Citizen Hughes

by Michael Drosnin

  “Re the ABM,” he scrawled to Maheu. “I urge you thank the president profusely for his offer to send Kissinger, but tell him I do not consider that this is necessary and I do not think it would advance the situation.

  “Bob, to have this man here could only embarass me.

  “It would place me in the position of refusing to see an envoy of the president, and, no matter how you try to dress it up, this is the way the president will view it.

  “Please, regardless of how you do it, kill off this trip in some way.”

  The offer that Nixon must have assumed would so flatter Hughes that it would ensure the payoff—and end his opposition to the ABM as well—instead left the recluse shaken.

  As yet unaware of the debacle, but taking no chances on the $100,000, half an hour later the president sent further evidence of his good faith. All through July Nixon and Kissinger had been considering final plans for a series of mammoth nuclear blasts, designed to test the ABM warhead. No official decision had yet been reached. But now, on July 16, the commander in chief sent advance word to his hidden benefactor.

  “Howard,” Maheu flashed to Hughes, “we are reliably informed that the AEC has finally given up the battle and will have all tests of a megaton or more held in Alaska. We are also informed that, for security reasons, they cannot, at this time, make any public announcement confirming their capitulation.”

  Howard Hughes had won his desperate battle to ban the bomb. Or so it seemed. Richard Nixon, after all, was growing in stature.

  It was time to celebrate.

  11 Howard Throws a Party

  It was to be the greatest party Las Vegas had ever seen, and Las Vegas had seen a lot of great parties. But this party was going to be thrown by Howard Hughes.

  All through the spring and summer months of 1969, as Hughes and Nixon moved to close their big deal, the billionaire was planning a party. It was tentatively scheduled for the same Fourth of July weekend that the hundred-thousand-dollar payoff was finally arranged. Indeed, Hughes was far more preoccupied with the big party than with the big payoff.

  The occasion was the opening of the Landmark, his latest hotel acquisition, and the first of his purchases to break the antitrust blockade—approved by a suddenly cooperative Justice Department three days before Nixon moved into the White House.

  But it was more than that. It was a celebration of the triumph of the Hughes-Maheu partnership. Nothing could stop them now.

  And yet that party would open a wound between them that never healed, one that festered for months. There would be other wounds—wounds terminal for Hughes, for Maheu, and for Nixon—but it was the explosion over the Landmark party that marked the beginning of the end.

  The Landmark was the ugliest hotel in town, an ungainly bubble-top tower with an interior decor that struggled to combine outerspace murals, ancient Incan wood panels, and Italian marble statues of other famous “landmarks”: the Eiffel Tower, the Colosseum, Big Ben.

  There was something strangely off-key about the entire place. A thirty-one-story haunted house, it had stood empty for eight years until Hughes bought it for $17.3 million from its bankrupt owners. With an air-conditioning system that never really worked and a constantly malfunctioning glass-walled elevator that crawled uncertainly up an outside wall of the tower, the Landmark had a permanent air of impending catastrophe. It seemed more like the setting for a disaster movie than the stage for a grand party.

  But to Robert Maheu it looked beautiful in the spring of 1969.

  “Howard, if you ever decide to leave the Penthouse, you will be flabbergasted at the sight from the top of this bubble,” he wrote, so carried away with his enthusiasm that he actually sought to lure Hughes from his lair. “It is magnificent during the day and unbelievably beautiful after dark. You get the feeling that this edifice was constructed at the very dead center of the valley, and that all the mountains surrounding the valley are in equidistant position.”

  It was an uncharacteristic burst of poetic sentiment. However, within weeks, this beautiful vision had degenerated into an ugly brawl, one that would last for months.

  “Instead of you and I clawing each others’ eyes out over the Landmark,” Hughes wrote Maheu as the planning for the grand party began to strain their marriage, “why dont you collaborate with me in endeavoring to find a formula for the opening that will satisfy both of us.”

  Like all their big fights, this one was over something trivial, but in this case both the triviality and the fight were taken to operatic extremes. Perhaps the very notion of an “opening” was frightening to Hughes, a man whose life was devoted to keeping things closed. This would be his first party since arriving in Las Vegas, indeed the first since he had drifted into seclusion more than a decade ago. And while Hughes himself would not, of course, be at the party, still he was in some sense going public.

  But there was more to this particular opening. It was Hughes going mano-a-mano with his arch-rival Kirk Kerkorian. Right across the street from the Landmark stood Kerkorian’s International, the biggest hotel in Las Vegas, taller than the Landmark, and it was scheduled to open the same week in July. The key issue was which day to hold the opening, whether to throw their party before or after Kerkorian’s. What Hughes wanted was a real blast that would blow Kerkorian right out of the water.

  “The public can definitely be persuaded to believe that the opening of the Landmark will be the greatest event since the Last Supper,” wrote Hughes.

  “On the other hand, to actually accomplish a fantastic opening of a brand-new hotel-casino with all of its complexities and all the things that may go wrong on opening night—that is something far more difficult.

