Summary of Unscripted by James B Stewart and Rachel Abrams: The Epic Battle for a Media Empire and the Redstone Family Legacy

By Willie M. Joseph

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Summary of Unscripted by James B Stewart and Rachel Abrams: The Epic Battle for a Media Empire and the Redstone Family Legacy

 

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Unscripted is an explosive and unvarnished look at the struggle for power and control at Paramount Global, the multibillion-dollar entertainment empire controlled by the Redstone family, and the dysfunction, misconduct, and deceit that threatened the future of the company. The Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists James B. Stewart and Rachel Abrams reveal the inner workings of two public companies, their boards of directors, and a wealthy, dysfunctional family in the throes of seismic changes.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Willie M. Joseph
• Release date: Feb 17, 2023
• ISBN: 9798215673621

Willie M. Joseph

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Season 1

I’m Going to Hell Anyway

Pilgrim knew more about Sumner Redstone than he let on, and Holland was well on her way to controlling two of America's leading media and entertainment companies. She and her ally Manuela Herzer were engaged and Holland had a rare nine-carat canary-yellow diamond ring to prove it. Sumner had more than enough wealth to go around, and Holland and Herzer hoped to replace his grandchildren with them in the supposedly irrevocable trust that conveyed his ownership stakes in his media empire. They had hired a prominent New York estates lawyer to explore their options. Shari was a professional businesswoman who owned 20% of National Amusements and had a complicated relationship with her father.

Despite their differences, they maintained a polite coexistence, even though they had little in common. Shari had graduated from law school, practiced law, raised a family, and held an executive position, while Holland had skipped college and ran from one unsuccessful business venture to another. Holland attempted to bring the feuding family together, but in Shari's estimation, she had driven a wedge between them. She accepted her father's choice, but privately expressed her distaste for Holland and Herzer, whom she referred to as whores.

Sumner Redstone was one of the richest men in the world, with a fortune estimated at over $5 billion. He had a lifelong fixation with the performance and value of his business empire, but as he grew older, he became increasingly indiscreet about his personal life and indulged in long-suppressed sexual impulses. His indiscretions began to affect his companies, as his film and television executives grumbled about the women his boss suddenly wanted on a TV show, in a meeting, or working at Viacom. Sumner was making up for lost time, as he had come from modest circumstances and his mother punished him if he made a mistake in piano lessons or failed to earn a perfect grade at the prestigious Boston Latin School. Sumner had no friends and studied hard at Harvard.

He excelled at languages and joined the military to help crack Japanese codes. He married Phyllis Raphael and had two children, Brent and Shari. He joined the family drive-in movie business and converted it into a chain of movie theaters, building multiscreen indoor cinemas. He developed a prodigious knowledge of the movie distribution business and was obsessed with ticket sales. He was a micromanager and personally wrote to the editor of the Quad-City Times to compliment the review of Jaws.

In 1979, he survived a fire at the Copley Plaza, but his right hand was permanently deformed. Sumner Redstone was driven to succeed despite a near-death experience, and his ambitions expanded after the fire. He joined the Michael Milken-financed corporate raiders, and his opponents underestimated his business acumen and determination. In his contest with media titan Barry Diller to acquire Paramount Communications in 1994, he ignored his bankers' financial projections and told Viacom's chief financial officer, Tom Dooley, I just want to beat Barry. In his biggest conquest ever, Viacom paid $40 billion for CBS in 2000, and Sumner's assets soared to an astonishing $14 billion. In 2012, he got a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame, but he still wanted to be on the cover of Time magazine.

Delsa Winer was Sumner's longtime lover and companion, but when accounts of an affair with Christine Peters turned up in the tabloids in 1999, Sumner was publicly humiliated. He hired a private detective to produce photos of Sumner and Peters holding hands in Paris after dining at the famed La Tour d'Argent restaurant, and when the Rupert Murdoch-owned New York Post plastered photos of the pair on its front page, Sumner flew into a towering rage, blaming his rival media mogul Murdoch. Phyllis filed for divorce from Sumner, citing adultery and cruel and unusual treatment. Despite his vow to never marry again, Sumner proposed marriage to Peters almost immediately after divorcing Phyllis, but she declined. Despite his public rudeness, Sumner continued to have lunch with him at his regular table at the Hotel Bel-Air, and there was no shortage of women willing to be seen with him.

