The morning edition of Variety sat squarely in the center of Duke's desk.
The headline, printed in bold ink, was their statement.
DILLER ASCENDS: PARAMOUNT CROWNS A NEW PRESIDENT.
Duke stood by the windows of his office, gazing out, he missed doing this.
Down below, grips were pushing heavy lighting rigs, and extras in period costumes were hurrying toward soundstages.
It was a good day.
The oak doors of the office opened, cutting through the quiet hum of the air conditioning. Barry Diller walked in.
"I see you read the trades," Duke said, turning from the window with a warm, genuine smile. "Congratulations, Barry. President of the studio and Vice-Chairman of Ajax. How does it feel?"
"Good," Diller replied, taking a seat in one of the plush leather armchairs opposite Duke's desk. He didn't even glance at the newspaper. "We have a problem in distribution for the next year slate that I need to-"
"Stop," Duke laughed, walking over and leaning against the edge of his desk. "For a day, Barry, go and celebrate. Let yourself enjoy the view from the top for a second."
Diller offered a rare smile. Diller was the ultimate machine, a man who worked everyday without stopping. And that was exactly why Duke had chosen him, Duke and Evans were the Creative people, while Diller was the businessman.
"I enjoy the view by making sure nothing crumbles underneath us, Duke," Diller said, opening his binder. "And we have some things to discuss."
"Fair enough," Duke conceded, "Let's talk about Washington. Specifically, let's talk about the GATT deal."
Diller's eyes lit up.
"John Mitchell's back-channel offer," Diller said, leaning forward. "The Republicans want our cultural support, and in exchange, they'll push through General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade protections that will essentially blockade cheap Japanese arcades and consoles from flooding the American market."
"Exactly," Duke nodded, moving behind his desk and sitting down. "If we take the deal, our interactive division basically get a state-sponsored moat. We'll own the video game hardware market for the next decade without any foreign undercutting. Atari becomes an absolute monopoly."
"It's mechanical genius," Diller breathed, tapping a gold pen against his legal pad. "It's a guaranteed billions in revenue. But..."
"But," Duke finished for him, "Mitchell is desperate. He wants us to create a PR machine toward the White House. He wants us to paint a rosy picture of the administration. And he wants it now, before this Watergate burglary nonsense turns into a genuine scandal."
Diller sat back, steepling his fingers. "Watergate is going to get worse, Duke. The press smells blood in the water. If Paramount is seen as Nixon's cheerleader when the story hits hard, the splash-back will hit the studio. We'll lose the counter-culture audience, which is the very demographic that makes us profitable."
Duke nodded slowly. "I agree. I haven't given Mitchell an answer yet. I don't want to offend the administration, but I absolutely refuse to tie this studio to a sinking ship. My instinct is to remain entirely neutral. Let the politicians eat each other while we make movies and build arcades."
"Neutrality is a fallacy, Duke," Diller countered smoothly. "At the level we are operating the studio is already a political entity. If you do nothing, Mitchell sees it as a betrayal. If you do something, the left sees it as fascism."
"So what's the solution?" Duke asked, genuinely curious.
"Neutrality front but supporting the GOP in some ways, and focus on money of course," Diller said, his voice dropping.
"It's impossible to use Paramount's movies to support the GOP. But it's totally possible to acquire a handful of independent television stations in key swing states or a mid-sized newspaper."
"If we own the news outlets, we can dictate the editorial slant. We can run stories that are mildly sympathetic to the administration, enough to satisfy Mitchell and secure the GATT protections. We manage the Watergate narrative on a local level."
"We support both sides just enough so that whoever wins the election, they won't attack us."
Duke leaned back, looking at Diller.
"Do you think they'll lose?" Duke asked quietly. "Do you think Nixon is going down?"
"It doesn't matter what I think," Diller said pragmatically. "It matters what the data says. And the data says the vote is volatile. Although the Eagleton affair seems to indicate that Nixon will win."
"Nixon will win the re-election," Duke stated with certainty. "He's going to win in a landslide this November."
Diller looked at him, slightly taken aback by the confidence in Duke's voice. "If you are so sure he's going to win, what is the problem? Why not just take Mitchell's deal directly?"
