0:04

On this episode of news World. For fans

0:06

of HBO's award winning and popular

0:08

Succession TV series, which

0:11

follows the roy family as they

0:13

buy for control of their media empire, here

0:15

comes a new book, Unscripted,

0:18

the epic battle for a media empire

0:21

and the Redstone family legacy.

0:23

And while the Succession series is inspired

0:25

by the Murdock family, Unscripted

0:28

is the true story of Sumner Redstone

0:31

and the Redstone Family as they wrestled

0:33

for control of Paramount Global, an

0:35

empire that included Paramount, CBS,

0:38

MTV, Nickelodeon, Showtime,

0:41

and Simon and Schuster. Here to

0:43

discuss their new book. I am really

0:45

pleased to welcome my guests, James

0:48

B. Stewart, New York Times bestselling

0:50

author and columnists to The New York Times, and

0:52

Rachel Abrams, reporter and senior

0:55

producer for the New York Times television

0:57

documentary series The New York Times

0:59

Presents James

1:09

and Rachel. Welcome and thank

1:11

you both for joining me on Newtsworld.

1:13

Thank you for having us.

1:15

Yeah, great to be here.

1:16

I'm really curious how did you two decide

1:19

to work together on Unscripted?

1:21

Well, Jim and I were both reporters

1:24

at the Times, but we actually had never met

1:26

before. But it turned out that we

1:28

at the height of the me too movement, had both

1:30

gotten different tips about

1:32

what we ended up learning was the same

1:35

story, and that was the real

1:37

reasons why Les Moonvez, the former

1:39

head of CBS, was ousted from

1:41

the company. I had gotten a tip, Jim

1:43

had gotten a tip, and an editor had said, you know, I

1:45

think you guys should pair up. And Jim

1:47

had the benefit of sitting on the outside aisle

1:50

where his desk was, so that all the foot traffic

1:52

coming and going from the newsroom would pass by, and

1:55

I passed by one day I said, oh, you know, let me just stop

1:57

and ask Jim. And I had to introduce myself

1:59

because we didn't even know each other, but I asked

2:01

him what he was working on. I told him about this source

2:04

that had come forward with a treasure trove

2:06

of materials that really complimented

2:09

some materials that Jim was already getting from

2:11

his source. And we paired up and started

2:13

reporting out the story for The New York Times,

2:15

And at some point Jim and I looked at each

2:17

other and we just thought, Wow, this whole saga with

2:19

less Moonvest and the Redstone family. This is

2:21

such an incredible family drama

2:24

and human drama. This really deserves a book.

2:26

So that's kind of how it started.

2:27

Yeah, I'd never done a book with anyone before,

2:30

and what we worked together really good on the stories

2:32

that kind of spawned it. But looking

2:34

back on it now, I think, wow, that was a

2:36

big risk. I keep pinching myself

2:39

that it worked out so well because

2:41

we've had a wonderful time working together

2:43

on this, and Rachel said, I'm glad

2:45

we had each other because these revelations

2:48

were so amazing that you know, Rachel will call me and

2:50

said, can you believe this? And I'd call back and

2:52

say, oh my god, guess what I just found? Because

2:54

it was great to have someone to kind of share those

2:57

discoveries with as they unfolded.

2:59

Was it a little startling, as you were in the middle of

3:01

all this to have Succession show

3:03

up as a TV series.

3:05

I remember our editor mentioned quite early

3:07

on that there were similarities,

3:09

and at that point

3:11

I deliberately decided

3:14

I'm not going to watch this. I

3:16

didn't want it in any way influencing

3:20

how we ended up interpreting

3:22

our material and then presenting

3:25

it in written form. So I

3:27

only watched Succession

3:30

after we had turned

3:33

in the manuscript. Of

3:35

course, now I'm an avid watcher. I'm like waiting

3:38

every Sunday night for the latest episode

3:40

to drop. And the parallels

3:42

are incredibly interesting,

3:44

and the difference. It's Rachel and I've spent

3:46

some time talking about all that, but I

3:49

don't know, Rachel, you might have plunged in sooner

3:51

than I did. I've been obsessed.

3:53

It's so great. I think it was really good to

3:55

have one of us not have seen it

3:57

and one of us have seen it, just because now

4:00

being asked to compare the show, it's fresh

4:02

in both of our minds, and I've of course been

4:04

stewing on this for a little while longer.

4:06

We're so grateful for the Succession audience because

4:08

truly, the audience that likes Succession

4:11

will love this book, because this is such a good

4:13

example of the truth can be stranger than fiction.

4:16

We were at a party in Los Angeles recently

4:18

and somebody walked up and said, your

4:21

book, Unscripted makes Succession

4:23

look like Little House on the Prairie.

