Judy & Liza & Robert & Freddie & David & Sue & Me...

by Stevie Phillips

  Perfect, I thought. This will fit right in with Li’s schedule. He then presented Li with a bill for four thousand dollars plus for Mate’s newfound obedience, and after we saw the captain click his heels for the final time, the two of us laughed until we hurt.

  That very night, just by coincidence, Judy was coming for dinner. Liza’s brand-new apartment finally was furnished—beautifully, I might add. She had a swell brown-and-white geometric rug on the living room floor, a great leather couch rested on it, and silk drapes hung in pools on the polished floor. Liza was doing fettucine Alfredo for Judy and the other guests. Dinner was only the start of any evening that Judy and Liza spent together. For that matter it was only the start of any evening that either of them spent alone. Nights went on until the last club closed. I, gratefully, was not invited.

  If there was one thing Liza knew about me, it was that I needed to get my eight hours of sleep during the night, not the day. Beyond that I was keen to separate my personal life from hers. We both wanted our privacy. Sometimes I wondered who picked up the checks when I, or some other agent, wasn’t around. Not Judy, and not Liza. I’ve since learned that when there’s a celebrity present, there’s always someone, some starstruck proprietor or friend who feels blessed enough to be in the company of greatness, who picks up the tab. From the owner’s standpoint, it’s good business and cheap publicity, but I always thought being a scrounger sent the wrong message. Not all celebs are freeloaders, but Judy and Liza were.

  So on the very first day of Mate’s return, Liza, who was busy entertaining, missed the dog’s 10:15 p.m. appointment with the sidewalks of New York. In a show of appreciation, Mate christened every new surface of the beautiful apartment. Fettucine Alfredo and poop could be found in places both high and low—Mate was, after all, a tall dog. This two-dollar dog with the four-thousand-dollar education in manners had subsequent chapters, but those would be lived out with the greengrocer around the corner.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Flying Solo

  Now that Judy was gone, representing Liza was not the only thing going on with me. I loved having my own apartment and being alone. I didn’t need anyone. I was willing to pay my dues, earn my way, and make it all on my own. My mother was frightened for me. She had so wanted my marriage to be a success, but when I told her it was not, she didn’t take me on as I’d imagined she would. She quietly supported me. When the time came, she even helped me to move. I knew she was heartbroken—I could see it in her face, her sad eyes—but she did not give voice to her sorrow. There was a little resignation, yes, but otherwise she looked ahead. I would one day, not too far in the future, come to understand that a substantial part of her sorrow was due to her lack of courage to do exactly what I was doing. She quietly bore her suffering. I would not. I knew I had other options. She never thought she did.

  It was 1964, and I was ready to confront the world without anything or anyone to lean on. I had toughed it out alone as a child, and I thought I had survived Judy. My experience with her had given me the armor to face the world. I wore a shield that protected me from most kinds of human emotions. I was hardened to human suffering. In any situation with complications—whether in negotiations or human relations—I figured I could clean it up and move on as I had with Judy. I gave short shrift to people who wasted my time and had nothing to contribute. I thought I was a good judge of that. I was certainly judgmental—about everything and everybody.

  I persuaded myself there was nothing I couldn’t do. I decided that I couldn’t be put in the same sentence as the downtrodden women Betty Friedan was talking about because I was so far ahead of the curve. I was not only out of the house and into the workplace, I was starting to tap-dance on top of the glass ceiling. Look, world, I made it to agent! No longer the all-purpose schlep, file clerk, gopher, and babysitter.

  By late 1964 I was making fifty thousand a year, which was huge compared to my friends, but then they were all women in secretarial jobs. I didn’t consider comparing my salary with those of the men in the office at that point (but that day was coming, and sooner than I would have thought). The office was growing in the number of clients being signed. My office was growing: It grew a window. My wardrobe was growing, and so were my confidence and pride. I was, for the moment, riding high, and cocksure no one could pull me down.

