Danny Sugerman's REAL Obituary

[Patricia]

In the "Correspondence" section of the February 10, 2005 [I]Rolling
Stone[/I], there is a letter from Jerry Hopkins under the heading
"[B]Goodbye, Danny[/B]." This is a [U]highly edited[/U] version of the
actual letter Jerry sent to Jann Wenner after Danny's death. Jerry's
asked me to do what I can to make sure as many people as possible see
the unedited version of the letter. So, here it is:

==========================================

Dear Jann,
I'm submitting an obit for Danny Sugerman, the longtime Doors manager
and my collaborator on
NO ONE HERE GETS OUT ALIVE, also a dear friend. There are several
previously untold stories
here and the surviving Doors won't like my telling them, but fuck
'em. I hope you can use
this. Danny earned it.

Thanks....Jerry

Danny Sugerman was what every rock band might dream about---a
loyal fan from
adolescence who in adulthood became a tireless and trusted career
manager, a champion whose
loyalty never ebbed. For the Doors, Danny wrote books and articles,
pestered everyone about
how great they were and actually believed his hype, and when it came to
negotiating contracts,
he could be a pit bull on steroids. It wasn't just Jim Morrison's
cult status that made the
surviving Doors multi-millionaires; it was for good fiscal reason that
kept Danny on the Doors
payroll for more than 20 years.
Born in 1954 in Los Angeles, he was one of three children of
a garment manufacturer
who would have liked his son to follow in his footsteps. But from the
time he was 16, after
he saw the Doors in concert and started cutting classes to hang out in
the band's West
Hollywood offices and answer fan mail, rock and roll was virtually all
he was cared about.
He idolized Morrison, who encouraged his early efforts at
writing---predictably
glowing reviews of the Doors' music that he gladly contributed to
anyone who'd print them.
Jim died in 1971 and after more than 30 publishers rejected a book
manuscript I wrote called
No One Here Gets Out Alive, Danny sold it to Warner Books (who actually
took it on the third
submission), then contributed a worshipful introduction, got poet
Michael McClure to write an
afterward, organized the discography and photos, and thus became my
"co-writer." Later, he
wrote a slightly fictionalized autobiography called Wonderland Avenue
in which Morrison again
played a huge role.
Initially it was the group's keyboard player, Ray Manzarek,
who paid Danny's bills
and gave him shelter, in exchange for helping keep the Doors name
alive. After the band's
revival in the 1980s, he started getting a percentage as manager. He
also produced an
illustrated history of the band, compiled a Doors book of lyrics, and
wrote the introduction
for a Doors box set, as well as managed marketing of the Doors catalog
and the release of
several videos. A book about Guns n' Roses and, briefly, management
of Iggy Pop, may have
been his only outside interests, though it could be argued that Iggy
and Axl Rose owed much to
the late Lizard King.
Through it all, Danny juggled and cajoled and pampered the
three separate
personalities who survived their singer's death. When Jim was alive,
decisions were never
made by majority rule---it had to be unanimous. They all agreed to
sell the rights to their
music to Oliver Stone for his 1990 movie The Doors---something they
hadn't done when
approached by other filmmakers---but then Ray Manzarek decided he
didn't like the script and
he acrimoniously pulled out as a consultant. Later, when Apple
introduced The Cube, the Doors
were offered $3 million for the use of one of their songs for a TV
commercial; previously,
they'd turned away all such use of their material, giving away rights
instead to Greenpeace
and the like, but now guitarist Robbie Krieger and Ray said yes and
drummer John Densmore
voted no, sending Apple to the Jimi Hendrix estate. Finally, when Ray
wanted to put the trio
back on the road with a new singer, John pulled out completely and took
Ray and Robbie to
court.
Danny also had Jim's estate to handle---ironically shared
by authority figures Jim
had no time for when he was alive, Jim's parents (his father was a
Navy admiral) and those of
his longtime girlfriend Pamela (whose father was a high school
principal).
Danny did have one other fixation: drugs. When Fawn Hall
became his secretary---
after she fled Washington, D.C., and the Iran-Contra scandal that
spotlighted her former boss,
Oliver North---and then, in 1991, his wife, he shared with her his
favorite, heroin. (Later,
he asked me to collaborate on a book called Heroin Honeymoon, but it
wasn't written.) Fawn
retaliated by introducing him to crack.
Eventually, they cleaned up and Danny worked for
organizations like the Drug Policy
Foundation and Musicians Assistance Program. But then Danny was hit
by lung cancer, and when
it went into remission, he was diagnosed with a brain tumor. He won
that fight, but the
cancer returned, payback for a lifetime of cigarettes. Adding insult
to carcinoma, in 2004
Ray fired him. Danny told me he didn't know why.
Danny died at age 50 on Jan. 5 in Los Angeles, survived by
his brother, sister, and
wife. The family asked that instead of flowers, donations be made in
Danny's name to the
MusiCares/MAP Fund, 817 S. Vine St., Hollywood, CA 90038.

[SteveT]

Hmmmm.. Wonder why it was edited? Mostly just common knowledge stuff.

[Patricia]

<<Hmmmm.. Wonder why it was edited? Mostly just common knowled­ge
stuff. >>

I posted on the Doors message board (www.thedoors.com) that Rolling
Stone was running the edited letter and told people if they wanted to
see the unedited version they could email me off the board and I'd send
it to them. Dave -- who lurks here on occasion -- publicly, sweetly,
invited me to post the letter on the board. I declined. Then within
hours he sent me a nasty personal message calling me a troublemaker and
telling me that from now on he'll be reviewing every post I try to make
and he'll decide if it gets posted or not. Since Dave is Ray's sock
puppet, apparently something in Jerry's letter hit a bit of a nerve.
Just imagine what would've happened if I'd actually posted it on the
Doors board.

[Jane Asher's Vagina]

On 31 Jan 2005 15:24:55 -0800, Patricia wrote:

> In the "Correspondence" section of the February 10, 2005 [I]Rolling
> Stone[/I], there is a letter from Jerry Hopkins under the heading

> "[B]Goodbye, Danny[/B]." Jerry's

> asked me to do what I can to make sure as many people as possible see
> the unedited version of the letter. So, here it is:

Picking you, PButt, as a trusted source is akin to picking Barry Bonds as
Male Athlete of the Year.

[Patricia]

<<Patricia wrote:
> In the "Correspondence" section of the February 10, 2005 [­I]Rolling
> Stone[/I], there is a letter from Jerry Hopkins under the ­heading
> "[B]Goodbye, Danny[/B]." Jerry's

> asked me to do what I can to make sure as many people as p­ossible

see
> the unedited version of the letter. So, here it is:

Picking you, PButt, as a trusted source is akin to picking B­arry Bonds

as
Male Athlete of the Year. >>

How clever. Now what's it supposed to mean? I wasn't the source of
the letter, Jerry Hopkins was. If you don't believe that, email him
and ask him. You can contact him through his website,
www.jerryhopkins.com.

[Jane Asher's Vagina]

> Picking you, PButt, as a trusted source is akin to picking B苔rry Bonds

> as
> Male Athlete of the Year. >>

On 1 Feb 2005 16:52:36 -0800, Patricia wrote:

> How clever.

Thank you.

> Now what's it supposed to mean?

If you don't know what it means, how did you know it was clever, Ms.PButt.
do tell.

> I wasn't the source of
> the letter, Jerry Hopkins was. If you don't believe that, email him
> and ask him. You can contact him through his website,
> www.jerryhopkins.com.

Thank you so kindly.

Pass.