  “And, it only takes one incident in which one stupid dealer accidently insults just one of the many, many newspaper writers which you and I will no doubt decide should be brought out here from New York, Washington, London, Paris, etc., and then the fat will be in the fire.

  “So, I say it is possible to control what people will expect the Landmark to be,” he concluded, “but I feel it is impossible to control with any certainty the outcome of the actual opening night.”

  Quite a dilemma. Hughes, however, had a solution. He would not approve any date for the opening.

  “Re the date of the opening, why dont you leave that open,” he told Maheu. “If the show and all other elements shape up very rapidly, fine, but I urge that a July 1st date not be committed any further in any publicity or word of mouth. I just dont want it to be embarrassing if the opening should be a little later.

  “With my reputation for unreliability in the keeping of engagements, I dont want this event announced until the date is absolutely firmly established.”

  Maheu was concerned. It was difficult to plan a Las Vegas gala and yet keep it secret; it was impossible to plan without knowing when it would take place.

  “If we are not going to open on July 1, we would very much appreciate your giving us a fixed date (whenever),” he replied, gently urging Hughes toward a decision. “We truly believe that July 1 is a good target. If on the other hand you have a reason why July 1 bothers you, you need not give us that reason, but we beg you to give us a fixed date.”

  Hughes had a reason, and he was pleased to give it. What he would not give Maheu was the date.

  “I would hate to see the Landmark open on the 1st of July and then watch the International open a few days later and make the Landmark opening look like small potatoes by comparison,” explained Hughes. “Also, I would hate to see the International open with Barbara Streisand while the Landmark has no name on the marquee.

  “So, please string along with me on an open date,” he insisted, relieved to have found a reason to avoid making the decision. “If you will go along with the above, then may I persuade you to help me try to find the very strongest name that can be made available by any conceivable device?”

  Unwilling to set a date, Hughes was more than willing to throw himself into planning the party. Down to the smalles
t detail. The big question, however, was who would entertain.

  There were pipe dreams. Bob Hope. Hope and Crosby. But neither had ever performed in Las Vegas. How about Dean Martin? He used to work at the Sands, but left soon after Sinatra stormed out. Now Martin was under exclusive contract to another hotel, indeed was part-owner, but Hughes wanted him. By any conceivable device.

  “Before I try to obtain somebody from my Hollywood contacts,” he schemed, “do you think there is any slightest possibility of getting Dean Martin by the following strategy:

  “I think Martin can be motivated by one of three factors, or all three:

  “1. Money—a capital gain on some asset he no doubt owns.

  “2. An agreement to finance some picture he would like to make. (Bob, there is not an actor alive who does not have some pet idea he would like to make into a movie. If Dean Martin does not have such a pet idea, he will be the first movie star I have ever heard of in my entire life who does not.)

  “3. I think Martin can be persuaded that my friendship may, in one way or another, be important to him sometime. I also think he can, very carefully, be persuaded I have a deep hurt from the lousy way he acted, and I think he can be motivated to repair the damage.…”

  The idea of getting Martin, of enticing him away from the “Rat Pack,” of stealing him back from his reputed mobster partners, began to really excite Hughes.

  “Can you imagine the nationwide publicity possibilities of Martin performing at the Landmark when he owns part of the Riviera?” Hughes added in a P.S.

  “I can see some smart reporter, with the proper encouragement, taking this thing and writing a complete dime novel out of the behind the scenes ‘True Story.’ Dont you see the possibilities of creating a plot out of that situation: Las Vegas moguls fight battle under the glittering surface. First Sinatra, then Martin walks out—then, the axe falls.

  “I know one thing,” added Hughes, concocting his own dime novel, “if I were a newspaper reporter, and my editor told me to take that story and make the most of it, I would have everybody from Sinatra to Martin to Moe Dalitz, the Justice Department, and two hired guns in it before I got through.”

  Maheu, also excited about getting Martin, offered an even grander vision. They would reunite the entire old “Rat Pack” on the stage of the Landmark, a coup that would truly leave its mark on Las Vegas history. Maheu took it one step further. They would call the whole dazzling assemblage of talent the “Hughes Parade of Stars.”

  The concept disturbed Hughes. He was not ready to step out on the stage.

  “First, Bob, I dont think my name should be used in connection with a theatrical production at the Landmark,” he wrote, instantly deflating Maheu’s dream. “I am fearful that the critics will consider that I have moved into the theatrical realm and have thereby placed myself in their target range. If it were used, it would give the critics the opportunity to hack away at my name at will.”

  The fear of being personally reviewed rekindled all of Hughes’s fears of going public, prompting him to reopen the still unresolved question of the opening date.

  “Now, regarding the opening date,” he added, “I humbly beg you not to permit anything to leak out in confirmation of any July 1st date. Just as determined as you are to beat K to the punch with an earlier opening than the International, I am equally convinced it is a mistake.

  “In two nearly simultaneous dates such as this, the later one is always the climax, and the one remembered. Also, the entity opening second is always the newest, and the first one is as old as yesterday’s newspaper.

  “I urge that no further statement be made or word leaked about the date until further along.”

