tomy's office she was accompanied by the man who was
her producer and steady amour. He was not destined to endure in either
capacity. "The boyfriend" recalls an old Tommy pal, "was out of there in
nothing flat." Into his place stepped Lisa Motolla's
husband who was being spotted entwined with Mariah in New York nightspots.
Tommy denied any romance."With God as my witness," he told reporters
nothing's going on between us." But the relationship was common knowledge
at CBS, where one executive remembers Tommy regaling him with descriptions
of intimacies with Mariah. The estracurriculars didn't bother Walter, who
awarded his new charge a $3million bonus after he'd only been on the job a
few months. "One of the more interesting facts about Tommy is that he's
extremely smart," Yetnikoff assured the trades. "He's hidden that from
the world until recently." When Tommy allgedly warned a troublemaker, "
You better fucking watch it or you're going to be sleeping with the
fishes," Walter smiled. He smiled again when in the middle of Grubman's
divorce from his longtime wife, who suffered from Multiple Sclerosis, he
heard Tommy phone attorney Barry Slotnick, who has represented Vinnie "the
Chin" Gigante and John Gotti. :You tell your friend Raoul Felder [a famed
divorce attorney, representing Mrs.Grubman] to go easy on Allen." Tommy is
said to have advised. "he's part of the mishphoca" a Yiddish term that,
in Italian translates as la Famiglia. (Motolla denies both incidents) As
time went along, however, Walter got distracted: first by a monthlong
drying out at Minnesota's Hazelden clinic, then by his role in the
arrangements for bad boy producers Peter Guber and Jon Peters to take the
helm of Sony's latest acquisition, Columbia Pictures. During those
negtiations, which wound up costing sony $800 million in assorted payouts
and contract settlements, the newly sober Yetnikoff managed to alienate
nearly everyone, mst fatefully his Japanese bosses, who packed him back to
the record company.

In his absence, the company had become a different place. "This is my
team; these are my people,"Tommy bragged. The new hires were his people;
since Yetnikoff's Hazelden sojourn Tommy had been positioning himself to be
their leader-in-title as well as in fact. Schulhof knew of his
ambitions-"Tommy," he says, "has always been power-hungry"-and knew as well
that a number of industry figures were assisting in furthering them. By
far the most formidable was David Geffen, the bilionaire record impresario
and implacable Yetnikoff foe. More than once Gefffen had urged Schulhof to
get rid of Yetnikoff, and Geffen also urged Michael Jackson, Yetnikoff's
most prized act to leave CBS. Jackson was unwilling to do that but did
drop several key members of his entourage closely identified with
Yeynikoff. In their place, he installed figures tightly linked to Geffen.
Notable among them was an attorney Tommy had recommended to David years
before, Allen Grubman. Oblivious to the forces which were gathering
against him, in June 1990 Yetnikoff drew up a deal memo which called for
Tommy to receive an estimated 15 million over the next 5 years not includin
annual bonuses. Tommy meanwhile was doing some negotiating of his own.
First he secured a quick ie Dominican divorce from Lisa ("cultural
differences," Tommy said of the breakup). Then, with Grubman, he drew up a
fresh contract for Michael Jackson. When Yetnikoff saw the precedent
shattering terms, he exploded. "this is ridiculous," he roared "You're
giving away the fucking store!" Yetnikoff there upon oredered Grubman
banned from the premises and told Tommy to begin directing CBS acts to
other lawyers. "Bust him." Walter commanded. "Take away Living Color(a
rock act) Then tell Mariah to move." instead Tommy went to Schulhof.
Walter, he reportedly claimed was being irrational, unsettling the team,
hurting Sony. "Tommy was really shook up" says a witness. " His loyalty at
that point was more to Allen than it was to Walter." By mid-August, this
dawned on Yetnikoff, and he presented the Japanese with an ultimatum: it
was either Tommy or him.