4:28

Well, I mean, that does seem like there's a

4:30

pathology of families

4:32

of enormous wealth, the ones that are healthy

4:34

are fine, but the ones that are unhealthy have

4:36

the resources to become really pretty strange.

4:39

H that's a very good way of putting it.

4:41

Yeah.

4:41

I think one of Rachel's famous lines, because you

4:43

dug this up, Rachel, was that the Redstones

4:46

gave each other subpoenas for Christmas.

4:49

Yes, that was the joke around CBS.

4:52

That was the joker, and that the employees would use.

4:54

There's all this litigation, and this high

4:56

powered litigation with expensive lawyers. I mean, you have

4:59

to be very rich to be going

5:01

around suing everybody and defending lawsuits

5:04

and launching lawsuits. And there were

5:06

a lot of lawsuits here, which, by the way, was good

5:08

for us because they all produce a

5:11

treasure trove of original materials

5:13

as evidence, much of which we were able

5:15

to get our hands on or see at

5:17

one time or another, even if some of it had been sealed

5:20

from public view. If there's an overriding

5:22

moral of this story, it's if you want

5:24

to be a billionaire, and you might think twice about

5:27

it. I think money can enhance

5:29

people's quality of life, no doubt about it. But too

5:31

much money sows its own

5:34

problems. I know. That's not a new idea because all the way

5:36

back to Shakespeare, but it's very dramatic

5:38

in this tale. I think a point

5:40

that Rachel has made and

5:42

I agree with it, is that you would

5:45

think that when you have that much money,

5:47

you would be surrounded by the best advisors

5:51

and the best of everything. Really, you can afford

5:53

that the accountants, the lawyers, the pr

5:55

people, and they were. There was an

5:57

army of them there, and yet the

5:59

guardrails went off. And what explains

6:02

that? And it's fascinating to see

6:05

again, when you have that much money,

6:08

even though you're paying for all this high powered advice,

6:11

so few of these people seem willing to

6:13

tell in this case, some the Redstone

6:15

what he didn't want to hear. It's an echo

6:18

chamber where everybody is current favor

6:20

and trying to get something out of you, and

6:23

so they feed you what they think you want to hear,

6:25

rather than what the best advice might be. I think

6:27

that's part of it. And then I

6:30

totally agree that the psychology of this,

6:32

particularly in a world

6:34

where nobody ever contradicts you.

6:36

You're rich, you're powerful. People

6:39

want to do what you want, and I guess your

6:41

ego sort of swells and you know, you're complimented

6:43

all the time, every says you're a genius, you

6:46

start to believe it. It creates

6:48

a lot of problems.

6:50

In the case of the Redstone

6:52

family, how many of the problems came from

6:55

Sumner and how many of them

6:57

came from other members of the family

6:59

who so how would sour well.

7:01

Certainly Sumner's temperament

7:04

and his ruthlessness and his need

7:06

to win at any cost really

7:09

was detrimental to his relationships and

7:11

caused him problems later in life. Jim

7:13

has said, for example, that this book

7:15

really made him think and made both

7:17

of us think that what matters is the relationships

7:19

you have in your life, especially at the end of your life

7:21

when you become vulnerable. And Sumner

7:24

pushed away his son, they were not

7:26

on speaking terms for years after a dispute.

7:29

He was ruthless and mean and abusive

7:31

to his daughter, and so basically

7:34

the way that he treated people this is just one example

7:36

from the book, but the way that he treated his own

7:38

family and people that might have cared about

7:40

him more and been in position to protect him left

7:43

him vulnerable for users and hangers

7:45

on. In particular, the two women who

7:47

moved into the mansion and basically took over

7:49

his life and isolated him from his family

7:52

and made off with at least one hundred and fifty

7:54

million dollars and by the way, almost took over

7:56

his entire media empire. So that's

7:59

just one example of the way that he

8:01

treated people, really coming back to haunt him

8:03

later in life.

8:05

I think the core relationship here is

8:08

I think Sumner and his daughter, Sherry.

8:11

We think it's interesting that literature and particularly

8:13

nonfiction hasn't explored that father

8:16

daughter relationship in much depth,

8:18

at least compared to fathers and sons and mothers

8:20

and daughters. It's really very interesting

8:22

to see the mix

8:24

that Sumner subjects

8:27

her to of both competition,

8:31

belittling her because she's a woman,

8:33

having expectations of

8:35

her because she's a woman, but in the end treating

8:38

her horribly. And it's

8:41

incredible. He did drive his son away, and

8:44

it's amazing that he didn't drive his daughter

8:46

away. I mean, he came close. There were points

8:48

where she said, look, I'm just going to sell get out of

8:50

this, try to detach, but she hung in

8:52

there, and in the end express

8:54

is maybe the only person left who really

8:56

loved him. And I think It is a tribute

8:59

to that very strong family. Beyond

9:01

that she still had this yearning

9:04

for his love and affection despite

9:06

everything that he inflicted on her.

