Stan Lee

by Bob Batchelor

  Although purposely staying at arm’s length from the print division, Lee never backed off his role as Marvel’s full-time spokesman, though he did up his speaking fee to $3,000 to give colleges less incentive to book him.24 When the Hollywood efforts forced him off the college campus lecture circuit, he upped his attendance at big-ticket events, like comic conventions, as well as his appearances on television and radio programs. The influx of cable television channels and the growing radio industry gave Lee more opportunities to reach audiences. For talk show hosts and radio deejays, Lee was routinely a stellar guest. Years of practice had honed his skills, so he offered great sound bites, as well as the tried-and-true, seemingly timeless stories about superhero origins. Lee had a knack for making each host or caller feel as if no one had ever asked him which superhero he liked best or if he had a single favorite comic book issue.

  In 1984, prior to appearing at the New York City Dimension Convention, Lee did a radio interview, boasting that comic books were at that time “far bigger than they’ve ever been,” citing Marvel’s role in creating “a fan following for comic books, that never existed twenty or thirty years ago.”25 He also noted the connection between the collecting craze, the rise of independent comic book shops, and the intense fandom that Marvel had created over the years.

  While Lee entertained fans that called in to the radio show with questions about changes in Spider-Man’s costume and how much old comics might be worth, the episode also revealed why many people grew angry with Lee over the years regarding the origins of the superhero characters. In the frenzied pace of television and radio programming, hosts and others who were not experts in comic book history and had no stake in it would take shortcuts to save time, like calling Lee the “creator of such characters as . . .” without attributing the cocreator status to the artists. The interviewers simply did not have the background to understand, but what about Lee’s responses? Should he have corrected or added information within the context of the appearance or let it slide? Sometimes he did and sometimes not. On the one hand, correcting the interviewer diverted time and attention, potentially leading to an awkward situation. But not mentioning the artists generated animosity among those in the know. Lee constantly balanced an on-air role that mixed spokesperson, provocateur, pitchman, historian, and actor—and in doing so, may have sacrificed truth for the sake of showmanship and audience entertainment.

  In 1986, Lee wrote a long essay, “Spidey and Me,” for a book that collected a number of his Spider-Man newspaper strips: The Best of Spider-Man. While the piece describes the character and revisits the origin story, it is also a kind of mini-autobiography. Lee admitted that his own ideas slipped into the strip, explaining, “I feel that it’s as difficult for writers to keep their own personal convictions out of what they write as it is for people in general to keep their personal thoughts . . . out of what they say in conversation.”26 Moreover, Lee wrote at length that each character “is really me. . . . I’m every single one of them . . . [but] Spider-Man is practically my autobiography.”27

  Lee dedicated three days a week—Saturday, Sunday, and Wednesday—to writing projects, while leaving the other four days for business meetings and strategy sessions. Just as he did in New York, he wrote outside, covering his word processor with a cardboard contraption of his own devising so that the glare didn’t blind him and the West Coast sun didn’t melt the various moving parts. Lee kept up his seven-days-a-week schedule, feeling that the move to Los Angeles “served to keep the creative juices flowing.” In an environment where everyone is dedicated to creativity, “I find myself ‘thinking story’ almost twenty-four hours a day.”28

  As Lee settled into his Hollywood role, Cadence Industries sold Marvel for $46 million in November 1986 to New World Pictures, a film production company and distributor that wanted to pair its TV and film efforts with Marvel characters. Harry Sloan, one of the partners who had purchased New World from director Roger Corman and his brother for $16.5 million three years earlier, told everyone who would listen that he believed the Marvel purchase would turn the company into a “mini-Disney.”29 Many at Marvel might have loved hearing such aspirational language, but Disney made its mark through film and merchandising, not publishing. What seemed like happy days might actually be a little portentous.