Word of the threat promptly reached Motolla, who began planning
countermeasures with Geffen and Grubman. Among the first, according to a
highly knowledgeable sourse was reaching out to Sony co-founder Akio
Morita, through his goddaughter, Seiko Matsuda, a Japanese Pop start with
whom Motolla had spent many very long yet-according to Motolla-wholly
professional evenings. That attempt failed, but an approach to the Wall
Street Journal did not. Long suspected as a repository for Motolla leaks,
the Journal reported on Aug 17 that Yetnikoff had recently signed a
contract which would phase him out of the record groups management. The
mos "logical candidate" to replace him, the paper noted, was his
trustworthy lieutenant, Tommy Motolla. Matters at last came to a head on
Labor day, when Tommy allegedly warned Sony that were he to be forced out
the entire top tier of the record company would depart with him. "I'm the
one who's out on the streets looking for talent,"a Sony executive quotes
Tommy as saying. "Walter is sitting in his office drinking." ('That's not
the kind of thing that i say or would say,"Tommy says. 'That's completely
untrue.') But 24 hrs later, the King of The Grooves had his walking
papers. Tommy though did not take his place. To his consternation Sony
corporation chairman Norio Ohga assumed the chairmanship of the music
group and delgated day-to-day authority to Schulof. Another embarssment
for Tommy followed two months later: Lisa Motolla filed suit against her
ex and his employers, accusing them of conspiring to commit fraud by
concealing the terms of the contract which Walter had drawn up in June.
After Yetnikoff threatened that he'd back up Lisa's claims in court, Tommy
settled, parting with a sum put in the millions. "Tommy's lucky Sam
Clark's dead," the corridor crack went. "Otherwise, there's a bullet in
his forehead."

Another headache was journalist Frederic Dannen, whose best-seller, Hit
Men, had sketched the darker chapters of Tommy's past all too vividly.
Now Dannen had another story, told to him by a reputed Motolla aquaintance
named Michael Franzese. According to Franzese, whom Motolla doesn't
remember meeting, he'd lately been approached about buying Tommy's stake
in Champion. Franzese passed, though not out of lack of regard for Tommy.
"I heard from guys on the street that, you know, Tommy was a guy that
understands us," Franzese told Dannen. "Let's put it this way: I don't
know what affiliation he's had. I'm not going to say that about him. But
he's a guy that could relate to somebody like me....Tommy, we knew he was
a friend of ours." What made Franzese's comments noteworthy was his
previous occupation. Until he became a cooperating government witness,
he'd been a high-ranking caporegime in the Colombo crime family,a career
at which he'd been so proficient that Fortune listed him as one of the top
Mafia bosses in the country. Amidst the hubbub, The New York Times
weighed in with a withering assessment of Tommy's management. Headlined
SONY MUSIC'S MR. BIG SPENDER, the Dec 91 story lambasted Tommy for signing
a series of "rich unprecedented deals" - -among them a $25 million
contract for aging Aerosmith, a group which had just been dumped by
Geffen. In response, Tommy minions began planting stories that the Times
was prejudice against italian-Americans. When the negative press didn't
cease, Tommy became the anything-to-please charmer. "It's better to be my
friend than my enemy," he confided to a critical female reporter he
invited for drinks. "I have connections. You wanna meet Michael Jackson?
The Rolling Stones? I can arrange it. Just tell me:what is it you want?"
By the time the session was over, the reporter recalls, Tommy was offering
to set her up with studio time. He was already doing that and then some
for Mariah, authorizing the expenditure of $800 000 to produce her debut
album, $500 000 to redo the video for her first single and an additional
$1million in promotion and marketing to grease the launch of both. The
strategy worked like ganbusters for all concerned including Mariah's
management company, Thomas D Motolla's Champion Entertainment. Industry
figures giigled at the serendipity and giigled more when Tommy, branding
the talk about his concern for Mariah 'sexist," started slicing years off
his actual age. There was no giggling at Mariah's talent though. Critics
including Time might call her synthesized colortura offerings "NuraSweet
Soul,"but the cool, curvaceous product of a blonde Irish mother and a
black venzuelan father was genuine phenom. David Geffen has called her an
act "any label would be thrilled to have.