9:08

In March nineteen seventy nine, Sumner

9:11

was staying at the Copley Plaza and

9:14

caught fire. He escaped through

9:16

a window. He hung from a ledge and

9:19

literally the flames apparently engulfed

9:22

his arm and his hand. After

9:24

sixty hours of surgery at Mass General, his

9:27

right hand was permanently deformed a

9:29

little more than a claw. How

9:32

much do you think having that disfigurement

9:35

affected him and shaped him.

9:37

I think that he himself would often use

9:40

this as an example of how he could survive anything,

9:43

and he would half jokingly say

9:45

that he didn't need a succession plan

9:47

because he was going to live forever. And

9:50

I don't think it's a stretch to say that this incident

9:52

really gave Sumner a sense of invincibility

9:55

and certainly a need to win it all costs,

9:57

because to him, this incident was an example of if

9:59

I could s this, I could survive anything,

10:02

and I should be able to win and get

10:04

whatever I want.

10:05

So instead of disfiguring him psychologically

10:08

in a negative way, it actually

10:10

gave him a sense of empowerment, which

10:13

may have been a way of coping with walking around

10:15

every day with a deformed hand. That

10:17

you can't hide it, so it either makes you feel

10:19

bad or it's proof of your invincibility.

10:22

It's certainly impossible to get inside his

10:24

head, but I would argue that if you

10:26

want to measure it as a positive

10:28

by how it affected him and his ability

10:31

to be successful in business. Sure,

10:33

maybe it did drive him business

10:35

wise, but I would argue that that temperament

10:38

really destroyed some of his relationships

10:40

and his personal life in ways that we were talking about

10:42

that really came back to bite him at

10:45

its heart. People love Succession because it's

10:47

a family drama that is not about

10:49

the business. The business is just the backdrop. And this

10:51

too, it's not about Paramount

10:53

and yacommon CBS. That's the backdrop

10:56

to this really difficult, sad,

10:59

torture times abusive

11:01

family story. And I think if

11:03

you measure in that sense, that fire was

11:05

really very destructive.

11:07

He had his insecurities, believe me, and there

11:10

was a poignant exchange that we were able

11:12

to report between him and one

11:14

of his many many women

11:16

that he was involved in and purported

11:19

to love whatever. But he said, at one point,

11:22

would you be interested in me if

11:24

you know I wasn't you know, this rich and powerful

11:27

mogul. And you know, she said she

11:29

had to pause and said, well, you

11:31

know, I don't know. You know, you're not very nice.

11:35

I thought that was a really very poignant exchange.

11:37

But you know, it was never about his hand.

11:40

He didn't have an insecurity about that. As

11:42

best I could tell, there wasn't ever any in

11:45

the many many interviews we did, no one ever said

11:47

that he was the least bit defensive about that. He

11:49

didn't hide it. He would play tennis

11:51

with it, with the tennis racket

11:53

strap to his arm. I think,

11:55

as Rachel said anything, he was kind

11:57

of proud of this sort of badge of revival

12:01

and a testament to his incredible

12:03

will power. And it was

12:06

very fierce.

12:07

It strikes me it's almost a Shakespearean play.

12:11

They have all these different tensions and greatness

12:14

and darkness mixed together. Yeah.

12:16

One of the things I people say, oh, and business

12:18

reporting, whatever you know business reporting,

12:21

or even you know, as you well know, political reporting,

12:24

it's people reporting. I mean,

12:26

we all share these qualities

12:28

to varying degrees. And they're on full

12:30

display here. It's just that in this context

12:34

you add a big helping of money

12:36

and power, which maybe you kind

12:38

of magnify some of this, But I

12:41

think anybody can identify with the

12:43

powers and recognize some of these qualities,

12:46

in many cases in their own families, stripped

12:48

of the fact that these people have billions of

12:51

dollars.

13:09

What surprised you the most as

13:12

you researched the book? And was it

13:14

the same thing or was each of you surprised by something

13:16

different?

13:17

We had so many do you want

13:19

to start, Rachel?

13:20

I think it's kind of what you were saying before, Jim about

13:22

the lack of guardrails around this guy.

