IT’S MY PLEATHER
Like his cousin Paolo, Maurizio wanted to make changes at Gucci. The company made big profits in the early 1980s, but it did so at the expense of its exclusive image. Long gone were the days that Gucci was associated with Jackie Kennedy and Princess Grace. Now, thanks to the huge success of Gucci’s cheaper, mass-market line of leather-and-canvas bags, sold not just in Gucci’s boutiques but in almost any retail store willing to stock them, the brand had become a tacky icon of conspicuous consumption. Gucci bags were now the kind of things that tourists, yuppies, and pimps bought at the mall, the airport, or even the drugstore.
In winter, shrews can lose 50% of their body weight; even their bones, skull, & organs shrink.
Maurizio wanted to restore Gucci’s faded luster, but after 30 years at the helm, his uncle Aldo wouldn’t take advice from anyone, not even from the firm’s largest shareholder—especially not while Gucci was earning more than $50 million a year in profits, much of it from products that Maurizio wanted to get rid of.
LET’S MAKE A DEAL
In the summer of 1984, Maurizio and Paolo came to an agreement: Paolo would vote his shares with Maurizio’s, enabling him to take control of Gucci. In return, Maurizio promised he would buy out his cousin’s 3.3 percent stake for $22 million, giving Paolo the money he needed to bankroll his own designer-goods company. The following September, the cousins put their plan into action, stripping Aldo of his power. They offered to let him stay on in a figurehead role, but when Aldo tried to fight back, he was thrown out of the company entirely.
Maurizio and Paolo’s deal fell apart just two months later, before Maurizio could get his hands on Paolo’s shares. Paolo turned Maurizio in to the Italian authorities for cheating on inheritance taxes, forcing Maurizio to flee to Switzerland to avoid arrest. Maurizio cleared up his tax problems without going to jail, but Aldo, Paolo, and Paolo’s brothers continued to fight him for control of the company.
Maurizio became convinced that the only way he was ever going to have a free hand at Gucci was to buy out his relatives. He didn’t have the money to do it himself, so he began looking for an outside investor. In 1987 he found one: Investcorp, a Bahraini investment bank, which agreed to buy the shares. Paolo sold out first, followed by his brothers, and then Aldo, who sold his shares in April 1989.
DUMB AND DUMBER
Maurizio was finally free to run Gucci as he saw fit, and Paolo now had the money he needed to get his own designer label off the ground. Neither cousin lasted very long. Paolo was the first to fail: Through a combination of high living and incompetent business decisions, he managed to burn through $40 million of his own money without ever opening for business. In 1993 he filed for bankruptcy, so broke that he couldn’t even pay his phone bill, let alone the more than $350,000 in back alimony and child support he owed his ex-wife. When he died from liver failure in 1995 at the age of 64, the Gucci company bought the rights to his name from the bankruptcy court.
It is impossible to see a full-spectrum rainbow (with all its colors) at noon.
Maurizio didn’t fare much better: His instincts about returning Gucci to its glory days were good, but he killed off many of the company’s most profitable product lines before there was anything new to replace them with. Its boutique stores empty and its coffers hemorrhaging cash, by the end of 1991 Gucci had a negative net worth of $17.3 million and was losing $30 million a year.
DOWNWARD SPIRAL
It’s possible that none of this would have threatened Maurizio’s hold on Gucci had he not also racked up $40 million in personal debts at the same time that he was running the company into the ground. Maurizio had used his Gucci shares as collateral for personal loans, and now that the company was losing money, he had no income…and no way to pay his debts. Investcorp was the only thing keeping the company afloat, but it had long since lost faith in Maurizio’s abilities. It refused to pump any more money into Gucci until he was gone.
Gucci was less than 48 days away from closing its doors and having its assets sold at auction when Maurizio, himself nearly bankrupt for nonpayment of personal debts, gave up the fight and sold his 50-percent stake to Investcorp. For the first time since 1921, there were no Guccis at Gucci, and there probably never will be again.