The performances of most of Tommy's other acts, however,
were not cause for celebration. But Tommy crowed about bright spots,
suchas the breaking of Michael Boloton and New Kids on the Block (both of
who were signed by teller). He claimed that since he had come aboard the
company's profits had tripled (an assertion The New York Times found
inflated five fold). But as 1992 began, Motolla's bottom line was
decidedly lackluster-particularly in comparison with the now unassailable
Warner's. Tommy's immediate concern, though was Schulhof, who had
formally taken over as chairman of the renamed Sony Music Entertainment in
Jan 91. As he had with Yetnikoff, Tommy strenuously massaged him. "He
made sure that he moved in on me, and he made sure that we had a good
relationship," says Schulhof, describing Tommy's daily dollops of
solicitude. "He managed me the same way he manages everybody else."
Privately however, Motolla was contemptuous of Schulhof-" an oppurtunistic
dunce," he called him to Jon Peters. Schulhof knew of the gibes, but,
taken by Tommy's hustle-as well as by his introductions to
superstars-defended his management in Tokyo, which was having trouble
parsing Tommy's explanations for dwindling market shares. "Maybe you can
find out what the facts are" a befudled Sony board member told a reporter.
'Maybe you can tell me." Tommy wasn't doing much talking to anyone.
Instead, he was making plans. Already, he'd cleansed the US labels of
most of Walter's loyalists. Now he was setting his sights om seizing
control of Sony's International division, which was being run in
glittering fashion by his old RCA nemesis, Bob Summer. With an elbow from
Tommy, the 'asset," as he called Summer in public, would be gone in 1993,
leaving Schulhof as the last barrier to total music-group control. His
ouster, however, require some doing. In the interval, Tommy began casting
covetous eye on Sony's motion-picture operations, which, under Guber and
Peters, had become renowned principally for office decor. As one
expensive flop piled atop another, Tommy, who had dabbled unsuccessfully
at being a movie producer, sought the advice of Bobby De Niro, who told
him to go for it. "I tried to convince him seriously to do it," says De
Niro. "because the people who were running it at the moment-he couldn't
have done it any worse." Tommy was tempted, but in the end decided to
stick with records, even though his relations with Schulhof were fraying.
Some of the disputes were petty, such as Tommy's alleged demand that Sony
provide him with round- the-clock bodyguards, a request Schulhof is said
to have greeted by throwing him out of his office. ("A joke. Nothing,
Absolutely untrue,' says Tommy.) Other reported conflicts were, however,
more substantive, such as Schulhof's blocking Tommy from purchasing rap
speacialist Interscope for $450 million. He was having an equally tough
time managing Michael Jackson, whose US sales were steadily dropping, in
part because of the well publicized allegations from a pre-pubescent boy.
"I knew it was always your problem," a Motolla aide claims he heard Tommy
tell the singer, when Jackson reequesting a $30 million check and a Sony
statement of support. "But you better fucking stop. You hear that
Michael? You better fucking stop." ("Absolutely not," Tommy says. "We
were totally supportive of Michael during that time. Absolutely never
said that." he also denies giving him the check.) Unappreciative, Jackson
phoned Schulhof. He wasn't to blame for his slump, he claimed, it was
Tommy's devotion outsize energy to promoting his now public girlfriend,
Mariah.