13:25

Yes, of course Sumner's money made him a target

13:28

for some of the abuse and some of the people who took

13:30

advantage of him. But I was

13:32

so shocked that there wouldn't be more guardrails

13:34

around him to keep those types of people out. And

13:36

it was really very sobering, thinking, well, if

13:38

it could happen to him, it could happen to

13:40

anybody. I think anybody who's listening

13:43

to this podcast who's ever had to deal or

13:45

take care of somebody they loved as they grew

13:47

older and was becoming more

13:50

infirm, more vulnerable. I think they'll

13:52

be able to relate to this book because this

13:54

is a guy who should have, as Jim said, had

13:57

so many more protections around him, he could afford

13:59

all the things in the world, and he didn't.

14:01

And I think people will understand

14:04

people who have cared for an aging love would

14:06

one will really understand how difficult

14:08

that can be. I think this is a good cautionary

14:10

tale that no matter how much money and power you

14:12

have, you need people that love you around

14:15

you to help you at the end of your life.

14:17

These two women who moved in the house with

14:19

him, one of them was his so called fiancees

14:21

you had a none caret diamond ring. The

14:23

other was a former girlfriend who

14:26

also kind of moved in and just stayed. And

14:28

they really took control

14:30

of his life in many ways as he deteriorated

14:33

mentally and physically as the age, and

14:35

I was very surprised to see how

14:37

close they came to taking over the

14:40

whole media empire and

14:42

the fortune. There was a supposedly

14:44

irrevocable trust that made

14:46

sure that this was going to descend to

14:49

his previous wife and to their children,

14:52

not that all that they had the best lawyers that could never be

14:54

broken. But what I came to realize

14:56

is they gained influence as long as he was a lot

14:59

he controlled the truees. And for

15:01

example, that trust that he control

15:04

could have sold these company

15:06

CBS Viacom, the

15:08

cable channel's paramount studio, to

15:10

these women for essentially a nominal

15:13

sum, and the trustees, because

15:15

he controlled that, would have approved

15:17

that, and that would have been the end of it. And they were consulting

15:19

a high powered New York lawyer, and they were well

15:21

on their way to that when very dramatic

15:23

events in the book, it all kind of blew up. But

15:26

like I said at one point, to be interesting to see at that

15:28

big moguls conference in some valley

15:31

every year, if suddenly these two women

15:33

Sydney and Manuela were wanding

15:35

around there as media moguls.

15:38

Were they sort of explicit collaborators.

15:41

Sydney and Manuela. Well,

15:43

they certainly formed some kind of an

15:45

alliance when it was convenient when

15:47

the two of them were both living in the mansion. They

15:50

were aligned with one another because their interests

15:52

were aligned up until the moment that they weren't.

15:55

And what I mean by that is the second

15:57

it appeared that Sidney Holland, one

15:59

of the two in was going to get booted

16:01

from the mansion, or that she had come into

16:03

Sumner's disfavor because he had found

16:06

out about a secret affair that she was

16:08

having with one of our other main characters

16:10

who we haven't even talked about yet, who is such

16:12

a trip, George Pilgrim. But the second

16:14

that Manuela found out that Sydney

16:17

had fallen into Sumner's bad graces,

16:20

she started plotting to basically

16:22

oustrf. I guess you could say that that alliance

16:24

was over the second it didn't favor Manuela.

16:27

Yeah, But to say they were collaborating, they

16:29

definitely were. Again another surprising thing

16:32

that we report in the book. They

16:34

siphoned off over one hundred

16:36

and fifty million dollars, which almost

16:39

all of which they have kept, And there

16:41

was one afternoon where they

16:43

cut off all communications from

16:46

Sumner to the outside world as usual lawyer

16:48

and then he proceeded to wire

16:51

ninety million dollars

16:53

into their accounts. Now

16:56

to call that collaboration, They were orchestrating

16:59

this, and they were moving

17:02

on many fronts to enrich

17:04

themselves and gain even

17:07

more influence over him. So I would

17:09

say if they were beyond collaborators in many

17:11

cases in this endgame, they

17:13

were the masterminds of this at.

17:15

That stage of his life. Were they more caretakers

17:18

than lovers.

17:21

It's a little hard to know. It's

17:23

sort of like at various moments, based

17:25

on a reporting, it appeared that they were

17:27

romantically involved. Manuela was certainly

17:30

romantically involved at one point, and then what would

17:32

you say, Jim short of transition to like house guest

17:35

slashed caretaker slash companion.

17:37

But it just certainly seems like their roles might

17:39

have shifted over time, and they were

17:41

also involved in bringing in other women to

17:44

have more intimate relationships with Sumner

17:47

that perhaps they were not having.

17:49

Yeah, there's very detailed testimony,

17:52

and I will say we didn't put all

17:54

of it in the grounds of taste,

17:57

but yes, I think what happened is they

17:59

we had both been romantic glovers

18:01

at one point, and then they

18:03

began bringing in other women that

18:06

Sumner was fixated on to

18:08

administer shall we say,

18:11

his sexual appetites. Now we're talking

18:13

about someone you know now well into his nineties.

