Bert Fields, the colorful and shrewd dean of Hollywood attorneys whose services were enlisted by superstars and studios alike, knowing they would face a rampant defense and almost certain of some measure of victory, died Sunday at his Malibu, California home. He was 93.
The cause was complications from long-term Covid-19, said his wife, Barbara Guggenheim.
Over the decades, there have been stars and studio heads turning to Mr. Fields, including Madonna, Tom Cruise, Warren Beatty, the Beatles, Michael Jackson, Dustin Hoffman, George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, Michael Ovitz and Jeffrey Katzenberg.
Urbane, fitted and tailored for Saville Row, became Mr. Fields something of a celebrity himself, collecting magazine profiles and regular gossip columns.
In addition to examples of his legal acumen, the press learned of an epicurean lifestyle mirroring that of his clients—the chauffeur-driven Bentley Arnage (cost: $250,000) he used to navigate Los Angeles, the homes he owned in Malibu. , Manhattan, Mexico and France, and the $100 bottles of wine served at dinner parties.
One of his most famous cases was his fierce representation of Jeffrey Katzenberg, the chief executive of DreamWorks Animation, against the Walt Disney Company for denying Mr. Katzenberg $250 million contractual bonuses for hits like “The Lion King” and “The Little mermaid”. ” when he was the president of that studio, from 1984 to 1994. Mr. Fields conducted a damning cross-examination of Michael Eisner, then the Disney chief, and revealed that Mr. Eisner had once told the co-author of his autobiography that he hated Mr. Katzenberg.
“I hate that little dwarf,” Mr. Eisner had said, according to Mr. Fields’ interrogation in court.
The revelation angered Mr. Eisner so much that he rose from the witness seat and warned Mr. Fields that he was pushing him too hard. The impression left by the exchange uneasy about the Disney company, which had built its reputation on lovable dwarfs and other animated characters, and on the kind and fatherly studio heads it presented on television. It settled the lawsuit for the entire $250 million, more than triple the amount ever given to a person in a Hollywood lawsuit, according to Variety.
When producer Harvey Weinstein and his brother Bob wanted to split their production company Miramax from Disney, a lawsuit seemed inevitable. But Mr. Fields, aware of Disney’s distrust of him, worked out a deal that allowed Disney to keep the Miramax name and its library of 550 films; in return, it had to give the Weinsteins $130 million to start a new film company.
“In the entertainment business, going to trial without Bert Fields is like entering the Arctic without a coat,” Harvey Weinstein, now in prison for sex crimes, once told DailyExpertNews.
Mr. Fields represented Michael Jackson in a civil suit that arose from allegations in 1993 that he molested an underage boy, a case settled for more than $20 million, but in which Jackson admitted no wrongdoing. Mr. Fields also warded further harm from a number of writers who had investigated Tom Cruise’s membership in Scientology, which they labeled a cult, by threatening them with defamation.
When Apple Corps Ltd., a company owned by the Beatles, wanted to prevent the tribute band “Beatlemania” from mimicking classic Beatles performances with look-alikes and imitations of their trademarks, it hired Mr. Fields in. He persuaded a Los Angeles judge to order the producers to pay Apple Corps $5.6 million plus interest for commercial exploitation.
When Warren Beatty protested a decision to cut four minutes of his film “Reds” (1981) from showing on television, he retained Mr. Fields, who took care of him as a director, the right to make final cutbacks.
In 2006, editor Judith Regan sent Mr. Fields to quell allegations of anti-Semitism that could have ruined her career. She had paid OJ Simpson $800,000 for a book, “If I Did It,” which she then promoted with a TV interview in which he apparently confessed to murdering his ex-wife.
Harper Collins, the publisher, pulled the plug on the project and then fired Ms. Regan, saying she had complained that a Jewish clique at the publishing house was out to get her. Mr. Fields spoke to several media outlets, warning them that as a Jew, he did not feel that her comments, even when accurately reported, were bigoted, and that accusing her of biased statements was defamatory.
He once explained his legal strategy to journalist Ken Auletta over a glass of chardonnay in Spago, the famous Hollywood hangout. “If I were a general I would attack and continue to attack – to unbalance the opponent, change the odds and make a settlement your way much more favorable,” he said. “It forces the other side to think, Hey, maybe I’m losing this case. Let’s settle it.”
Mr. Fields’ will became apparent when author Barbara Chase-Riboud filed a $10 million lawsuit against DreamWorks, accusing her of using material from her historical novel for the 1997 film “Amistad,” directed by Steven Spielberg. , about a revolt of slave ships.
Mr. Fields retaliated during a joint appearance with her on DailyExpertNews by pointing out that a passage in her novel was identical to that of another Amistad account. He declined to use the word plagiarism, but Ms. Chase-Riboud settled herself out of court, even praising the film as a “beautiful piece of work” and adding that the producers did nothing inappropriate.
Mr. Fields was given the impression that he had never lost a case, but all but a handful of cases were settled out of court and not always as lucrative as his clients had expected. Madonna’s 2004 breach of contract against Warner Music was settled for $10 million, not the $200 million she had asked for.
The reputation of Mr. Fields was clouded in 2002 when federal detectives began investigating the activities of the private investigator he often employed, Anthony Pellicano, and discovered that that crass detective had illegally wiretapped many lawsuits to track down incriminating information and legal strategies. Mr. Pellicano was sentenced to 15 years in prison, but Mr. Fields was not charged.
“I never knew there was wiretapping, never,” he told DailyExpertNews.
Nevertheless, he admitted that those years were a “tough time,” and the stain of murderous legal tactics clung to him afterward.
Bertram Harris Fields was born on March 31, 1929 in Los Angeles. His mother, Mildred (Rubin) Fields, was a retired ballet dancer who read both The Wall Street Journal and The Communist Daily Worker. His father, F. Maxwell Fields, was an eye surgeon whose patients included Groucho Marx and Mae West.
In his adolescence, Bert’s father joined the army, despite being in his forties. Bert was sent to live with an aunt in San Francisco and then to a boarding house in Los Angeles, where he lived while attending high school. He made his living by earning money as a caddy.
He eventually attended UCLA and then Harvard Law School and married Amy Markson after graduating in 1952. As the Korean War continued, he served as a lawyer in the Air Force’s Judge Advocates office and then went on to work for a law firm in Beverly Hills. There he dealt with the divorce of a fashion model, Lydia Menovich, and fell in love with her; she became his second wife. They were married for 27 years, until her death from lung cancer in 1986.
He met Mrs. Guggenheim, an art consultant and his third wife, when he was defending her against a lawsuit from Sylvester Stallone regarding a painting she had bought for him. In addition to her, he leaves behind a son from his first marriage, James, and two grandchildren.
Early in his career, Mr. Fields did some acting work and appeared as a prosecutor in an episode of the TV police drama “Dragnet”; Jack Webb, the show’s creator and star, was a customer. He soon acquired other clients—Edward G. Robinson, Peter Falk, and Elaine May—and formed a profitable friendship with the super-agent Michael Ovitz, who called him more luminous names, such as Dustin Hoffman. In 1982, Mr. Fields merged his company with another, to become the entertainment powerhouse Greenberg Glusker Fields Claman & Machtinger.
mr. Fields was proud of his interests outside the law. He was an expert on Shakespeare and wrote three books: one that claimed Shakespeare had a secret writing partner, another that was a revisionist evaluation of “Richard III” and a third that was a fictional biography of Shylock.
He also wrote two mystery novels under the pseudonym D. Kincaid, where his alter ego, a lawyer named Harry Cain, relies on a shady private detective who occasionally carries out illegal wiretaps.
Alex Traub reporting contributed.