Jackson was at least half right. Mariah's career was soaring,
and Tommy was guiding it every step of the way. He approved her material,
oversaw her arrangements, checked her promotion and, to no one's surprise,
made sure her attorney was Allen Grubman, who, in addition to handling a
goodly chunk of Sony's legal chores, now represented a third of its talent
roster and the bulk of its key executives. "Allen Grubman is my best
friend in the world," Tommy says in response to questions about conflicts.
"End of subject. Over and out." he continued to feel that way even after
Billy Joel filed suit in 1992, accusing Grubman of a aundry list of
eyebrow raisers, including stoking Joel's business manager with kckbacks.
Grubman said that he was being used as "a deep pocket" scapegoat," and
Tommy smirked with the little fanfare, the suit was confidentially put to
rest a year later. Then Grubman blabbed, boasting to reporters that
there'd been no settlement," that he'd won "total victory" over Joel's
"frivolous" claims. In short order the singer's attorney was back in
court, with papers tarring not only Grubman but Tommy too. According to
the documents, which included a detailed replay of an F.B.I interview with
Grubman, things began going awry when Joel's business manager invested his
money in a string of racehorses and invited Tommy and Allen to do the
same. By and by, Tommy decided to reclaim his cash, onlt to be informed
by the business manager that the money was gone. The manager advised
Tommy, however, not ot worry: he was going to bump off a nag and collect
on the insurance. Without alerting Joel or the authorities, Tommy (who
remembers thinking the whole thing a joke) passed the news on to Grubman,
who later referred to the alleged scheme as "comic gossip." However, the
horse in question did die-officially of natural causes. The suit
settlement was even neater. The samd day Billy dropped his litigation, a
$2.4 million check arrived from Sony, along with a pledge of an additional
$600 000-supposedly for future record royalties and commercial
endorsements. Few in the industry believed it. "Why would Sony put up
$3million for Grubman, when they'd not been named in the suit?" says
Joel's lawyer. Leonard Marks. "the answer is"he's got the Motolla
connection."

In June 1993, Tommy took on a new connection of his own,
marrying mariah in a Manhattan ceremony described by one rock star guest
as "not so much a wedding as a coronation." Six months in the planning, it
was showbiz grandiose, featuring 50 young girls throwing floer petals, an
8 piece orchestra playing classsical music, a boy's choir, and a 300
member guest list encompassing Barbara Streisand, Bruce Sprigsteen, Gloria
Estefan, Michael Bolton, Billy Baldwin, Tony Danza, Christie Brinkley,
Sandy Gallin, Chynna Phillips, Tony Bennett, Mo Ostin, Ozzy Osbourne,
Robert De Niro, Michael Ovitz and, hardly last, Allen Grubman. The star,
naturally was Mariah, who watched tapes of Charles and Di's nuptials to
prepare, and whose 27-foot train required handling by 6 ladies in wiating.
At the reception afterward, David Geffen gawked at the violin players
lining the marble staircase of the Metropolitan Club, and another guest,
referring to the wedding's Episcopal-church venue, was heard to say ,
"Every marriage Tommy converts." The condition of Sony Music, however, was
nothing to laugh about, and Tommy was beginning to show the stress. On
one occasion, he reportedly had to be restrained from whipping out his gun
at a cabdriver who'd cut him off in traffic.("No I never pulled a gun on
anybody,'says Tommy. "that is outrageous, preposterous, ludicrous. These
stories all sound like jokes to me.") On another, he allegedly reacted to
an aide's resignation announcement by placing a pistol on his desk, then
turning his cheek and taunting, "Go ahead, take your best shot, I dare
you." ("No, I did not,"says Tommy.)

Schulhof had worries of his own. With Sony's motion-picture unit about to
force a $3.2 billion write off, he needed the crown jewel music group to
bail him out. Tommy, though wasn't coming to his rescue. "he's falling
into the same trap Walter did, "Schulhof told a reporter. "Relying too
much on the same old established superstars." His opinion was shared by
much of the industry, which bubbled with rumors that Tommy was on the way
out. The chatter got louder when Sony's in-house "urban"
label-DefJam-defected to Polygram, which proceeded
to increase its book value threefold. Then the old Tommy luck reappeared.
The cycle that spins the music business turned toward Sony, swelling
profits and revenues. Better yet, in Dec 1995 , the Japanese fired
Schulhof. In the reorganization that followed, the chairmanship of Sony
Music went to Thomas D. Motolla Jr. To hear Tommy tell it, everything
has been roses since. "Our business is going great," he says. "And you
know what one of the biggest satisfactions is? I've proven everyone wrong.
They all said I couldn't do it. Well, take a look at Billboard. That's
my report card, and it comes out every week. And you know what it says?
It says we're on top." What Billboard in fact says is this summer Sony
acts dominated The Billboard 200 albums chart. Warner's however continues
to dwarf Sony in all domestic categories, despite having spent the last 2
years beheading leading executives. For Tommy, this was a plus. It
allowed hin to claim that under him, Sony was the most stable shop in the
industry. how much loner the stability will continue is open to question.
While Tommy says, "This is my house, I built this house, and I'm not oging
to leave it," Sony Corporation President Nobuyoki Idei will be making the
final call, and already the differences between Tokyo and the Bronx are
showing. "If I write a memo to Tommy, he gets mad," Idei told the LA
times. "He goes crazy. He says, "What's the matter, don't you trust me?"
Tommy didn't help matters when during a visit to Japan last January, he
publically lectured Idei, telling him to leave him alone. Failure to do
so, Tommy told a gathering of nonplussed local journalists, could "scare
the death out of Eddie Vedder....and Bruce Sprinsgsteen."