18:17

And there was testimony about

18:19

exactly what this entailed, and there

18:22

were limitations, shall

18:24

we say, but that didn't stop them from

18:27

trying, and they paid out a lot

18:29

of money to these women

18:31

who would come in and try to administer

18:33

it to Somener's appetites. But

18:36

I think by this point Sydney and Manuel

18:38

themselves, perhaps by

18:40

design, had shifted these responsibilities

18:43

to the women they were bringing in.

18:45

So here you have an aging billionaire who

18:48

clearly is very smart. But to

18:51

what extent do you think he's aware that he's

18:53

being isolated. I mean,

18:55

at what point does he rebell and say, no,

18:58

you can't cut me off from the world.

19:00

Well, until the news of the affair

19:03

very dramatically disrupted

19:05

that relationship, he

19:08

seemed either unwilling

19:11

or incapable of breaking those

19:13

ties, even though it's clear, or

19:16

the best we can tell, he

19:18

was growing increasingly unhappy. I mean,

19:20

the staff and the nurses would report

19:23

that he would have these episodes of

19:25

crying, and he would beg

19:28

Sydney and Manuel for one thing or another, and

19:31

they were quite harsh with him and in

19:34

some cases sort of belittled him

19:36

in his condition, and

19:38

his family would occasionally visit and

19:41

get through, but the women kept reducing

19:43

that and cutting it off and then sometimes he'd

19:45

cry and say, oh, you know, to his daughter, I wish

19:47

you know, I wish you could stay, but you have to go because Sydney

19:50

doesn't want you here. He seemed

19:52

to enthralled to them until news

19:55

of this affair, which caused

19:57

him to irrupt. And

20:00

that was the one thing that he had always said he wouldn't

20:02

tolerate. And that did lead

20:04

to a rupture here, and that was the opening for

20:06

share, his daughter and his

20:08

family members to re enter his life.

20:11

But until that point, and again, I think

20:13

when Rachel said this is a problem many families

20:15

face, there's no question that

20:18

he was mentally and physically deteriorating

20:20

at that phase of his life. He'd alienated

20:22

so many other people, and

20:24

he was very very dependent on

20:26

these women. And one of the things that they did

20:28

to maintain their influence over him was

20:30

threatened to leave him, and they would say,

20:33

you'll be all by yourself. No one else loves

20:35

you. We're the only people who love you. And

20:37

they kept drumming that in and

20:39

that is according to the testimony

20:41

that came out in some of the trials. That's a classic

20:43

element in cases

20:46

of alleged elder views.

20:48

In that sense, you have people

20:50

who become sort of his surrogate

20:52

family, cutting him

20:54

off from his real family.

20:56

Well, yeah, and then the chief executive of Viacom,

20:59

which owned the Paramount Studio and the cable

21:01

channels, was openly

21:04

reported to be his so called

21:06

surrogate's son. Again, having completely

21:08

alienated his real son, the

21:11

chief executive there stepped

21:13

into that role. And the

21:15

financial performance of the company was

21:18

horrible. It was terrible, and yet

21:20

he absolutely remained

21:23

loyal to this surrogate son.

21:25

And even after the women were out and

21:27

Cherry reasserted herself and was

21:30

sort of saying, you know, I think there's some problems

21:32

here, and he said, don't tell me to fire

21:34

him, because I'm not going to do that. The story

21:37

it took some very dramatic events for that relationship

21:40

to deteriorate. But again,

21:42

I think it shows this melding

21:44

of business and personal emotions

21:47

which really began to influence

21:50

the course of the business empire.

21:52

But the business empire remained pretty remarkable

21:54

and up to his death.

21:57

Yes it did, but certainly it

21:59

was Jim. Wouldn't she say that they were not particularly

22:01

prepared for some of the forces that were overtaking

22:03

the media industry more broadly, and arguably

22:06

they could have been had they had shall

22:08

we say, less distracted leadership force.

22:11

Yes, I think that everyone would agree, including

22:14

members of the Redstone family, now that they

22:16

were very important, in some cases,

22:19

very healthy company. CBS was indisputably

22:21

the number one rated broadcast

22:24

network, but at a time when the

22:26

broadcast networks were beginning to lose

22:28

their grip on the entertainment

22:31

landscape. And that was true of all almost

22:33

all the assets that the

22:35

digital revolution, the rival of streaming

22:38

of the Netflix, Amazon, of Disney

22:40

Plus getting underway. All of this was happening

22:43

while this fighting was going on,

22:46

and the boards were locked in combat,

22:48

and I don't know there's any question that they

22:50

lost two or three very critical

22:53

years squabbling over

22:55

the future of who was going to control all of this

22:58

and in what form that would take, while

23:00

the world was dramatically changing,

23:03

and now the paramount global

23:05

empire is struggling to

23:07

contend with these giants that emerged

23:10

in the entertainment space.