He was six feet tall and had once had thick, wavy reddish-blond hair, but now dyed it varying shades of pink. Herzer was born in Argentina and was a naturalized American citizen. Despite a wealthy former husband and a romantic partner with whom she'd had a child, Herzer struggled to maintain an affluent Beverly Hills lifestyle. After being rejected by Peters and Herzer, Sumner found himself living alone in luxury hotels and searching for women to date. Steven Sweetwood, Sumner's stepnephew and a stockbroker who handled Viacom's stock buybacks, set Sumner up on a blind date with an elementary school teacher in Manhattan named Paula Fortunato, a friend of a colleague of his at Bear Stearns.

Fortunato was living in a one-bedroom apartment. Sumner and Fortunato met at Il Postino restaurant and became inseparable. After three years of intense negotiations, Sumner finally worked out a settlement with Phyllis that left him in full control of National Amusements and Viacom and CBS. Sumner and his staunch allies controlled a solid majority, and should anyone's loyalty to Sumner falter, he retained the power to replace them. As part of the settlement, Sumner also gave Phyllis half of his large stake in a pinball machine and video games maker, Midway Games, best known for its Mortal Kombat franchise.

Redstone and Fortunato were married in April at Temple Emanu-El on Fifth Avenue and had a reception at the New York Public Library. Sumner took his new bride to Beverly Hills and paid close to $16 million for a sprawling eight-bedroom house with sweeping views of downtown Los Angeles from its infinity pool and adjoining hot tub. He cultivated exotic koi in a front-yard pond with a waterfall, installed an elaborate tropical fish tank, and surrounded himself with TV screens constantly tuned to CNBC and Viacom's stock price. He had a close relationship with Philippe Dauman at Viacom, who guided him through the hostile takeover of Viacom and the acquisitions of Paramount and CBS. Sumner admired Dauman's intelligence and Columbia Law School pedigree.

Sumner Redstone was a media mogul who valued loyalty, nepotism, and the Mafia code of omertà. He rewarded his surrogate son Dauman by making him a trustee of the Sumner M. Redstone National Amusements Trust and a Viacom board member. He also hired Les Moonves, an actor-turned-TV executive who was gregarious, handsome, charismatic, and firmly ensconced on Hollywood's A-list. Moonves broke into television with roles in The Six Million Dollar Man and Cannon and soon realized his future lay in producing rather than acting. Moonves rose through the ranks of Lorimar Television and Warner Bros.

Television to become president of CBS in 1995, where he vaulted the network from last to first place in the ratings on the strength of hits like Survivor, CSI, NCIS, and Cold Case. He was an entertainment mogul from the old school who had his hand in every creative aspect of the business but delegated financial and legal details. Dauman may have aspired to similar autonomy, but Shari blamed Dauman for encouraging her father's move to the West Coast, which she saw as an attempt to distance Sumner.

In 2006, Sumner Redstone agreed to cooperate with a Vanity Fair profile and was praised for his new wife, Paula, but the article also depicted him as frail and senile at the age of eighty-three, losing his train of thought, repeating stories, and asking that questions be repeated. This led to an angry outburst between Sumner and Paula at the premiere of Stardust, followed by a meltdown at Dan Tana's. Soon, Sumner was again squiring Christine Peters, who had a production deal at CBS, and Herzer was back on the scene. Sumner confided in both women, telling Herzer that his relationship with Paula was horrible and Peters that I'm so unhappy. After Tom Cruise appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show and proclaimed his undying love for Katie Holmes, Sumner ejected the Hollywood megastar from Lucille Ball's former quarters on the Paramount lot and terminated the studio's fourteen-year relationship with him. Sumner filed for divorce from Paula in October 2008, citing irreconcilable differences.

He was gracious toward her in his public comments, noting that the financial terms of their divorce settlement went far beyond anything mandated in their prenuptial agreement. He bought her a $4 million house in Beverly Hills and a $2.6 million condo in Florida.

Sumner in a Skirt

Sumner's children, Brent and Shari, had initially embarked on independent careers far removed from the family theater chain and their father's media and entertainment acquisitions. However, they still owned one sixth of National Amusements under