  New World leaders, including chief executive Robert Rehme, welcomed Lee to the company and relocated him to a fancy new office in its Westwood headquarters. On the surface, they respected Lee. Several members of the board of directors asked for his autograph for themselves or their children. It seemed that he finally would get some of the admiration that he earned through his dedication to Marvel and the superhero genre, as well as creative control over them in the transition to television and film.30 At the same time, though, there were conflicting reports that Rehme didn’t really know Marvel from DC or the comic book business in general, confusing the two publishers (and their respective superheroes) when discussing the purchase with New World employees. Supposedly, when Rehme realized that New World bought Spider-Man, not Superman, he yelled: “Holy shit. We gotta stop this. Cannon has the Spider-Man movie.”31 Rehme didn’t know the characters that well or read the comic books to find out, but he did push the company to pursue new ideas.

  New World quickly sought to use superheroes in attention-grabbing ways, especially Spider-Man. The web slinger would soon be turned into a 9,522-cubic-foot helium balloon for the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade at a cost of $300,000. Officials estimated that about eighty million viewers would see the televised parade each year, along with two million in person, so that marketing push would offset the initial expense. Next, company marketers decided to bring the character to life in the summer of 1987, having Spidey marry longtime sweetheart Mary Jane Watson at home plate in Shea Stadium before a sellout crowd of fifty-five thousand on hand to watch the world champion New York Mets.32

  At the center of the spectacle, Lee played the role of justice of the peace presiding over the wedding ceremony. The event parlayed Lee’s celebrity status and more or less rewarded him for coming up with the idea of having the pair wed in the daily newspaper strip (also replicated in the comic books). New World created a branding campaign for the live-action nuptials, getting Lee a morning television interview with popular newscasters Maria Shriver and Forrest Sawyer on Good Morning America and coverage on the nightly tabloid Entertainment Tonight. Countless newspapers around the country covered the marriage, getting the iconic character back into the national spotlight, not to mention its human creator. Lee worked tirelessly to provide a voice for the character to the myriad of journalists and broadcasters who wanted to chat about the event.

  Despite the public relations successes and Marvel’s ability to generate profits, New World limped along on a financial shoestring. The stock market collapse in late 1987 and the lackluster performance of its big-budget films left the company deeply in debt and exceedingly vulnerable in an age of corporate raiders who liked to buy up struggling companies and profit off the juiciest pieces of the carcass.

  Lee, fixated on pitching superheroes to New World producers, was once again pushed to the sidelines. A New World insider reported: “Stan’s not in the loop, because he’s not a player; he’s not a partner. He wasn’t a vote. But he was like a pit bull. He just didn’t want to walk away.”33 The internal politics took a turn for the worse for Lee, but no one realized how the company teetered on the edge of bankruptcy.

  Gradually, the whole story would be revealed as a series of financial manipulations that led to New World putting Marvel on the chopping block. Many suitors took immediate interest, as long as Lee signed a deal to stay onboard. Eventually, Ronald O. Perelman, one of the biggest sharks in the capitalist seas, won the bid, putting up $82.5 million via a series of shell corporations.

  Celebrating fifty years as a Marvel employee in 1989, Lee once more faced a new scenario, with chaos perhaps being the most consistent theme of those five decades. But, Stan had endured all the uphe
aval, based on a mix of tenacity and enthusiasm and his trump card—he symbolized the Marvel Universe for generations of fans. Lee was Marvel, no matter who actually owned the company, just as he became the father of superheroes to generations of readers and viewers, regardless of his actual role.

  CHAPTER 13

  MARVEL MANIPULATIONS

  In 1989, as President Ronald Reagan and wife Nancy prepared to return to civilian life after eight long years in the White House, CBS 60 Minutes reporter Mike Wallace interviewed the first couple just days before they left for their California ranch. The conversation touched on numerous topics, ranging from the strength of the Reagan’s long marriage to the trying times they spent in the nation’s capital. At one point, Wallace turned the discussion to an interesting but unrelated topic to give viewers a flavor of how the president lived a regular life, even while serving as the leader of the free world.

