Supermob

by Gus Russo

  A subsequent investigation (The Walker Report) by The National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence rightly determined that the melee was the result of a "police riot."

  CHAPTER 14

  Scenes from Holl ywood, Part Two

  DURING THE SIXTIES, Sidney Korshak began grabbing attention for something other than his labor-negotiating prowess. It is a truism that, for the male of the species, a prime motivation for the accumulation of power is the attendant benefit of attracting nubile sex partners. And success in vibrant cities like Chicago, Beverly Hills, and Las Vegas avails power brokers of the most nubile of the nubile. In this world, it matters little that one has a beautiful and immensely likable wife, like Bee Korshak, at home raising the kids. What counts is that only a tiny fraction of men are capable of denying their genetic imperative in the face of nonstop temptation. According to people who observed him, Sid Korshak was most definitely not among that fraction. "He liked the girls," pal Irv Kupcinet said euphemistically.

  MJ Goldblatt, who worked for a time as the executive secretary to Korshak's Chicago buddy Joel Goldblatt, recalled how "Sidley" (as she disparagingly referred to Korshak) utilized his link to Goldblatt's Department Stores' inventory to lavish women other than Mrs. Korshak. "Sidley bragged about his girlfriends—he had an ego," Goldblatt recounted. "He used to call Joel's office to have us send them gifts—TVs and stereos. I know because I had to do it. He looked me over a few times. He was a womanizer. Joel once told me Sid was actually more of a voyeur."1

  In Las Vegas, the FBI took note of Korshak's philandering. "He had lots of girlfriends," chuckled former Las Vegas SAC Dean Elson.2 But it was in Beverly Hills that Korshak was most often seen with beauties other than Bee Korshak, or otherwise on the prowl.

  "A girlfriend of mine wanted to sell roses in a restaurant," added movie producer Gray Frederickson (The Godfather series, Apocalypse Now). "I asked Sidney if he knew of anything, and he said, 'Is she cute?'" In fact, she was a stunner, Korshak was informed. "So he met with her and set her up at one of the biggest hotels in town."3 The Bistro's Jimmy Murphy saw the parade of Korshak consorts passing through his Canon Drive front doors. "If Sidney was there with a girl, he was well-covered," remembered Murphy. " 'I was just advising her,' Sidney would say." Gianni Russo, who often met Kor­shak for lunch at the Bistro, agrees: "He always told his wife it was business, because he consulted with a lot of studios."4 Of course, Korshak was not alone in openly bringing his lady friends to the posh restaurant, where spreading gossip was a no-no. In fact, the only danger in these trysts was the chance arrival of the man's wife. "The Bistro didn't have many hiding places," said Murphy, laughing, "so it was par for the course to have to sneak a girlfriend out through the kitchen when someone's wife showed up."5

  Not all of Korshak's partners were unknown starlets or flower girls. Inevitably, he was linked to some of the most desired and well-known actresses of the time. Both Johnny Rosselli's girlfriend Betsy Duncan and Korshak's former daughter-in-law Virginia Korshak were among those certain of a Korshak affair with titian-haired actress Rhonda Fleming. Bistro owner Kurt Niklas, Irv Kupcinet, and Virginia Korshak all also witnessed a "long-term affair" with Stella Stevens.6 Judy Campbell Exner recalled seeing Sidney with Stella at his Riviera Hotel.7 At the time of the alleged SidneyStella affair, Virginia Korshak was dating a well-known television star and attended parties with him at Stevens's home. "He was one of Stella's best friends," Virginia said. "He told me that Stella is being kept, that money is provided to her by Sidney Korshak." Still other sources have linked Korshak to beautiful blond Warner Bros, contract starlet Diane McBain, thirty-four years younger than Sidney, and a ubiquitous face in such sixties television fare as Surf side Six, 77 Sunset Strip, Maverick, and Hawaiian Eye. But of all the Korshak affairs, the one that stands out as the most valued—and represented what the FBI termed "Korshak's only known weakness"8—was that with a flame-haired temptress, thirty-three years his junior, who went by the name Jill St. John.

  mi

  With the boosting of her stage mother, Betty Oppenheim, Jill St. John first appeared under the name Jill Oppenheimer as a child actress in the film Sandy Dreams. While still not out of her teens, St. John had appeared on over one thousand radio shows. By the early 1960s, St. John, who the studio flaks liked to point out had an alleged 162 IQ, found her niche as a guest star on comedy variety specials, especially those of Bob Hope, who relied on a constant supply of female eye candy for his shows. She had also appeared in a number of forgettable films with Korshak friends such as Frank Sinatra {Come Blow Your Horn, 1963; The Oscar; 1966; and Tony Rome, 1967), whom she also dated; Dean Martin (Who's Been Sleeping in My Bed}, 1963); Warren Beatty (The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone, 1961); and Peter Lawford (How I Spent My Summer Vacation, 1967; and The Oscar, 1966).

