One night, years ago, when Bush was a congressman, we went for a walk in Washington, D.C., after the Alfalfa dinner. We passed the White House, which was all lit up, and I said, "I think you're going to live in that house someday."
"Don't be silly," he said.
But I knew it. I could see it in the way the other politicians gathered around him at the dinner-he was a natural leader.
In 1980, on the night that he was elected vice president, Bush was at my house in Beverly Hills, in my living room. He brought about twenty-five of his advisors. They had just come off the campaign trail and were exhausted. The election was over, and they had flown to California to see Reagan. I showed a film. (In it, Walter Matthau played the chief of the CIA, which I thought was appropriate, as Bush had had that same job.) James Baker fell asleep on the couch. We drank champagne and celebrated. It was a great honor for me, but Bush didn't look at it that way. To him, it was just a night at a friend's house. Later, when he became president, he used to take me to state dinners, meetings, everything. He had me to lunch with Mikhail Gorbachev, just the three of us, me, the president, and the premier. I did not stay in a hotel when I went to Washington. I stayed in the White House. (What a thrill, sleeping in the Lincoln Bedroom, with the Gettysburg Address under glass!) He took me behind the scenes, showed me how the world is wired at its highest reaches. How did it happen that this beautifully educated, perfectly bred, white Anglo-Saxon Protestant from New England became so friendly with this mutt from the Bronx? It's a question I've often asked myself. I think it's because he trusts me, and knows that I trust him. I'm not going to be one way with him, another way with someone else. For better or worse, I am still the same kid who ran away from the Bronx. Life is strange-you travel so far, do so much, but the people you look for at the end are often the same people you looked for at the beginning.
Over the years, Bush and I have played a lot of tennis and golf. Our friendship started on that court in Maine, and tennis and golf have been a continuing theme. One day, when Bush was president, he decided we should play a determining match. "You pick a partner and I pick a partner," he said, "and we'll finally settle it." So who does Bush recruit? The pro from his country club! He's president of the United States, and this is the best he can do? What a gentleman! He wants to win, but doesn't want to destroy me. Who do I recruit? Rod Laver, who was then living somewhere in California. We played at Bush's house in Kennebunkport. Laver walks out. The president says, "Oh, my God. It's Rod Laver! The greatest tennis player ever! I am so excited to meet you!"
"Tell you what," Bush said to Laver. "You be my partner."
I said, "No, Mr. President. He will not be your partner. He is my partner. You have already chosen your partner. The pro from your club."
As we walked out on the court, Laver said to me, "Do you want to let him win?"
"No," I said, "I want to beat him."
"How bad?"
"Bad."
"Okay," said Laver, "here is what we are going to do…"
And he explained how he would control each point, setting the ball up a foot or so in front of my racket. I just had to slam it home.
We took a picture at the end of the match. It's the president, posed as if dead on the court, with me and Laver standing over him, grinning.
All the King's Men
I have always been a believer in relationships, in strength in numbers and flying in a pack, which is why, in 1963, I combined my business with the businesses of two friends to form Management Three. It was me, Bernie Brillstein, and Marty Kummer. I had some acts, the biggest being Jane. Bernie had some acts, the biggest being Jim Henson and the Muppets; Marty had some acts, the biggest being Jack Paar. Together, we figured we could take over the world. Bernie died in 2008, Marty before that. More than friends, these men were family. I loved them. If you work with people you love, which, of course, is not always possible, the hard times become an epic adventure. If Bernie was around, he would tell you about the office we rented at Fifty-fifth and Lexington Avenue. He would tell you about the hundreds of nights we spent out in the city, in the nightclubs and dives, the cocktail tables crowded with martinis. We searched every nook and cranny for talent. I had set myself up as the outside man, the public face of Management Three, who had to be kept in good suits and luxury, as our potential clients would judge the health of the company by my appearance. I bought myself a Rolls-Royce and hired a driver, though I could not afford them. I figured it was all about appearance, perception, as the man who rides in style often rides away with the big contract.
Bernie went to Los Angeles to open a West Coast office. Then I went out. This is when I made the full-time move to LA. Within a few years, I moved into the house that I have called home ever since. LA was wildly exciting in those years. The last of the old moguls were still around, as were the stars of Hollywood 's Golden Age. Jimmy Stewart, Cary Grant, John Wayne, Rita Hayworth, Gene Kelly-I would come to know them all. People think New Yorkers of my generation, their memories swollen with egg cream and stickball and whatever, long for those old neighborhoods, but that is not true. What we miss, if anything, are the people, the world when it was crowded with crucial players. As for the place, I have always believed the West Coast has it over the East Coast in every way. Going from New York to LA, with its palm trees and swimming pools and white houses and green hills and Santa Ana winds, was excellent in a way it is hard to express. It was like stepping from the orchestra pit of the theater on Fordham Road in the Bronx up onto the screen. Things started to cook as soon as I was settled in LA. There were meetings, deals, parties, signings, but all of this was really just the prologue before the great early triumph of my career-the success that would make everything else possible.
I was in bed, Jane at my side. I always sleep with a notepad on the table so I can write down ideas that come in the night. That night, I saw Madison Square Garden in a dream, fronted by a huge marquee on which big, beautiful, red letters, lit against a blue velvet sky, read: JERRY WEINTRAUB PRESENTS ELVIS PRESLEY. My eyes clicked open like a camera shutter. I rolled over, started writing.
"What now?" asks Jane.
"I'm going to promote Elvis Presley," I tell her. "I'm going to take him to Madison Square Garden."
"That's crazy," she says. "You don't even know Elvis Presley."
"Not yet," I say, close the book, roll over, and am asleep before she can answer.
The next morning, I dug up a number for Colonel Tom Parker, the onetime carnie who had managed Elvis for years, got him on the phone, and said, "Colonel Parker, this is Jerry Weintraub. I would like to take Elvis Presley on the road."
The Colonel had a sly, deliberate way of talking. He took his time. You just knew he was grinning, chomping a cigar, turning it slowly in his mouth. He said, "Who are you, son?"
"This is Jerry Weintraub," I told him. "I have a strategy in mind, a way to take Elvis on the road that will mean a lot of money."
He said, "Look here, boy, in the first place, Elvis is not going on the road"-at this point, the mid to late sixties, Elvis was doing movies, and had not been on tour for years-"and, in the second, if he were to go on tour, which he's not, it would not be you taking him. I've got guys lined up for that job, people we need to take care of."