23:26

It struck me as kind of amazing that his

23:29

family starts with drive in theaters. If

23:32

you think about the scale of change

23:34

from there to hear and he

23:36

rode most of that wave until

23:38

he finally became older. He didn't, but there was a

23:41

long stretch there where he seemed to

23:43

be a genius.

23:44

He took credit and I don't know that anyone disputes

23:46

it for inventing the idea of

23:48

the multiplex. They

23:50

started with two drive in movie theaters outside

23:53

of Boston, and the advantage

23:55

of that was they were in suburban locations

23:58

readily accessible by auto, unrelatively

24:01

inexpensive land as opposed

24:03

to say, the downtown traditional

24:06

marquee movie theaters. So he

24:08

had the idea of turning those into

24:11

the standalone brick and

24:13

mortar theaters where you had many

24:16

films showing at once, and

24:18

that, of course became a very very

24:20

successful model for movie

24:23

distribution spread all over the country. So that

24:25

was clearly a brilliant breakthrough, and he

24:27

was obsessed with the business. He knew the

24:30

box office numbers from

24:32

memory at like every theater in their

24:34

chain, and like we call he's

24:36

writing to the Davenport, Iowa newspaper

24:39

when Jaws opens, they hit theaters all

24:41

over the country. He knew it all. He was

24:44

very on top of the business.

24:45

So in a sense, the business had absorbed

24:48

him, and to some extent, that

24:50

may explain why I had

24:52

such difficulty with personal relationships.

24:55

Well, he was certainly obsessed with that

24:57

and making the money and making deals. So

25:00

that really is what launched

25:02

it from being a movie theater chain to

25:05

owning the content creation.

25:08

And he participated in the junk

25:10

bond revolution. He made bids

25:12

for other companies. That's how he

25:14

got CBS, That's how he got Viacom,

25:17

and then in many ways, the crown jewel

25:19

that he cared about the most was

25:21

Paramount Pictures, and he

25:23

got into a bidding war with Barry

25:25

Diller. Barry Diller was very, very

25:28

successful media executive

25:30

started the Fox Network years ago, had

25:33

emerged as and he's still a

25:35

brilliant successful media

25:38

executive today. But Sumner

25:40

Resident beat him in the bidding

25:42

for Paramount, and that

25:44

was a triumph that really was in some ways

25:46

the high point of his dealmaking life.

25:49

But it also was the path to Hollywood.

25:51

And Sumner was

25:54

seventy six by the time he

25:56

finally put this empire together and he moved

25:58

to Hollywood, so he was already kind

26:00

of getting up there, maybe a little

26:03

late to be arriving on the Hollywood scene,

26:06

but that move to Beverly Hills

26:09

seemed to mark a very significant

26:11

turning point in his life where

26:13

he was no longer just ruthfully focusing

26:16

on his business. But he got divorced. He had

26:18

an second wife, he got rid of her. He

26:20

started seeing all these women. You

26:22

know, it is kind of a cliche, but he

26:24

got a taste of the glamor and

26:27

the prestige and the excitement of the

26:30

movie business in Hollywood, and it

26:32

was a turning point in his life, and

26:34

not one for the better.

26:36

Now, as I understand that his daughter, Sherry

26:39

has ended up with most of the empire,

26:42

would that be an accurate Stevemen, Yes,

26:45

what happens to her brother?

26:47

Her brother has been living on a

26:49

ranch in Colorado for years

26:51

now, and he had a falling out with his

26:53

father when he felt that his father was truncating

26:56

this a bit, but essentially felt

26:58

that his father was giving Jerry too

27:00

much power and control over the family business.

27:03

Right.

27:03

They didn't speak for how many years, Jim did? They not

27:05

speak for like decades? I want to say.

27:07

Yeah, he didn't go to his father's funeral,

27:10

didn't.

27:10

Go to his father's funeral, wanted nothing to do

27:12

with the business after that, and he is

27:14

absent from this story. Basically

27:16

from the time that our story starts, Sumner

27:19

had described Philippe Dlmond,

27:21

as Jim said, as a surrogate

27:23

son. One can only imagine how that made

27:26

his real son feel, to the extent that his

27:28

real son was even paying attention anymore to his

27:30

father's business.