OUT OF THE ASHES
It’s a testament to the strength of the Gucci brand that once Maurizio Gucci was replaced with competent management, it took the company just five years to repair its tarnished image and make record profits on more than $1 billion a year in sales. Maurizio was not so lucky: In 1995, the same year that Gucci went public, he was gunned down in Milan by a hit man hired by his ex-wife. She is serving a 29-year sentence for the murder.
Thomas Jefferson cut a piece of wood off a chair once owned by Shakespeare to take home as a souvenir. It’s on display at Monticello, Jefferson’s home in Virginia.
MUSIC ON TV
More tube tunes, from the ’80s, ’90s, and last week. (Parts 1 and 2 are on page 125 and 280.)
Yo! MTV Raps (August 6, 1988). In 1988, MTV started to branch out from showing a wall of music videos in random order all day. First, they launched the TV-trivia game show Remote Control, and then its first show dedicated to one specific kind of music: rap. Already a cultural presence in urban areas with large African-American populations, the presentation of rap videos five days a week on MTV turned rap into one of the two most dominant kinds of pop music in the United States, taking it from the cities to the suburbs. Hosted by DJs Doctor Dre and Ed Lover, the first video shown on Yo! MTV Raps was “Follow the Leader” by Eric B. & Rakim.
MTV Unplugged (November 26, 1989). While the show later featured just one artist per episode, performing their songs without the aid of electric instruments, the first episode had three acts: Squeeze, Syd Straw, and Elliot Easton. The first act Squeeze with an acoustic rendition of “Pulling Mussels From the Shell.”
By 1992 going on Unplugged was a major career milestone for a rock or pop act, demonstrating that beneath studio production, there was a legitimate musical talent. LL Cool J appeared in 1991 with a live, acoustic band for a unique rendition of “Mama Said Knock You Out,” and the original members of KISS performed for the first time in nearly two decades on a 1995 episode, which led to a reunion tour. Mariah Carey’s Unplugged cover of the Jackson 5’s “I’ll Be There” went to #1, and Nirvana’s acoustic album sold more than six million copies. But the biggest success to come out of Unplugged was Eric Clapton, long on the sidelines of the music mainstream because of drug addiction and personal problems. His acoustic Unplugged disc sold more than 10 million copies and won the Grammy Award for Album of the Year in 1993.
Total Request Live (September 14, 1998). Almost since its inception in 1981, MTV has had some kind of show where it counts down its most requested videos of the day. The 1998 incarnation, Total Request Live, became a cultural phenomenon. Broadcast live from MTV’s studios overlooking Times Square, the show’s audience was primarily teenagers, and the power of getting a top video on TRL propelled two music fads: teen pop and rap-metal. Exposure on TRL made superstars out of Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera, and *NSYNC in the pop category, and Kid Rock, Korn, and Limp Bizkit in the rock class. The very first video played on the show was the #10 video of the day: “Space Lord,” by alternative rock band Monster Magnet.
American Idol (June 11, 2002). Fox didn’t have high hopes for a show that let young, amateur singers compete for a recording contract, so it scheduled it as a summer show, when viewing levels are less than half of what they are the rest of the year. American Idol was originally filler (in fact, ABC and NBC both turned down the chance to air it), but today it’s the #1 show on TV, and has been for a record seven years straight. It’s made indisputable stars out of winners Kelly Clarkson and Carrie Underwood, as well as runners-up, Chris Daughtry and Jennifer Hudson. Judge Simon Cowell became a household name, and host Ryan Seacrest an entertainment mogul with a production company that creates top-rated reality shows. Young pe
ople singing for a chance at stardom seems like an easy premise to copy, which is why the other networks tried—and mostly failed—to find their American Idol with shows like Duets, The One, America’s Got Talent, The X Factor, Country Star, America’s Next Greatest Rock Band, and more. As it still does, footage from auditions made up the first few episodes of the first season of Idol. The first person shown singing was an unidentified blonde woman who sang a portion of Bryan Adams’ “Heaven.”