  *

  My job was expanding to cover all of television for the clients we represented. My immersion in this new medium started with Liza. I had gotten my foot in the door booking Li, who was salable after her success in Best Foot Forward. F&D recognized this and asked me to handle the comics. My bosses had taken on several new associates: real old-fashioned booking agents, good friends from the MCA days. With them came a number of bookable comedians: Milton Berle, Jack Carter, and Shelley Berman—big earners all—who played the same clubs that Liza could go into. (And I was always thinking of Liza, still my only client.) F&D promised the comedians movie stardom. Not a one of them seemed to enjoy what he did: Each one wanted Paul Newman’s career. Well, that was understandable. All they had to do was earn it. Television was their point of departure, and it fell to me to find them good dramatic roles in which they could demonstrate their fine acting ability. While the movie stars looked down on TV, comedians reached up hoping to grab on to it. I was now mandated to make that happen.

  I woke up every day bent on figuring out how I could get Shelley Berman on Ben Casey or Dr. Kildare. I spent my mornings cultivating TV producers and their aides, who were snide, snotty, crass, and boorish. I spent lunch treating one or another of them to a better meal than they had manners for in the King Cole Bar at the St. Regis or the elegant dining room at the Regency. (No dating prospects here. These were not guys you’d want to bring home to mother.) By three or four in the afternoon, one of the comedians was usually sitting on the edge of my desk asking, “So what have you done for me lately?” Selling wasn’t easy. It went something like this:

  The producer of a new television series is on the phone. He has called because he knows my office represents Paul Newman. He wants Paul to star in the first episode of his new show to help get his series launched. Of course I’d like to help him because down the road, if the series gets picked up, I can sell him lots of clients. He thinks his new series is better than Gone With the Wind. (I’ve already read the script. It’s not even as good as Godzilla.)

  Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I am clear that I absolutely must nail a deal for one of the comics to star in a series soon or we’re going to lose him and his big income from nightclub dates. Can’t allow that to happen. Not good for business, not good for the bottom line. The comic believes he is Paul Newman, or as good as. However, once the producer knows he can’t get Paul, I must go forward pretending Shelley Berman is, in fact, every bit as good an actor, and I must persuade the producer to take a shot with him instead. The producer then bumps me over to one of the boorish underlings, and I set up the next lunch date.

  Truth is, there was a good net result. The lunch tabs I picked up on Shelley Berman’s behalf probably exceeded his salary for one appearance on the TV series Rawhide, but then Shelley was a wonderful actor as well as a nice man, and the meals at the St. Regis were worth every penny. Besides, Shelley Berman supporting Clint Eastwood was a feel-good piece of casting.

  The new agents and I worked closely together. The more I helped secure TV for their clients, the more they helped me secure good club engagements for Liza. They knew their way around deals in these clubs. They got the best money. I was a fast learner. “One hand washes the other” never proved truer than when I booked TV. As a woman agent in TV, I was an anomaly at the time. It gave me an advantage. Being a woman made securing lunch dates easy, if for no other reason than the curiosity factor. A woman selling comics who picked up the tab at the best restaurants on the East Side! That was new and different. I didn’t think of it that way at the time, in spite of the fact that everyone I took to lunch remarked on it.

  And so, finally, F&D gave me a
secretary and I ran the TV department in New York, the home of every important buyer in that fledgling industry. Clients from Freddie’s new office in LA were referred to me because I was now in charge of finding jobs for any clients interested in this growing medium, the medium in the middle between live and film, the medium that was about to explode, putting a television into every home in America, the medium that would establish Li’s career, and practically end Judy’s.

  In the end I was treated well by TV. All the comics worked on dramas, but none of them ever became movie stars, except Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis. Only they weren’t ours.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Starring Liza

  Liza’s success on TV made her a star, and F&D had shown me by example how to capitalize on this. Get a press agent. I hired a wonderful publicist, Lois Smith—a giant of a woman in every way—whose competence and take-charge attitude relieved us of the need to worry about press. She milked the interest in Liza, and then I booked her until her feet hurt.