"Because I am a builder, Barry," Duke smiled, "I want to build theme parks, I want to invent new technologies, and I want to tell stories."
"I don't want to spend the next three years answering subpoenas because we got too close to a paranoid White House. I also don't want to offend either political side because we need to sell tickets to both of them."
Diller nodded slowly, absorbing the philosophy. "Understood. We stay clean. But we buy the TV stations anyway."
"Agreed," Duke said, standing up and reaching for his suit jacket draped over the back of his chair. "Draft the acquisition proposals for the stations. Let's start in the Midwest. And Barry?"
"Yes?"
"Keep Paramount running smoothly," Duke said, slipping his arms into the tailored jacket. "I'm leaving the lot for a few days."
"Where to?" Diller asked, already making notes on his legal pad.
"I'm going to Dallas in December," Duke said, a nostalgic glint in his eye. "I need to check on some... liquid assets. But before that, I have a flight to catch this afternoon. I'm going to the deep south."
"Deep South?...you mean Georgia?" Diller frowned, "John Boorman is shooting Deliverance down there on the Chattooga River. But that's a Warner Brothers picture. Why are you visiting a competitor's set?"
Duke grabbed his cane and offered a smile. "Because Ross invited me and I plan on meeting a person there."
___
The Chattooga River in northern Georgia was a torrent of white water and jagged rocks.
Duke stood under the shade of a massive oak tree, leaning comfortably on his cane. He was dressed for the climate, a light linen shirt with the sleeves rolled up, and tailored khakis.
Fifty yards away, director John Boorman was screaming through a megaphone, his voice echoing off the canyon walls.
In the river, Burt Reynolds and Jon Voight were clinging to a half-submerged canoe, looking terrified as the rapids battered them.
"It's a beautiful kind of chaos, isn't it?"
Duke turned. Standing a few feet away, holding two glasses of iced tea sweating in the Southern heat, was Steven J. Ross.
The head of Warner Communications was a man who radiated charm the way a radiator bleeds heat.
"Steve," Duke greeted, accepting the glass of iced tea. "Thanks for the invitation. Though I have to admit, I prefer my sets with a little more air conditioning and a little less risk of drowning the actors."
Ross laughed, "Boorman is a madman, but the dailies are spectacular, Duke."
"I feel audiences will like this," Duke agreed, taking a sip of the sweet tea.
The two men stood in silence for a moment, watching the crew reset the cameras.
Despite the polite smiles, the air between them crackled with a mutual friction.
"So," Ross said, leaning against the trunk of the oak tree, "I hear you've been having some trouble in my backyard. New York City."
Duke didn't flinch. "The arcade bans."
"The city council is terrified," Ross chuckled, shaking his head. "They think our little ping-pong television cabinets are going to turn the youth of Manhattan into a pack of degenerate gamblers. I know the mayor, Duke. I could make a phone call. Smooth things over."
"I appreciate the offer, Steve, but knowing you, you'll have it handled," Duke said smoothly. "The data proves our arcades actually lower local crime rates by keeping kids off the streets. We'll win anything NYC throws our way."
"I'm sure you will," Ross conceded easily. "You always do. But it points to a larger problem, doesn't it? The old guard doesn't understand the new technology. Look at the MPAA."
Duke nodded, knowing exactly where Ross was going. "The theatrical windows."
"Exactly!" Ross exclaimed, gesturing with his glass. "We're shooting this brilliant movie right here, and the moment it's done, I have to beg the theater chains to give me screens. I want to put movies in theaters faster, wider, and with more control. But the MPAA is resisting. They want to protect the old way of doing things with slow rollouts."
"The system is built on scarcity," Duke noted. "You want to build it on volume."
"And so do you," Ross said, turning to look Duke in the eyes. "Don't pretend you don't. You put The Godfather on more screens on opening weekend than anyone thought possible. We should be working together on this, Duke. Warner and Paramount, pushing the MPAA out of the way to modernize the industry."
Duke smiled, swirling the ice in his glass. "I'm always happy to modernize, Steve. But I find that when Paramount leads, the MPAA tends to follow eventually."