  Jill St. John (Photofest)

  One constant in St. John's life was her insatiable attraction to wealthy and powerful men. By 1969, the twenty-nine-year-old actress was already in the midst of her third failed marriage, this one to singer Jack Jones, to whom she had been married less than two years.'1* Just as he had done thirty years earlier with Dorothy Appleby, Sid Korshak, whom St. John said she met in 1962,9 "arranged the [divorce] settlement," according to a Hollywood columnist. And, by all accounts, again like Vaffaire Appleby, Sid Kor­shak took a special liking to the striking redhead. "I introduced Sidney to Jill St. John," said veteran MCA agent Freddie Fields, "something for which he was always grateful."10

  "Everyone in this town knew about Sid and Jill," asserted Johnny Rosselli's goddaughter, actress Nancy Czar,11 and, according to some, Kor­shak's interest in St. John predated his handling of the Jack Jones divorce. One friend of both Jill's and Jones's, who asked not to be named, said emphatically, "They married Jill off to Jack Jones. Sid not only set Jill up with movie roles, but he set her up with Jack, who was a foil for Sidney, although he probably didn't realize it." The contention rang true with Frederic Side-water, a Hollywood producer friend of Korshak's (King Kong, The Bible). "Sidney told me that when they were in Vegas, Jill and her husband were given separate suites so she and Sidney could get together."12 The FBI also noted that Korshak often used a "beard" in his assignations with St. John.13 However, according to the FBI, when Bee went off to Europe with girlfriends, Sidney seized the opportunity to openly spend a couple of weeks "with his paramour" in Aspen, Colorado, or New York's Regency Hotel.14

  About this time, according to Kurt Niklas, "Korshak had Jill ensconced in an apartment in Beverly Hills, and they dined almost daily at the Bistro. Suffice it to say, their affair was not a well-kept secret."15 Another St. John friend added, "It was common knowledge that he was keeping her. Sidney was incredibly powerful, generous, and charming. My opinion is that neither one thought this was going to last forever. I think they were both very real. If I was an attractive young lady, I would see nothing wrong with Sidney."

  The apartment was just one of many perks to be enjoyed by a Korshak mistress. One of Jill's boyfriends claims that Korshak lavished the actress with ten grand a month in CDs (certificates of deposit). Korshak's Teamster associate Andy Anderson recalled being asked to purchase a hand-carved ivory chess set for Jill when Anderson was in Hong Kong. But St. John's special passion was jewelry; she liked to brag that her engagement ring from her second marriage contained a diamond that stretched "from knuckle to knuckle."16 Anderson knew of a $50,000 diamond bracelet given to St John. When Jill spied one pricey bauble she wanted, Korshak suddenly cashed in his Bistro stock. Although he had promised Niklas that if he ever got out, he would sell his stock back at the original price of $21,000, he now demanded the current valuation, $70,000. 17

  "Go write me a check for seventy thousand dollars," Sidney ordered Niklas. "Jill saw something she wanted at Van Cleef & Arpels, and I didn't want to lay out pocket money. Besides, you can afford it."18 (One of Kor­shak's rules was to always buy with cash, thereby leaving no paper trail.) Others assert that Korshak went so far as to
buy Jill a home in Aspen, Colorado. Producer Gray Frederickson came to believe it after what Jill told him years later. "When Sid called, I'd run," she said. "He was paying for the house."19

  Teamster leader Anderson recalled how one trinket intended for St. John never made it to her. When Sidney was in England, he eyed a convertible Rolls-Royce that he thought Jill would like, so he purchased the car and had it sent over. But the car was sent to Korshak's house by mistake while he was away. His wife, Bee, thought it was for her. According to Anderson, Bee said, "Sidney, you are such a sweet husband!"20