  Wallace asked the president, “You read the comics in the morning?” Reagan then spoke about his morning routine, explaining that he first turned to the comics section, and then read the “serious stuff” to prepare for the day. Wallace revealed that Spider-Man was Reagan’s favorite comic strip, while the president spoke about how much he loved to read and couldn’t stand to be without a book at all times.1

  Reagan’s critics may have joked that the syndicated Spider-Man comic may have been as much as Reagan could handle intellectually, but knowing that the president read his work gratified Lee, who had readily committed Spidey to a series of public service campaigns over the character’s long history.

  Reagan’s admission that he read Spider-Man as he enjoyed his breakfast symbolized how influential the character, Marvel Comics, and Stan Lee had grown over the preceding decades. The leader of the free world started his day reading Lee’s words! That kind of news could get just about anyone through another boring meeting with a film production company or the idea that yet another big-name Hollywood actor wanted to play a Marvel superhero. When the world found out that the president read Lee’s strip, the writer had just turned sixty-six years old, but his exuberance matched that of someone half his age.

  In the 1980s, Philadelphia native Ronald O. Perelman stood as one of the richest men in New York. Many considered him a leader with a King Midas touch, turning everything around him into gold. In an era characterized by financial jockeying, leveraged buyouts, and hostile takeovers, Perelman waged economic and corporate warfare with other tycoons in high-stakes chess matches with hundreds of millions of dollars hanging in the balance.

  In early 1989, when New World Entertainment searched for a company to buy Marvel so that it could finance of fresh wave of television and film expansion, Perelman responded with an $82.5 million offer through MacAndrews & Forbes, a shell company that he owned in an intricate web of holding companies and parent firms that were all controlled by the billionaire. While Perelman served as the public face of the deal and put up about $10.5 million of his own money to finance the purchase, Chase Manhattan Bank actually took on most of the debt, a typical setup in the go-go capitalist takeover era.

  Securing Marvel—including its iconic superhero characters and licensing rights—for less than $100 million seemed like a steal to many observers. The transaction seemed financially sound and potentially lucrative. “It is a mini-Disney in terms of intellectual property,” Perelman explained. “We are now in the business of the creation and marketing of characters.”2 On paper, the mogul seemed potentially the right leader to turn Marvel into an international media powerhouse. He had a solid plan to push the company toward a global audience and build off some of the world’s most recognizable characters. More importantly, Perelman had the resources and financial backing to build a team that could accomplish this goal.

  Perelman took a chance on Marvel, because the comic book industry was riding a wave of resurgence in the late 1980s. But the financier knew the real money would come when he sold stocks in the company. Several factors merged to make its impending IPO (initial public offering) rewarding, ranging from a growing comic book store expansion to several aggressive price increases that seemed to push sales higher, rather than drive readers away. Simultaneously, comic books had transformed from cheap magazines to glossy, foil-covered collector’s items. Subsequently, Marvel’s sales per copy jumped over 30 percent year-over-year from the last half of 1989 to 1990.3

  Overall, Marvel’s sales in 1990 eclipsed $70 million, with an addition $11 million from licensing. While insiders like Perelman stood to get even richer at the IPO, outside investors had to determine the risk involved, given that profits stood at a meager $5.4 million in 1990. The figure rose as sales increased, but as recently as two years before they had only been $2.4 million.4 Circulation and store sales were only one part of the Marvel puzzle, however. There were eighty companies that licensed Marvel characters and added to the earnings potential. The influx of technology at the time led to even more deals, including superhero-based video games and television and film productions on VHS.

  For a financier like Perelman, turning a part of his far-reaching empire into the next Disney would create a legacy unmatched in the entertainment business. Critics, however, thought that he really meant to just hype his new purchase, gussying it up as a way of prepping parts of it for sale or other forms of financial exploitation. Certainly, Perelman’s primary interest was fixed on making money, not reading Spider-Man comic books. In the quest to emulate Disney, corporate America’s master empire builder, the company needed a strong film division, which it created with Marvel Films.