27:31

One of the diabolical things that I think Sunder

27:33

did was to pit his children against

27:36

each other and to favor one

27:38

and the other, which, by the way, you see very

27:40

much in the Succession drama also

27:43

on TV happens in there. But this

27:45

went back and forth, and of course, naturally it

27:47

did create tensions and resentments

27:50

between brother and sister, who are

27:52

not in contact either

27:54

anymore. But there is an interesting wrinkle

27:57

in the story where granddaughter,

28:01

his son, Brent's daughter did

28:04

surface in the story and

28:07

aligned herself with

28:10

the two women who had moved in with

28:12

Sumner against Sherry in

28:14

that wing of the family. So those

28:17

resentments built

28:19

her down to the next generation

28:22

and has led to more tension and

28:24

trouble, and her bet on

28:26

the two women did not pay off, obviously,

28:28

when they were ejected, she went

28:30

with them, and there's still bad blood

28:33

at that level of the family.

28:35

This was Brent's daughter.

28:36

Brent's daughter is.

28:38

It does yet to be interestingly complex.

28:41

Yeah, and there's some incredible scenes that

28:43

are like kind of right out of succession, where

28:45

there'd be these birthday parties you

28:47

can only imagine, like the two women were

28:49

hosting first dated his ninetieth and his

28:51

ninety first is ninety second, and they

28:53

would invite the family members, and

28:56

then there's these family feuds break

28:58

out at the table Sunder's

29:01

birthday party where the two women are

29:03

the unofficial hostesses.

29:06

We call this a book unscripted because it's true.

29:08

But you couldn't make this up, you know, if this was

29:10

fiction, nobody would believe it.

29:12

Does Brent get a portion of the

29:14

money anyway, even though he's on a ranch in Colorado.

29:17

He sold his entire interest

29:20

in the family enterprise for I think

29:22

it was two hundred and fifty million dollars,

29:25

which of course is a lot

29:27

of money and I think has enabled him to

29:29

live.

29:29

That's a pretty big consolation prize.

29:31

And this was many years ago. By the day, I'm

29:34

sure it's grown. By today's standards, it would

29:36

even more. Although that really was pretty

29:39

small percentage of the total

29:41

value. I mean this empire, I mean

29:43

Sumner himself. I think his

29:46

fortune probably was estimated

29:49

by Forbes four billion dollars his personal

29:51

fortune, and that the empire's you know,

29:53

worth was above ten billion at

29:56

its peak. Now it's lower. So the two hundred and fifty

29:58

million, it's a lot. It was a relatively

30:00

small amount. At one point, Cherry was negotiating

30:03

to sell her part or about a billion.

30:06

That all fell through for reasons that

30:09

are clear in the book.

30:10

So she was forced to accept the four billion

30:12

because she couldn't negotiate the one billion.

30:14

Well, that deal fell through, so she kept

30:17

her interest, She kept her ownership

30:19

stake, which was twenty percent, and

30:21

then when her father died,

30:24

she gained control of the trust and

30:26

the family company that owned the

30:28

underlying assets. So she now has

30:31

her father's interests passed to her

30:34

and her family members.

30:35

An amazing story. Now there was one other person you

30:37

had mentioned.

30:39

George George Pilgrim.

30:41

Yes, what's the deal with him?

30:43

George Pilgrim seems like he is straight

30:45

out of Central casting if you read

30:47

this book. I mean he still has these chiseled

30:50

features from when he was a soap

30:52

opera star. He was an aspiring

30:54

actor. He never quite got

30:56

to the A list, but he certainly had a

30:58

bunch of credits to his name. He was very good

31:00

looking, and he was running around town in La

31:03

He ends up running some kind of a scheme.

31:05

I'm trying to remember exactly what he went to prison for.

31:08

I think it was a combination of male fraud and

31:10

possibly wire fraud as well. So

31:12

he ends up in prison. He's out of prison, and

31:15

he ends up romantically involved,

31:17

somewhat unexpectedly with

31:19

Sydney Holland, one of these two women who ends

31:21

up living with Sumner, and he proceeds

31:24

to have this really secret,

31:27

torrid affair with him. She'll take the company

31:29

jet and fly out to Sedona,

31:32

where he lives. They'd make passionate love,

31:34

and then she'd fly back before Sumner

31:37

went to sleep. So he was none the wiser and

31:40

George Pilgrim he thinks that he's

31:43

in love with this woman, they're going to get married,

31:45

and he ends up being there undoing.

31:48

He's basically the butterfly that flaps

31:50

its wings and causes its tsunami halfway

31:53

around the world because when he finds

31:55

out that Sydney is actually involved

31:57

more than she's represented with some no red Stone.

32:00

He goes berserk and he gives an interview

32:03

to Vanity Fair where he basically spills

32:05

the beans. He says, I've been involved with Sydney,

32:07

and when Sumner finds out about that, well

32:09

that gets the ball rolling to get Sydney kicked

32:11

out of the mansion and then Manuela out of the mansion

32:13

and ultimately serves up Cherry Redstone

32:15

a victory of getting back into her father's life.