  Jill and Frank Sinatra (David Sutton, MPTV)

  The Korshak-St. John affair was seemingly immune to public embarrassment, and whatever private cost it may have incurred was kept surprisingly discreet for the microscopic showbiz-capital glare—no tabloid exposes or public shouting matches with spouses, etc. The relationship did have a curious sidelight when St. John began being seen on the arm of Dr. Henry Kissinger, the national security adviser to newly installed President Richard Nixon. For years, Kissinger had been close to MCA VP Taft Schreiber, a staunch Republican supporter who introduced Kissinger to the Hollywood party circuit. And like so many Washington pols before him, Kissinger was quickly seduced by the allure (and the starlets) of the film capital. Along the way he became good friends with Korshak pals such as Frank Sinatra, for whom Kissinger threw a number of parties when the singer visited Washington. 21

  While the admitted "secret swinger" Kissinger orchestrated the wholesale obliteration of Vietnamese and Cambodian civilians by day, his nights were spent in the company of a parade of young-enough-to-be-his-daughter consorts. 22 In Washington, the gossip wags devoted much copy to the Tinsel­town exploits of Dr. K., who was seen dating unnamed "mystery blondes" as well as known celebs such as Mario Thomas, and even a Danish star of X-rated flicks named Judy Brown. There were even whispers in the White House that he was enamored of press secretary Ron Ziegler's twenty-seven-year- old researcher, future ABC newsreader Diane Sawyer, a former America's Junior Miss.23

  But it was Kissinger's relationship with St. John, seventeen years younger, that garnered most of the ink. Jan Amory Cushing, a friend of both Kor­shak's and Kissinger's, remembered how she first heard of the "affair of state." "Henry told me he said to Jill, 'Look, I would like to invite you to the White House. It's a big dinner, dance, you know, the president will be there.' And she said, 'That's so kind of you, but I've been to the White House many times. I'll take a pass.' But I think Sidney fixed them up anyway," Amory posited. "Even though Sidney was having the affair with her, he said, 'Go to the White House, it'll be fun.' So she went."24 One has to give it to St. John, who was able to simultaneously enthrall both one of the country's most powerful public officials and its most furtive power broker. Andy Anderson just rolls his eyes at the thought: "Jill St. John was seeing Kissinger and Sid­ney," he said in wonderment.

  Eventually, Kissinger began escorting St. John to Los Angeles parties that included Korshak pals such as Lew Wasserman, Paul Ziffren, and Kirk Douglas, with the actress openly crowing about her relationship with the good doctor. "Jill used to sit in Eli's Steak House [in Chicago] with Sid [Korshak] and Gussie Alex and talk about Kissinger," said Eli's regular Jack Clarke, who witnessed the trio there chatting about it.25

  During one film shoot, screenwriter Tom Mankiewicz paid a visit to Jill's London apartment, where he overheard the national security adviser speaking with Jill during a critical moment in history. "The phone rang and it was Henry Kissinger, and he was in Paris," Mankiewicz recalled. "Turns out he was actually in the secret negotiations with the Vietnam War at the time, but we didn't know it."26 In late 1972, Korshak remarked to Kurt Niklas, "Can you believe what Kissinger told Jill? The guy is a prick." Niklas asked for clarification. "I'm talking about the jerk violating his national trust," said Korshak. "The dumb sonuvabitch told Jill that we're going to bomb Hanoi into oblivion—and they complained about Jack Kennedy and Judy Campbell. Keep this under your lid. I don't want Jill getting into trouble." According to Niklas, this revelation occurred one week before American B-52s in fact began bombing Hanoi.27

  Andy Anderson related that the Nixon-Kissinger carpet-bombing of North Vietnam led to a more intimate kind of Cold War. "Sidney told me that she said to Kissinger that she wouldn't sleep with him anymore unless he ended the Vietnam War," Anderson recalled.28 Others were dubious of the idea of the bedroom brinkmanship. "I doubted Jill ever slept with him," offered Tom Mankiewicz. "I think it was for show. He went with a friend of mine—Hope Lange—and nothing happened. I think Henry thought he'd look great."

