THE PRODUCER WHO SEDUCED THE PRESS AND WON HIS WIFE A GOLDEN GLOBE

Will the passing of a 95 year-old businessman in Ichilov Medical Center in Tel Aviv finally provide closure to a scandal that has plagued the Golden Globes for 38 years?

Israeli businessman Meshulam Riklis died quietly with his family by side on Friday, January 25. He spent most of his childhood in the city, having arrived there with his family from Istandul, where he was born in 1923. From these humble beginnings, Riklis would prove himself an astute money market manipulator, launching and destroying business enterprises riding a wave of investment surges and bankruptcy purges on his way to a US$1billion empire. 

In 1977, while holding court in Las Vegas as co-owner of the iconic Riviera Casino, the 49 year-old left his wife to woo and ultimately wed a 19 year-old starlet named Pia Zadora. Within three years, his wealth and influence had carved out for her a career before the camera, a remarkable achievement given her somewhat limited range (her only previous on-screen role was in 1964’s Santa Claus Conquers the Martians, at age 10).

His grandest gesture was funding director Matt Cimber’s adaptation of James M. Cain’s 1946 novel, Butterfly as a vehicle for her. A sexed-up thriller about a devoutly religious coal-miner (Stacey Keach) who has an incestuous romp with his nymphette daughter (Zadora), the film featured some old Hollywood legends (Orson Welles, Stuart Whitman, June Lockhart) but was mauled by critics; in one of the kinder reviews, The New York Times referred to the “sleazy melodrama” as a “camp classic”, noting that “Miss Zadora is not a convincing actress,” calling her “spectacularly inept.”

However, Meshulam Riklis lived by the creed, “Whatever Pia wanted, Pia got,” (including photo shoots for Playboy and New York Magazine). Riklis cosied up the Golden Globe voting body, The Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA), as only an ‘80s billionaire could do; he took an initial group to see Pia perform at the Riviera ahead of a lavish banquet and private screening of his wife’s comeback film, before repeating the hospitality for a larger HFPA contingent at his Beverly Hills mansion. (Pictured, above; Pia Zadora as Kady in Butterfly)

When that year’s nominations were announced (and with the film still awaiting a US release), there was Pia Zadora’s name shortlisted as The New Star of Tomorrow. She would then compete - and win - against fellow nominees Kathleen Turner (Body Heat), Howard E. Rollins Jr and Elizabeth McGovern (both for Ragtime), Rachel Ward (Sharkey’s Machine) and Craig Wasson (Four Friends). When presenter Timothy Hutton read her name, the room seemed to drain of air; there was almost total silence.

When the film was released six days later, and it became all too obvious that Zadora was perhaps the least likely to win an award for her onscreen presence, public and industry backlash became vitriolic. So stained by the rumours that the award had been bought and that the HFPA voting group were approachable, broadcasting partner CBS bailed on their ongoing screening contract; ABC and NBC networks also passed on the now floundering show (after 12 years in the broadcasting wilderness, it returned to network television on NBC in 1995). The Golden Raspberry Awards, aka The Razzies, redressed the balance somewhat, awarding Zadora the Worst Actress and Worst New Star honours.

Meshulam Riklis continued to accumulate wealth and blow it on Zadora’s acting projects. The same year as Butterfly, he produced Fake-Out (also for director Matt Cimber), a dire thriller not quite so awful as Butterfly but still unwatchable by any standard. In 1983, he bankrolled The Lonely Lady, a vulgar, trashy Z-grader in which Zadora (as a Hollywood screenwriter, no less; pictured, right) is raped by Ray Liotta…with a garden hose; it swept that year’s Razzie awards. Riklis bought his wife some studio time with Jermaine Jackson; together they recorded the duet When the Rain Begins to Fall, from her 1984 scifi-comedy romp, Voyage of The Rock Aliens). Riklis and Zadora would divorce in 1993; he left the film business, she retired from acting in 1999.

The late Israeli producer has always denied anything underhanded occurred between himself and the HFPA. “These rumors are ridiculous,” he insisted, when asked the time. “The by-laws say okay to a screening in the home. Other people take the judges out to fancy restaurants—what’s the big deal?” Perhaps; and, frankly, the HFPA have not done their credibility any favours with some left-field choices in the intervening years (let's say…Dudley Moore in ’85, for Mickey & Maude, over Ghostbusters’ Bill Murray and Beverly Hills Cop’s Eddie Murphy). There is no denying, however, that Riklis’ clandestine actions turned the name of his young wife into an industry punchline that lasts to this day. (Pictured, left; Riklis, right, with wife Tali Sinai and friend in 2011)