32:18

So he's start of the character who's dropped in

32:20

who changes the whole story.

32:22

George was constantly telling us things that

32:25

Jim and I would think that, okay, well that's obviously not

32:27

true, and then we'd verify it, you know, we would

32:29

be able to confirm it in some way. And Jim

32:31

has a great story about how George took over the

32:33

story.

32:34

Basically, well, yeah, you know, we'd

32:36

actually started writing the book. We're working

32:38

on it, and Rachel, it's calling

32:40

me from Sedona, Arizona with tales

32:43

of George. And this was some of these calls when

32:45

we kept say, oh my god, I can't believe this, can you believe this? This

32:47

can't be true. I was thinking, you

32:49

know, we's Harry Moore, this it was totally fascinating,

32:52

and I was thinking to myself, I'm kind of annoyed

32:54

here because it feels like George is trying

32:56

to take over the story. When we started

32:58

this, we didn't even know George existed, and

33:01

he was looming larger and larger. And then one

33:04

day I think I woke up and I thought, you know, let

33:06

George take over the story, because it's

33:09

so integral to the whole thing. So the whole

33:11

kind of the arc of the story change. And we

33:13

opened the book now with a scene in which

33:16

George and Sydney are

33:18

meeting at the Peninsula

33:20

Hotel swimming pool in Beverly Hills. We

33:22

threw out like a lot that we'd already written and

33:25

started over again, and amazingly, it clarified

33:27

the story so much, and suddenly all the pieces

33:29

fell together and the arc of

33:32

the tale unfolded in a very

33:34

I won't say easy, because writing's never easy, but

33:36

it seemed like it just was meant to happen

33:39

that way.

33:39

You, too, are so fun and the

33:42

story you're telling is so amazing. Have

33:44

you begun to think possibly of doing another book

33:46

together?

33:49

I'm still trying to bask in the glory of this

33:51

one. No. I think if Jim and I had a great

33:54

idea that we could team up on,

33:56

we'd love to do that again. But it all comes down

33:58

to the idea.

33:59

Yeah, I have to say. One of the reasons that's

34:01

worked out so well, I think is we

34:03

have a lot of common, but we're also obviously

34:05

we're very different where there's a different gender,

34:08

a different age, and so it's

34:10

certainly especially in the reporting of this, it

34:13

broke down very nicely. Our background

34:15

and skills were very complimentary

34:18

working on this, and so another saga like

34:20

that, you know, would lend itself to that. I'd

34:22

be perfectly happy to go at it again.

34:24

Given the success of Succession,

34:27

I wouldn't be at all shocked to see

34:29

you two approach by Hollywood about

34:31

a movie, although I suspect maybe Paramount

34:33

wouldn't do it. There

34:35

are a lot of other folks who are going to read your book and think,

34:38

Okay, this could be a real docu drama.

34:40

Well, I think it was just announced that

34:43

the streaming movie rights have been

34:45

just acquired, so you were very

34:47

excited about that.

34:49

That's great. I want to thank you. This has

34:51

been one of the most interesting and

34:53

fun podcasts that we've done, and literally

34:56

in the last couple of days, folks all around

34:58

me have been talking about Succession and saying how

35:00

I have to watch it, And now I can tell them,

35:02

yes, and they have to listen to this podcast

35:04

and buy your book because it's the real

35:06

thing, not just fiction. James

35:09

and Rachel, I really want to thank you for joining

35:11

me. We're going to have a link to your book on

35:13

our show page. Everybody who's heard

35:15

this, nos, it's fascinating. You've done

35:17

an amazing job. And I now have

35:20

to tell literally half the folks on our

35:22

team are watching Succession, so

35:24

I'm going to tell them all they now have a homework assignment

35:26

and they've got to go to the real thing to

35:29

back up the fictional thing. But thank

35:31

you very much for being with us.

35:32

Well, thank you,

35:34

thank you so much.

35:38

Thank you to my guest James B. Stewart

35:40

and Rachel Abrams. You can get a link

35:42

to buy their new book on Scripted on

35:44

our show page at Newtsworld dot com.

35:47

News World is produced by Ginglid three sixty

35:49

and iHeartMedia. Our executive

35:51

producer is Guernsey Sloan and our

35:53

researcher is Rachel Peterson. The

35:56

artwork for the show, Who's created by Steve

35:58

Penley. Special things to the team

36:00

at Gingrid three sixty. If you've been

36:02

enjoying newts World, I hope you'll go to Apple

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now, listeners of Neutrold can sign up

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36:21

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