Ross's eyes narrowed slightly, a flash of genuine competitive annoyance breaking through his affable mask. "You know, Duke, for a guy with such a shiny reputation, you are a remarkably dirty player. I still haven't forgiven you for stealing American Zoetrope out from under my nose."
A few years prior, Francis Ford Coppola and George Lucas had set up American Zoetrope with Warner Brothers money.
Warner had hated the experimental films they produced, effectively burying the studio.
Duke had swooped in, used his Future Memory and capital to rescue Zoetrope, and folded Coppola into the Paramount family, a move that directly resulted in The Godfather.
"I didn't steal anything, Steve," Duke replied, his voice light and unapologetic. "I simply picked up a diamond that someone threw in the trash."
He still didn't like Ross since the whole FTC ordeal
Ross let out a short laugh. "Touché. You gave him a good script, I'll give you that."
"I didn't give him anything" Duke corrected gently. "Coppola had total creative control, something that Paramount takes very seriously. We just decided to invest in him."
"Well, speaking of investments," Ross pivoted smoothly, "I didn't invite you out to this swamp just to talk about Francis Coppola's ego. I want to talk about real estate, more specifically theme parks."
Duke's internal panic instantly rose. Theme parks were his endgame. It was the physical manifestation of his IP strategy.
"I'm listening," Duke said.
"Warner is expanding," Ross said proudly. "We just opened Warner Bros. Jungle Habitat in New Jersey. Have you seen it?"
"A drive-through safari park," Duke nodded, a playful glint entering his eyes. "Lions, tigers, and baboons roaming around the Tri-State area. It's very ambitious, Steve. Tell me, is it true what they say?"
"What do they say?"
"That you only opened a cash-heavy, untraceable ticket-sales business in New Jersey so your friends from the area have a place to launder their money?" Duke asked, his tone perfectly conversational.
Ross stopped cold. Then, just as quickly, Ross laughed.
"You're such a son of a bitch, Duke!" Ross laughed, clapping a hand on Duke's shoulder.
"Money laundering! Do you hear this guy?" Ross looked around as if playing to an invisible audience. "No, Duke. No money laundering. Just good, clean, family entertainment. But it's just the beginning."
Ross removed his hand, his expression turning sharp.
"Jungle Habitat is a proof of concept. The real money is in destination parks. Like Disneyland, but bigger. I have the land and can get the permits, Duke. Between us we have some of the greatest intellectual property in the world. Bugs Bunny. Daffy Duck. Superman. Batman."
"You have the momentum. I'll offer you a partnership. A joint venture between Warner Communications and Paramount. We build a mega-park together. We split profit fifty-fifty. We crush Disney before they can get back u´p."
Duke stood listening to the rush of the river and the distant yells of the film crew.
He looked at Steve Ross, feeling a profound sense of clarity. He knew the value of IP better than Ross ever could. He knew what Batman would be worth in 1989. He knew what Superman would be worth in 1978.
Licensing them was a fool's errand. When you rent the characters, you work for the landlord.
"It's a beautiful vision, Steve," Duke said, his voice calm. "It really is. A park with the Justice League and the Looney Tunes would print money."
"So we draw up the papers," Ross smiled, sensing victory.
"No," Duke said simply.
Ross's smile froze. "No?"
"No," Duke repeated, leaning slightly on his cane, "I don't do joint ventures unless it's with countries, Steve. If I build a park, every brick, every character, and every ticket stub belongs to Paramount. I am not interested in being a landlord for Warner's ambition."
"You're making a mistake, Duke," Ross warned, his voice losing its jovial tone. "You don't have the political connections to get something like that in New York."
Duke offered a smile. "Everytime we meet we seem to threaten each other, Steve. As for political connections... well i already dealt with the FTC so I think i'm covered, after all money always wins."
Duke handed his empty glass back to the Head of Warner Communications.
"Enjoy Georgia, Steve. The picture looks great. Now if you dont mind, I got a meeting with the governor."
Without waiting for a response, Duke Hauser turned and walked away, his cane fighting against the Georgia dirt.
___
This chapter was supposed to be longer but i been having very bad last few days