  One would suspect that the powerful Kissinger ranked first in the peccadillo pecking order, and that might have been true with most mortals, but not so with Sid Korshak. Los Angeles labor lawyer and Korshak friend Leo Geffner recalled, "Often, when Kissinger invited Jill St. John to the White House, she would say, 'Sorry, I have an invitation from someone more important.' "*29

  As the Korshak-St. John affair lost momentum years later, friends witnessed the tightrope St. John attempted to walk. "I was at this ski trip in Bear Valley, California, in the early seventies," recalled Missy Chandler, the former wife of Los Angeles Times publisher Otis Chandler. "There was a pro-celebrity ski race, and Jill was there, paid to promote it. She was there with [skier] Spider Sabich. She was in the hot tub with Otis and myself and she said, 'Don't you dare tell anybody I'm here, because Sid will find out and I'm creamed.'" According to Missy, Jill was particularly worried that her date with Savitch would appear in the gossip columns of Otis's newspaper.30

  Photographer and concert producer Ron Joy dated St. John during a period when the actress was making a halfhearted attempt to separate from Korshak. After coming off a five-year relationship with Frank Sinatra's daughter Nancy, Joy met St. John at a Hollywood party, and the two began dating soon thereafter. "We dated for quite a while. At that time, she was a girlfriend of Sidney. Korshak and I were aware of each other, actually, because of Nancy—I had seen him at Frank's house. Anyway, when I met Jill, Sidney hadn't been coming around for a while—I think because he was trying to be a good husband to his wife. He had reformed for about a year. One day after lunch at Jill's house on 1326 Beverly Estate Drive,+ she said, 'Sidney's coming up. Do you want to stay and meet Sidney?'

  " 'No. I want to get out of here,' I told her. But I was slow moving out that day and I didn't get out in time—I had a phone call or something. He was already there by the time I came out of the bedroom. I think he was standing at the time, holding a briefcase."

  What happened next left an indelible impression on Joy, unaccustomed to power on the level of a Sid Korshak.

  "He didn't introduce himself or anything," remembered Joy. "He just said, 'So, you're the guy who was fucking Nancy Sinatra.' That was his comment. Then he turned to Jill and said, 'Here, this is for you.' And, boom, the briefcase opens and cash falls in her lap—tightly bundled hundred-dollar bills. I would assume—and I didn't count it, obviously—that it was half a million dollars to over a million. He dumped this money right in front of me. He wasn't trying to hide anything, that's for sure. This was her present."

  Joy said Korshak gave him a look that said, "She's back with me now," and Jill merely smiled at the young photographer in agreement. "I was out. I knew it," Joy added. "I'd been around her for a long time and I was smart like a fox. I said, 'Jill, I guess this is the end. Thank you for a fabulous time.' I felt bad for about ten days or so—physically sick. But I had a great relationship with her. Jill was just great."31

  The Korshak-St. John affair ended, according to an FBI source, after the actress gave the Fixer an ultimatum to either move in with her, or else. But Korshak refused to leave Bee, and so it ended. The source described Korshak as "melancholy" after the breakup.32

  Perhaps the most troubling aspect of Korshak's infidelity was his utter lack of discretion. One of Bee's friends described him as "just a bastard" because he would even bring his mistresses to his family parties.3
3 Virginia Korshak remembered one particular embarrassment. "Bee told me that Rhonda Fleming's husband called her up, after thirteen years of marriage, and let it be known Sidney was having an affair with his wife. Bee even said to me that 'Sidney would deny it if I caught him in bed. He'd say I was seeing things, it's not the truth.' "34

  For those unaccustomed to living in such rarefied air, the question always arises as to how the cuckolded spouse copes with such regular public humiliation, a lifestyle that often saw Bee escorted to parties by family friends, such as Ambassador John Gavin, when Sid was off doing his thing. Those who knew Bee Korshak said that Sidney offered her such a great life in every other respect that the trade-off was tacitly accepted. "All the traveling to Europe with Dinah Shore and Barbara Sinatra. If she broke up with Sidney, she wouldn't have that life," said one acquaintance.35 Former daughter-in-law Virginia Korshak opined, "I honestly think that Sidney made it up to her. He must have said, 'If you can put up with these things, you get a sixty-carat emerald.' I think Bee liked that. I mean, Bee liked the Norell gowns." She may also have liked that the giving of a long leash was mutual. "Sid was a permissive guy and let her do her thing as well," explained one family friend. "She liked tennis pros," said another.