  Li did things the comedians couldn’t do. She danced and sang, and did it well, and since it was the heyday of television variety shows, I had a playground that was enormous. Kraft Music Hall, The Hollywood Palace, LaughIn, The Carol Burnett Show—all immensely popular shows—kept calling her back for several appearances. I booked her on The Ed Sullivan Show eleven times. I campaigned tirelessly to get her into the Academy Awards show as a performer, and very early in her career, 1966, she sang the award-winning song, “What’s New, Pussycat?”

  These appearances furnished her entire apartment and then some. She now had discretionary money, and her exposure made her a star. Besides making her known in every household in America, her appearances brought her to the attention of Hollywood and also helped create an audience for her out on the road. We both got it right.

  Wherever she worked, back then she put out 100 percent. She was gracious, always gave credit to others, and never complained. Producers loved her. Directors were clamoring. The press was hovering. She ceased being simply “the daughter of…”

  For me her ever-increasing popularity was heady stuff. Three years into my career as a full-time agent, and I was fortunate enough to be working with a rising star with real talent: a triple threat whose singing, dancing, and acting meant she could work film, television, concerts, clubs, and the stage. My calls were all picked up.

  While it was essential that everyone in showbiz know who she was, within “my” industry, both network and some studio executives were also starting to hear my name. I liked it; wanted more of it, and I had nothing but time to devote to our cause. Without either a husband or children to concern me, and no immediate interest in a social life, the open road loomed ahead, and there was no traffic jam in sight. I could drive at top speed. Work, and more work.

  *

  Judy, now aware of Liza’s popularity, suddenly became interested in Liza’s talent. It was an asset to her. Although she had featured Liza on one of her CBS shows, that was more a “mother” thing than an acknowledgment of Li’s stardom. But once Judy’s TV show was canceled, and with no new films on the horizon, Judy went off to her once-again new favorite place to live—London—whence not so long ago she had come.

  While there, she announced a concert exploiting Liza’s fame that Liza had not approved. As if that mattered. As Li’s agent, I knew that the concert having been announced, Liza had to do it. Liza understood that, too. And luckily, where talent meets with adequate rehearsal, good things happen. The Palladium was a great triumph. For Judy, her brilliance so long recognized, her audience so adoring, it was just another triumph. For Liza it was the first ovation of that size and length. The overwhelming demand for tickets led to a second successful concert that gave Liza a big leg up in that market. She handled herself magnificently, and I think I was as proud as Judy. Although far from being motherly toward Liza, I did have enough of a strong impulse to protect her professionally, and I could do that without emotional involvement.

  Judy also wanted to protect Liza, but I could see, clearly, that there was a competitive thing going on. It carried an edginess, wherein suggestions from Judy took on an acidic tone. Any suggestions I made—whether about wardrobe or songs—were always in Li’s interest. Judy wanted everything done her way, and it came out disguised as suggestions. Liza had good instincts, but Judy always trusted her own more than anyone else’s. However, bottom line, Judy very generously did share the limelight with Liza. Liza’s stock shot up, and so did mine.

  *

  I dealt with many producers on Liza’s behalf in the early and midsixties, some of them buffoons, some blusterers, but each in their own way taught me something about show business. The network and film company execs treated me like a princess because I represented stars. Even though Freddie or anyone else in the agency might have signed them, the stars were still my clients. Lest you have any doubt, there’s a correlation in showbiz between the amount of respect one gets and the size of the talent one is selling.