Glee (May 19, 2009). One of the most spectacular failures in TV history is the 1989 series Cop Rock, which combined searing police drama…with cops and robbers spontaneously bursting into Broadway-style musical numbers. ABC cancelled the show in the middle of its first season; that same year, CBS tried a musical/drama hybrid, too, with Hull High. It was a bomb, too. Maybe those shows were just ahead of their time, because when Glee debuted in 2009, it was an instant hit. Fox savvily promoted the show about an Ohio high school choir made up of misfits by selling recordings of the music performed on the show—primarily the cast singing popular songs by acts like Journey, Queen, Rihanna, and Lady Gaga. Twelve soundtrack albums have been released, and most have sold 500,000 copies or more. The Glee cast holds the record for most singles to hit the Billboard Hot 100 chart—205 through the 2011–12 season. (By comparison, the Beatles hit the charts a total of 70 times.) Glee is a top-20 TV show among viewers under age 40, and in 2011 Fox gave it the plum post-Super Bowl slot. The first song sung on the singin’ teens show was the soul classic “Respect,” by Mercedes Jones (actress Amber Riley) in her audition for the glee club.
Hanako, the oldest known koi fish, lived for 226 years. Most koi don’t live past 45.
The Voice (April 26, 2011). The first song on this show was sung by the four celebrity judges—Christina Aguilera, Blake Shelton, Adam Levine, and Cee Lo Green—performing Gnarls Barkley’s “Crazy.” (Green is a member of Gnarls Barkley.) Then the show moved into its audition rounds, where amateur and unsigned singers, as well as singers dropped from their record labels, auditioned “blindly” for the judges—the judges sat in high-backed chairs, and if they liked what they heard, they spun their chair around, got a look at the singer, and added them to their “team.” The first season winner was a guy named Javier Colon. Since American Idol debuted in 2002, every broadcast network has tried to find some sort of talent contest to compete with the ratings juggernaut. The Voice is the only one that’s come close. It finished the 2010–11 TV season at #20 in the ratings; the next season, The Voice finished #3…just behind Idol’s Wednesday episodes, and three spots above its Thursday edition.
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MARX MADNESS
Groucho: “Do you think a mustache ever gets lonely?”
Chico: “Sure it gets-a lonely. Hey, when my grandfather’s beard gets here, I’d like it to meet your mustache.”
Groucho: “I’ll talk it over with my mustache. Tell me, has your grandfather’s beard got any money?”
Chico: “Money? Why, he fell hair to a fortune.”
—Monkey Business
In Mayan civilization, cacao beans were currency. Painted-clay counterfeit beans were common.
IT’S THE END OF THE WORLD AS THEY KNOW IT
Even if you don’t know anything else about the Mayan calendar, you may have heard that it supposedly predicted that the world would end on December 21, 2012. Here’s a look at some other doomsdays that have come and gone.
Doomsday: February 20, 1524
Predicted by: Johannes Stöffler, a German mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, and professor at the University of Tübingen
End Times: In 1499 Stöffler calculated that 20 planetary “conjunctions,” or appearances of two or more planets in the same part of the sky, would occur in 1524, and that 16 of these would occur under the astrological sign of Pisces (February 19–March 20). Pisces is the water sign, so Stöffler took this to mean that the world would be destroyed in a second Great Flood. His prediction was taken seriously. Thanks to the invention of Gutenberg’s printing press a few decades earlier, pamphlets telling of his prediction were spread far and wide. As the date drew near, many people built boats and loaded them with provisions. One wealthy German nobleman, Count von Iggleheim, built a three-story ark.
Moment of Truth: The year 1524 began with much of central Europe in a drought, which soothed fears…until it began to drizzle on February 20, sparking a panic. A terrified mob descended on Count von Iggleheim’s ark and tried to force their way onto it. In the riot that followed, von Iggleheim was stoned to death and hundreds of people were crushed or trampled. Then the skies cleared…and the mob realized it had all been for nothing.
Aftermath: Stöffler tried to save face by “recalculating” the date to 1528, but few people paid attention. He died in 1531.
Doomsday: May 19, 1780
Predicted by: Residents of New England and eastern Canada (with a lot of help from mother nature)
You can tell the age of a frog by counting the rings in its bones (which will kill the frog).