  Maheu was getting upset. It was not Kerkorian who worried him. It was Hughes. It was not the date of the opening that concerned him. It was the fact that Hughes refused to pick any date.

  “I sincerely hope that you understand the truly unbelievable position in which I am placed when I still cannot commit a day of opening,” he wrote. “Howard, we are not the least bit stubborn on July 1 per se. If you prefer that we do it a few days after the International, please give us a fixed date and we will proceed accordingly.

  “But darn it, Howard, if you care about what happens to the Landmark you simply cannot hold this decision in abeyance any longer.”

  Hughes was not about to be outflanked. If Maheu would not be drawn into a debate over the merits of throwing their party before or after Kerkorian’s, the naked impresario had a new excuse to leave the opening date open. Another rival event, bigger than the International.

  “I just had a rude awakening,” he wrote in mock alarm. “The moon landing is planned for July!

  “Now, what disturbs me equally is the fact that there may be another event scheduled for one of the dates under consideration, either locally or elsewhere, which may dilute the publicity impact of the Landmark.

  “So, Bob, please review the calendar, both locally and nationally, and report to me all events of publicity import which are scheduled for July. Then, I will do my best not to delay the selection of the Landmark date.”

  By mid-June, however, Hughes had still failed to approve a definite date for the opening, still tentatively set for July 1. Maheu was climbing the walls. It had gone beyond the party. His entire public image in Las Vegas was at stake. He was one of the most powerful men in town, and now he was being shown up as a flunky who did not even have the power to pick the date of a party. Finally, he could no longer stand the humiliation.

  “Here I am on the front line talking to Dean Martin, Danny Thomas, the Astronauts, the public, the Governor, and I don’t know what in the hell I am talking about because you still have not given us a date,” a frantic Maheu wrote Hughes.

  “I am getting to a point where I frankly don’t know what in the hell to tell them when they ask the very simple question—when are we going to open?

  “Honest to God, Howard, if this question is not resolved forthwith, I am simply going to have to get the hell out of town because I just simply cannot continue facing all these people any further.”

  Hughes refused to answer the question of the opening date. Instead, he responded to Maheu’s frantic plea by calling their whole partnership into question.

  “Bob, you have done a good job for me and I appreciate it,” the billionaire wrote with heavy solemnity. “I also appreciate your several statements to me that you have a low flash point and that I should learn to accept this in its proper relevance.

  “However, Bob, there are some things in life becide money and success,” he lectured his underling, taking the broader view.

  “I am afraid I have reached the point where I have a greater reserve allowable tolerance in my money-success column, than I have in my health-and-remaining-years column.

  “If, under these circumstances, you think my failure to give you a specific date has placed you in a position of embarrassment under which you dont want to be in Las Vegas, I think maybe the time has come when, for my health’s sake, a somewhat less efficient and less successful man, but one who would not find it so difficult to put up with my, admittedly less-than-perfect operation, should perhaps be the resident managing executive here in Las Vegas.

  “Re: the Landmark opening, I have told you repeatedly that I dont want the Landmark to open until after the International.

  “Bob, I say this only in the interest of harmony.

  “If I were indifferent to your barbs and inferences, it would be no problem,” he concluded, “but I am not indifferent, and some of your implications get under my skin and my blood pressure goes higher than [the] Landmark Tower, which is not good.”

  Hughes had called Maheu’s bluff and raised him the limit. Suddenly, it was not merely Maheu’s public image, but his five-hundred-thousand-dollar-a-year job that was at stake. He quickly backed off, left the opening date open, and gently urged his boss toward the next order of business: the guest list.

  Planning for the Mad Hatter’s Tea Part
y now proceeded in its own lunatic fashion. Hughes threw himself into the debate over who would attend with a frenzied delight born of the knowledge that at last he had found a device that could forever delay the opening. Obviously there could be no party if there were no guests.

  Maheu tried to impress upon Hughes the urgency of assembling a guest list by raising the specter of Kerkorian.

  “I just received an exquisite invitation for the opening of the International,” he wrote. “While we are talking, he is moving. Howard, I really believe that any further delay on the list of potential invitees for the Landmark will place us in an embarassing position.”

  It made no impact. Hughes refused even to consider the list Maheu had painstakingly compiled until a week before the still tentative date of the opening, and then rejected the entire list out-of-hand. He presented this rejection as an act of pure reason, suggesting that Maheu simply prepare a new list according to certain scientific specifications.

  “I understand your anxiety to get started on the list of invites,” the billionaire wrote Maheu solicitously.

  “However, the only lasting damage will come from failure to invite certain important people while inviting others, about whom said important people will no doubt learn.

  “Now, Bob, I simply dont have the man-hours, and you dont want to wait for me to go thru this list name by name,” he continued, maintaining his pose of sweet reasonableness and complete cooperation as he cast aside all of Maheu’s invitations.

  “You will just have to appoint somebody to make a new list using this concept:

  “Categorize the people you want, and where you invite one such person, invite likewise the others in the same category who have equal merit, who are equal friends, etc., unless they have done something to be disqualified, or unless they should be disqualified because of simple lack of stature, or disloyalty, or such-like.