A closer to home worry--closer even than Yetnikoff, who still vows
vengeance on the ex-friend he calls Scumolla' is Mariah. With tastes that
run to Rollerblading and riding the "really cool" Tower of Terror, Mariah,
friends say, is a very young 26 year old. They also portray her as
increasingly antsy about her husband's wardening("Always being up my ass,"
a former staff member quotes mariah as saying), which includes the
employment of 2 bodyguards, whose duties extend to accompanying her to the
bathroom door, and the placing on Sony's payroll of a constant
shepherdess, the wife of Epic Pres Dave Glew. For all of Tommy's
precautions, though, there have been slips: a Concorde flight during which
mariah poured out her problems to Diana Ross; an unwelcome frienship with
an old high school boyfriend ("Tearhis eyes out" an aide recalls Tommy
saying after he saw his wife being ogled, but Tommy says, "No, I never
said anything like that") and the most public incident, a noisy quarrel in
a Beverly Hills hotel lobby after this year's Grammy awards. The evening
was not a good one for Mariah, whose Tommy-arranged show opener with Boyz
II Men was soon overwhelmed by a killer gospel performance by Whitney
Houston. The night got worse as Mariah began losing in category afte
category. As the goose eggs piled up, TV cameras showed her face
tightening, while Tommy squirmed in the seat beside her. After the
sixth and final zip, her countenance was the picture of gum-chewing rage.
She vented it in the lobby of the Peninsula, where Sony was hosting what
was to have been a celebration. 'She was berating him that he didn't have
enough power to get her a Grammy," says a Sony executive. "It was like a
limp dick argument." When the shouting stopped and they went up to the
party, Tommy ordered monitors playing tapes of the awards switched off.

Since then, Mariah has stayed close to home-a$10 million estate detailed,
in a bit of fortuitous synchronicity, by the same contractors who did the
massive renovations of Sony's Manhattan headquarters. "We tried to live
up to every tradition," Tommy says of the 20000 sqft domicile that
resulted. "we joined hands and did it together......Tried to study
Georgian manor houses and make it look like a well-maintained 100 year old
mansion. Not bad for a kid from the Bronx, huh? From the accounts of the
vistors-who rate the spread the equal of anything in Harrison-not bad at
all. It's got 2 ponds;neighbours such as Ralph Lauren and Stanley Jaffe;
a kitchen the size of a boccie court ("He's so spoiled me with his food
that I can't go to restaurants anymore," Mariah gushed to a Tommy cleared
interviewer); so many rooms that Mariah' s not sure of the number; a
suberranean shooting range equipped with an arsenal of rifles, pistols,
and shot guns; color surveillance cameras secreted in birdhouses; and
overlooking an indoor swimming pool surmounted by a cloud-painted ceiling,
a state of the art, 64 channel recording studio. This elaborate facility,
says a friend, "just about eliminates the need for Mariah to ever go into
New York." Sometimes, though she does, passing through the 2 sets of
electronic gates Tommy's installed. A recent outing was for the 1996 Rock
and Roll hall of fame induction, at the conclusion of which the stars went
up onstage to jam. As the music swelled, Mariah stood up, about to join
them. Then she looked at Tommy, who gave 2 quick shakes of the head.
Just as quick, Mariah sat back down. Tommy who has awarded his wife her
very own vanity label-Crave, it's being called-denies the story, as he
does abetting the demis of racehorses, contributing to Yetnikoff's
downfall, Shivving Mickey Schulhof, knowing Vinnie "the Chin", and the
vague rumors of his own father's being involved with the bentnoses. (If
you print that he is," Tommy says jokingly, "he's gonna rub you out.")

