Larry Tisch wrested control of CBS, and the rot set in. I had a front row seat...it was nuts.

Carl Spielvogel cut a deal with Tisch to replace 13 agencies and also take over their LA in-house shop. It was doomed from day one, but a hell of a ride.

It was the summer of 1986, and I was head of new business at Backer & Spielvogel.

Correction: Carl Spielvogel was head of new business…the MASTER…the GOAT. I was his caddy, scrambling after him as he led what still stands as the fastest, most profitable growth and sale of an ad agency in history.

Carl called me over to his office one day, and in his typically focused, complete sentences, said, “I just got off the phone my dear friend Larry Tisch who, as you know, now runs CBS.

“We may have an opportunity. Go see Steve Leff right away and work on a proposal to Larry’s people.”

Translation: “I told Larry we could save him a lot of money. We need to move quickly and sell the idea to CBS leadership. Larry will support it, but not force it.”

Leff, one of the four junior partners under Carl and Bill Backer, was the swaggering head of Backer’s media group. He and Jay Schoenfeld, the professorial yin to Steve’s rizzy yang, built the dominant domestic media operation in the 80’s, leveraging Backer’s momentum and spectacular profitability for the pleasure of its clients and the pain of its competitors.

Steve and I labored non-stop over what became a 7-page single-spaced letter to the CBS brass that promised a cost-saving, efficiency-boosting “one stop shop” the would elevate and unify the CBS brand while taking on the advertising for the entertainment, sports, news and international divisions.

Reality check: The proposal was gonzo-delusional. We had no idea what we were getting into—logistically, financially, culturally, politically.

CBS says GO, “dog catches bus,” and the madness begins.

Dean Scaros—one of the finest, smartest bosses I ever had—worked the division chiefs while I led our LA and NY teams’ day-to-day activities. It was my first of many “flying the plane while building it” Adlandish adventures.

CBS had a 100-person in-house agency in LA, and the top of our punch-list was taking it over and laying off half the people with no understanding of what that would actually mean.

I fail to compete with Sam Shepard

My final staff-cut showdown with the women co-heading “my” (ha!) LA agency was over lunch in The Polo Lounge at the Beverly Hills Hotel.

The day begins ominously with a mild earthquake swaying the palm trees outside my bathroom window while shaving. The omen proves prescient at lunch downstairs: the team seethes with low-burn anger towards me, only soothed by their fatal distraction facing the drop-dead sexy Sam Shepard, eating alone, back against the far wall, making just enough eye contact with both of my star-struck employees to effectively vaporize me.

The account management co-head resigned not long after, but her creative partner stayed on to fight her New York overlords—that is, my team and I—who “never got” how the LA world worked.

My NY creative leader loses out to the breast clinic

Next up for humiliation was our fabulous NY creative director, Bill Chororos, who flew out to meet his intransigent LA creative leader for the first time.

When he arrives at the agency he’s told by her executive assistant, with insincere apologies, that the boss had to leave for an appointment at her breast clinic, she would not be returning that day, but might be able to meet with Bill the next day.

Bill hopped the next plane back to New York.

Lucky I was still smoking and drinking

Sobriety was 6 years in my future—good timing, since my day-to-day client smoked more than 4 packs a day accompanied by generous doses of alcohol. I did my best to keep up.

I rode home with him occasionally on MetroNorth to Westchester in the smoking car. By the time I’d arrive home my aromas could fend off a swarm of murder hornets, much less any sober human being.

30 straight weeks of red-eyes

I was also flying out to LA every Monday morning, taking red-eyes back every Tuesday night, heading straight into the city early Wednesday morning, all while Liz was pregnant with our first child.

She remains a saint for putting up with this and later California Adlandishments I’ll cover in future posts.

But the creative work almost made it worth it

There was one huge, never-to-be-repeated silver lining of the CBS affair: the creative work. We produced dozens what became some of the very best TV commercials of my career.

One day we sold a bundle of TV spots at Blackrock (CBS HQ) without one creative or budget comment from the clients, and no further input till the rough-cut stage.

Bill Chororos pulled me and our amazed creative team aside as we waited for the elevator. He waited for us to focus on him in anticipation of his words of wisdom: “What happened just now—I want you to remember this: these are ‘the good old days’”

Translation: “That’ll never happen again, boys: No revisions, no budget restraints, no clients at the shoots, and no input till it’s too late? Trust me: you will look back on all this, shaking your head, saying ‘those were the good old days.’”

Truth, front to back.

More on that creative work next week.