  I became skilled at oiling my way around a decent deal. I learned when to be bullish and when to walk away. I developed, as my experience increased, an instinct for how far I could press in a deal without losing it or hurting the other side. Someone recently asked me how one does that. My short answer: There is no formula. Every deal is a case of original impression. No two deals are totally alike. One can use a musical metaphor and play the buyers like a piano. Sometimes one treads softly, pianissimo. Occasionally one bangs all the notes with force and vigor. It’s a judgment call. My salary was not going to change if I killed someone in a deal. The 10 percent commission to the agency might be a few bucks greater, but if you angered the buyer, causing him to flee forever, it wasn’t a victory for anyone. You either have judgment or you don’t. I have never enjoyed putting anyone’s back against the wall for a few extra dollars (as David did). And I don’t believe it makes for a happy working situation for the artist. There are many who would disagree with that. They need to squeeze the last dollar out. They are bloodsuckers, and I don’t like them.

  Sometimes one gets lucky. The first deal I ever made on Broadway, I made with one of the legends on that street, and he was a prince: Hal Prince. He is a wonderful producer, a great director, and a man of enormous integrity. Such words are thrown around a lot, but Hal is truly deserving of each one.

  Hal was in his thirties and already very successful when he produced Flora, the Red Menace. In 1965 his partner, the late great George Abbott, both the writer and director of the musical, was approaching his eighties. They were a magnificent odd couple whose names were spoken in the hushed tones of reverence. They put Liza through the wringer, auditioning her four times—which saw both of us sitting around the office waiting to see if there would be yet another callback. She got the role, and although she was magical in it, Flora was a flop. Maybe that’s why she didn’t get the role in Cabaret that she ultimately made famous on film and won the Academy Award for.

  In spite of its failure, Liza did pick up the Tony Award for Flora, and she did it wearing my beautiful black floral print gown with spaghetti straps. She might have afforded her own at that moment, but it was totally normal for her to borrow what I owned. We had walked into my closet and selected the one and only.

  *

  Interestingly, Liza’s very first musical act was, for me, the most memorable. I clearly remember her taking me to a cold-water railroad flat on the West Side of Manhattan. It was as low rent as you could get in midtown Manhattan. We entered a dark hall that brought the mood, if not the intense cold, of winter inside. At the end of this cheerless tunnel was a kitchen where the stove was the only heat in the room. A young man sat at an old upright piano playing show tunes in his own wonderful way. He could play anything, in any key, in any manner or mode one requested: jazz, ragtime, boogie, or “give me ‘God Bless America’ as Mozart would have composed it.” His energy and excitement were infectious.

  Sitting at the oilcloth-covered kitchen table absorbing the warmth eman
ating both from her immensely talented son and the cast-iron stove was Mama Hamlisch. Her sunshine smile told me how she doted on her Marvin. Liza, too, could never resist the opportunity to show off when she happened to be in the same room with a piano and someone who knew how to use it. And as I watched these two great entertainers duet Gershwin, classic Broadway, marvelous old movie music, all great tunes that I loved, I knew I was witnessing something spectacular. Both Marvin and Liza adored performing, and an audience of two was enough.

  “Marvin and I are going to do an act together,” Liza advised. I’d certainly seen enough of his talents to think it was possible. Liza also rounded up Fred Ebb and John Kander, who had been lyricist and composer on Flora, to do the grueling work of launching these youngsters. All of them were at the beginning of spectacular careers. Fred became her lifelong friend; he designed all her acts and wrote her wonderful “special” material. With this remarkable team in place, I went ahead and booked the dates.

  What came out of this collaboration was the most original and charming nightclub act I’d ever seen. Liza had two backup dancers: one very tall and thin, the other very short and fat, equally talented and wonderfully nimble. The dancing threesome was pure fun. You couldn’t forget the act once you’d seen it, and you’d never forget the West Coast opening night if you were lucky enough to have been there. It took place at the Cocoanut Grove in the old Ambassador Hotel. All of Hollywood society turned out that night to see what Judy’s little girl could do. The Kirk Douglases, the Gregory Pecks, the Gene Kellys, George Cukor, Vincente Minnelli, and Judy herself all sitting front and center. Suffice it to say it was a superglamorous, A-list showbiz night.