  Bill Bevins, Perelman’s top manager and former chief financial officer at Turner Broadcasting would run Marvel. He named Lee to head the new Marvel Films entity and surprised him by immediately tripling his salary. The move obviously pleased Lee, particularly after being marginalized by the Hollywood sharks at New World. In his view, Lee felt that he had received insufficient pay over the years. When Bevins announced the increase, it caught Lee off-guard. He even thought that he must have misheard his new boss. That evening he told Joanie about the exchange and admitted to her that he certainly must have been hearing things. The two of them spent the rest of the night trying to figure out what Bevins might have actually muttered. A couple weeks later, however, Joanie checked the mail. There was Stan’s paycheck. When Joanie ripped it open and saw the figure, she nearly fell over. Lee’s former salary had indeed been tripled. From that point forward, Lee had nothing but kind words for Bevins. More important than his own improved financial standing, though, Lee believed that the raise symbolized the way the new owners wanted to build Marvel into the kind of efficient corporation that could compete with any entertainment company in the world.

  Lee’s future looked bright. Once again he had the power to oversee Marvel’s film and television expansion. He had long shared the notion that Marvel could transform into a modern Disney-like empire. Perhaps Perelman had the money and cachet to pull it off. Lee had never felt comfortable with the staff at New World. Perelman, ever on the prowl, would exact a bit of revenge several months later, buying New World outright when the company continued to slip. Now Lee had a larger playground to operate in as he attempted to build Marvel’s live-action and animated business.

  Lee’s long relationship with Spider-Man never waned, even decades after he and Ditko had created the teen superhero with a mountain of real-life problems. Over the years, whenever Spider-Man would zip back to the top of the pop culture radar, there Lee would be, ready with a story and sound bite, whether providing comments about Gwen Stacy’s death in June 1973 or marrying the character to Mary Jane Watson in a live-action wedding before fifty-five thousand screaming fans at Shea Stadium in June 1987. Lee’s marketing mirrored Marvel’s efforts at keeping the web crawler at the heart of the company. Most observers felt that Spider-Man had become the most popular superhero in the world, displacing the competitor’s invincible strongman in the red cape and the scowling guy in the black mask.

  In August 1990, Marvel rele
ased Todd McFarlane’s Spider-Man #1, a highly stylized and visually stunning reboot, with a variety of colorful covers, meant to spark media attention and sing to the hearts of comic book collectors. The combination of the national exposure and cover variants led to the issue becoming the best-selling comic in history with about 2.85 million copies getting into readers’ hands. McFar-lane focused on the character’s visual identity, as he explained, “to break people of reading a comic book the way they’ve been used to for the last twenty years.”5 In other words, McFarlane hoped to start a new conversation with Spider-Man, the way Lee had been able to do at the dawn of the Marvel Universe.

  Lee never gave up hope that someone in Hollywood would turn Spider-Man into a big screen hero. But in the early 1990s, he had to look to other characters first. Lee had become a fixture in Hollywood. Among his many tasks, he often served as a story consultant for Marvel-related media, like the 1990 NBC television film The Death of the Incredible Hulk, with Lou Ferrigno and Bill Bixby. Although it had been years since the original series aired, the live-action Hulk grew in popularity over time as fans looked back at the program with nostalgic longing. There was something magical and thoughtful about the Bixby/Ferrigno team that audiences coveted, particularly Bixby’s tortured loner persona and existence as a stranger in his own life.6 Several years later, when superhero comics in general were marked by extreme violence and action, the Hulk television series and its spin-off films seemed almost quaint.

  In 1994, Lee edited The Ultimate Spider-Man, a collection of short stories by a number of important comic book veteran writers and illustrators. His introduction provided readers with an insider’s glimpse into how the character came about, as well as Lee’s thinking at the time. He divulged, “no one at Marvel expected Spidey to become a cultural icon. . . . At that time, he was just one of many, many characters that were being continuously hatched, published, abandoned, and forgotten if they didn’t catch on.”7 So, instead of disappointing fans and journalists who asked about Spider-Man’s origins and expected a big, triumphant story, Lee admits that he “cooked up” a vision of the day in which he saw a spider on the window that hatched the idea. He later came up with “Amazing” for Spider-Man, just because he liked the way it sounded.8 Lee constantly moved between downplaying his own efforts and an overly confident guise that readers understood was (at least partially) tongue-in-cheek.