The comment comes at the end of another drawn-blind day for Tommy, who's been
getting more than his share of bad breaks of late. For starters, Oasis
one of his hottest acts can't decide whether to break up or stay together.
For another, Sony Music Japan, source of a fifth of his profits, has kust
cut its 6 month earning forecast by more than a half. As if all this
weren't enough, word is spreading that Tommy's good friend Michael Ovitz
has been chatting with Idei about taking over Sony Music for Disney.
Nonethelesss, Tommy says he's feeling super. It's been several weeks
since our last encounter and he's been keeping close tabs on my enquiries.
He knows that Atlantic co-chair Ahmet Ertegun has called him a terrific
record executive; that Irving Azoff has laude him for being "graceful,
passionate, and posessed of big balls." Indeed even Billy Joel had good
words. Says a forgving Billy, "I think of him as a Roman. I mean, in the
classic sense." Of course Tommy knows there are other opinions out there,
so he's had his lawyers remind ex-employees of their confidentiality
agreements. Quite on their own, his old friend Daryl Hall and John Oates
have also been consulting lawyers in an attempt to find out where all the
money went. But Tommy's had lawsuits before-such as the one George
Michael filed to get out of his deal with Sony. And what did all the
claims of Tommy's connections with "unsavoury organizations" get Michael?
The sale of his contract to Geffen, who forked out $40 million. Mariah
though, is another story, a not at all happy one according to insiders.
"If you leave,"one said he advised her not long ago, " make sure you find
someone just as rich and powerful as Tommy. Otherwise, he's going to
destroy you." Answered Mariah, "Don't you think I know that?" There's no
sign of Mariah leaving just yet. But the lyrics she penned to a recent
song might give even the most secure of mates pause. "we were as
one,"they go, "for a moment in time/and it seemed everlasting/that you
would always be mine/now you wanna be free/So I'll let you fly." Perhaps
mindful of the message, Tommy's had an old record-boss friend, who happens
also to be a friend of Tommy's visitor, call to request that he do nothing
to disturb tranquility chez Mottola.

Not Tommy says, that he's got anything to worry about. To demonstrate how
relaxed he is, how absurd and hysterical are the stories told about him, he
presents a gift. It's a copy of Joseph "Joe Dogs" Iannuzzi's latest work,
The Mafia Cookbook. We laugh and Tommy starts to reminisce about the old
days: the night Bruce Springsteen spotted John Gottiin a restaurant ("He
yells over to one of the waiters, 'Hey, tell the boss that the Boss wants
to meet him'"); the good times with Hall & Oates ("They stayed at my house,
I cooked, I loaned them money-they were like brothers to me"); the
character Morris Levy was. "He was a funny guy, a great guy, a pioneer in
this business. If Morris were alive tiday I'd go to his house or he'd come
to mine." This would probably be new to Morris, who couldn't get Tommy to
take his calls while he was appealing his extortion coviction. That
Mottola, Morris growled to Frederic Dannen, "is a no-talent mover-upper.
He's a user." But Morris is dead, and Tommy's rolling, talking of the 15
million records Celine Dion has sold, the 30lbs he's got to lose, the "lot
cockier" attitude he used to have. "I was a hustler,' he says, 'a guy who
thought he knew it all. Iwas hungry, I was ambitious, I was anxious, I was
raging: budda-bump,budda-bump,budda-bump." Anyway, Tommy says those days
are gone. "Goin in and pushing my way around, i realized that was not
going to be the approach that works all the time. So now I wanna be able
to get along with everyone. I want everyone to live." He leans forward
the way Michael does in the movie, when he lets Kay ask him once, just
once, about the family business. "I'm serious," he says. "I'm telling
you the truth. Period."