Five minutes later, the phone rang. It was Hammer. He said, "Hey, kid, get over here, let's talk."
I went to meet Hammer at his office in Beverly Hills. He was a small and steely man, with a helmet of silver hair and horn-rimmed glasses. There was mischief in his eyes. He said he wanted to be where the action was. He was always in jump position. In him, I saw big deals and fun. In me, he saw himself as a kid. We had the same sensibility, we rhymed. So we called our lawyer-we had the same lawyer-and told him to draft an agreement. Just like that, we were partners.
I loved to listen to him talk. My stories were about the Bronx, the Air Force, Elvis, the Colonel, Zeppelin, Sinatra. His were about the Communist Party, Trotsky, Lenin, Brezhnev, Moscow in January, Nixon, and Reagan. We hatched plans, crazy ideas.
I remember a trip we made to China. There must have been a reason for this trip, but in truth Hammer just liked to go for the sake of going. Airports, cities, languages-that was his thing. We spent the night on the plane, engines humming, the world black outside the window. Then Beijing came into view, a sea of lights. We were met on the tarmac by bands and diplomats. Armand was the main event wherever he happened to be. The Chinese had a manifest. It listed the dozens of people in our group. Because I was Armand's partner-in America we were Weintraub-Hammer, in the rest of the world we were Hammer-Weintraub-my name was second on the list, which, as far as the Chinese were concerned, made me something like a vice president.
Though we had been up for hours, we had no time to rest or shower and were instead hurried by motorcade to a dinner at the people's palace. This was the 1980s, not long after Nixon opened China to the West. There was still something mysterious and exotic about the country, the squat buildings and shrines, the sea of faces, the narrow lanes. It was as if we had passed through the looking glass. The party was held in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, where we sat around an enormous table. Hundreds of waiters were coming and going. Ritual governed the slightest gesture.
Hammer occupied the seat of honor, between the premier of the nation and the chairman of the country. I was second in importance, also seated between high officials. There was a lot of eating, talking, drinking. This was followed by the toasts. They came one after another, as dignitary after dignitary raised his glass and spoke about the generosity of Dr. Hammer. At one point, I leaned over and looked at Armand to see how he was taking all this. His chin rested on his chest and his horn-rimmed glasses had slid down nose. He was asleep.
Then a little man at the end of the table raised a glass and said, "And now, we honor our other fine and honorable guest, Hollywood movie man and maker of the great film E.T., Mr. Jerry Weintraub. Everyone applauded. Then the little man said, "Now Mr. Jerry Weintraub, please to stand and say a few words."
I stood, blushing, nodding through the applause. I tried to say no, no, I did not make E.T., but everyone seemed so happy with me, it felt wrong to disappoint them. In the end, I gave in and signed all their stills from E.T.
We spent the rest of the trip in meetings with officials. Hammer, having finally gotten some sleep, was exploding with energy, shaking hands, talking, making deals, which, to him, was the same as making friends.
Hammer was unpredictable and fun. As I said, he wanted to be where the action was. I'll give you an example. During Jimmy Carter's presidency, George H. W. Bush scheduled a reception for Deng Xiaoping, a member of China's ruling Politburo, in the course of his first visit to the United States. It was a big deal. Deng Xiaoping made only three stops when he was in the country. He went to Washington for a state dinner at the White House, he went to California to visit Disneyland, he went to Texas for a dinner with George Bush. The Chinese loved Bush-he had been the American representative in the formative years after Nixon's first visit-and they wanted to let the world know how much they valued George Bush, and how important he was. Ronald Reagan took notice of the dinner, and, in my opinion, it was a factor a few years later when Reagan picked George Bush to be his running mate. The dinner would be held in Houston, Bush's hometown. Bush told me about the dinner and asked if I wanted to invite anyone and so forth.
As soon as Hammer heard about this the calls started. He had tried to get on the list for the state dinner, but was rejected by the State Department. There were several reasons, chief among them his long relationship with the Russians. We were, after all, trying to take advantage of the rivalry between the Russians and the Chinese. After the White House turned him down, Hammer focused on the dinner in Houston. He had to be there.
But it was a no go, I couldn't do it, and Hammer finally gave up. Or so I thought. Then the night came. And Hammer showed up. No invitation? So what? There he was. I'm not sure how he got there, and do not remember the whole backstory, but Bush, who had known Hammer for years and was at that time a private citizen, said something like, "Of course, of course, he's here, let him in."
Bush introduced Hammer to Deng Xiaoping, who was thrilled to meet Hammer because he had known Lenin-so thrilled, in fact, that he insisted on being seated next to Hammer at the dinner. Everyone was sent scrambling. All the seats had to be rearranged. Hammer ended up next to Deng Xiaoping, and that's how the two of us got an invitation to visit Beijing at a time when private citizens didn't do so. And we went on a private jet, which was the only way Hammer, who was over eighty by then, would travel.
A few years later, I threw two parties at my house for Yitzhak Shamir because I really admired him. He was then prime minister of Israel. Shamir was a tough guy and a real hero. Hammer was at both parties, helping Shamir hit up the people at the dinners-forty heavyweights from LA-for money. He wanted us to drill for oil in Israel. I remember him sitting with his map, pointing to all the known fields in the region, saying, "Look, where we're sitting, there's got to be oil!" We had done surveys, tests, studies. We knew there was no oil, but he refused to believe us. He kept saying, "Gentleman, please, please, look where we're sitting! There's got to be oil."
Shamir was smart. He knew that in order to get to us, he had to get to Hammer, and to get to Hammer, he need only play on his vanity. So, at the end of dinner, the prime minister stood and said, "I would like to thank Dr. Hammer, who loves and understands Israel and is therefore going to help us drill for that oil that's just got to be there. I mean, look where we're sitting!"
Hammer, never shy of a spotlight, then said, "Uh, yes, Mr. Prime Minister. We will drill and the Jewish state will have its oil!"
Hammer went to each of us later, saying, "One million from you, one million from you, one million from you, and we find that oil."
When he came to me, I said, "Hey, Armand, I know a better way to get oil."
"What's that, wise guy?"
"Let's just sink a bit into the Saudi Pipeline."
I kicked in the money, though. It was always that way with Hammer. He was a very good salesman. (They never did find oil in Israel.)
Hammer became even more active as he got older. He wanted to go everywhere and see everything. His bags were packed, his plane was fueled, he was ready to travel with a change in the news. In the summer of 1982, while we were in the air on our way to South Korea, we got word that Leonid Brezhnev, the Russian premier, had died.
"Turn it around," Hammer told his pilot. "We're going to Moscow."
The pilot leaned on the stick, the plane banked steeply.
"What are you talking about?" I asked.