End Times: Doomsday predictions typically begin with a forecast of when the world is supposed to end, followed by a wait to see if anything happens on that date. In the case of May 19, 1780, the process was reversed: Odd things began to happen, causing people to fear that the world was coming to an end.
Moment of Truth: For several days leading up to the 19th, the sky in much of the Eastern United States and Canada was a hazy yellow, and the sun and moon glowed red. Then on the morning of the 19th, the sky quickly darkened and by noon was as black as night. “If every luminous body in the universe had been shrouded in impenetrable shades, or struck out of existence, the darkness could not have been more complete,” a Massachusetts man named Samuel Tenney wrote. “A sheet of white paper held within a few inches of the eyes was equally visible with the blackest velvet.” Birds sang their evening songs in the darkness and then fell silent for the “night,” and cows returned to their barns to sleep. When night fell many people went to bed despairing of ever seeing the sun again. “It was the general opinion that the day of judgement was at hand,” Yale president Timothy Dwight wrote. It wasn’t. The sun did come up on May 20, though the sky was still darker than usual, but that passed after a couple of days and life returned to normal.
Aftermath: So what caused New England’s “Dark Day,” as it came to be known? Smoke from a massive forest fire, hundreds of miles west in what is now Ontario’s Algonquin Park. Wind carried the smoke all the way to the eastern seaboard, where it combined with fog and already overcast skies to turn the day as black as night. News traveled much more slowly in the 1780s, and nobody in New England knew about the fire. (That’s one explanation, anyway: To this day some religious groups believe that the Dark Day was the fulfillment of Biblical end-times prophesy, and a sign that the second coming of Jesus Christ is just around the corner.)
Doomsday: May 18, 1910
Predicted by: Camille Flammarion, a French astronomer and founder of the French Astronomical Society
End Times: Halley’s Comet was due to reappear in 1910, and this time the pass was going to be unusually close. For six hours on May 18, the Earth was actually going to pass through the comet’s tail. Flammarion hypothesized that when it did, there was a good chance that deadly cyanogen gas from the tail of the comet would penetrate the atmosphere and wipe out all life on the planet. A minority opinion to be sure and one loudly dismissed by other prominent scientists. But the newspapers knew a good story when they heard one. Eager to cash in on public interest in the comet, they happily published Flammarion’s prediction.
More than a third of New Yorkers were born outside of the U.S.
Terrified people in North America and Europe stocked up on oxygen canisters, gas masks, special umbrellas, quack medicine “comet pills,” and other doomsday supplies, then barricaded themselves in basements or rooms that had been carefully sealed off against outside air. One man in Atlanta had himself lowered to the bottom of a 40-foot well, where he remained
until the crisis passed. All-night church services were held in the United States, Russia, and other places. For those who preferred comfort of a different kind, many saloons stayed open all night as well.
Moment of Truth: The earth passed through the comet’s tail, and as just about every distinguished scientist besides Flammarion had predicted, nothing happened.
Aftermath: Somehow, Flammarion’s reputation did not suffer much when the world failed to end as he’d predicted. He remained a respected figure in astronomy. Two craters, one on the moon, one on Mars, have been named in his honor, as has the comet 1021 Flammario.
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UNCLAIMED ODDITIES
The Unclaimed Baggage Store in Scottsboro, Alabama, sells items that travelers left behind at airports. Some of their weirder ones:
• Moose antlers
• Vacuum-packed frogs
• 19th-century suit of armor
• 4,000-year-old mummified hawk
• Live rattlesnake
• Shrunken human head
• U.S. Air Force missile guidance system
In ancient Rome, parsnips were thought to have aphrodisiac properties.
THE POLITICALLY CORRECT QUIZ
How sensitive are you? Here are some real-life examples of “politically correct” and “politically incorrect” behavior. Guess which answer is the “correct” one. (Answers are on page 602.)
1. In 2011 the city council of York, England, banned children in its Sure Start toddler group from making a gesture while singing a nursery rhyme. What gesture, which nursery rhyme, and why?
Uncle John's Fully Loaded 25th Anniversary Bathroom Reader (Uncle John's Bathroom Reader) Page 53