Original subtitles

moody music

[Cindy] My friend was doing legal work

for Panama and for Noriega,

and my friend said,

"I think maybe I could make a connection."

I said, "Make the connection."

Noriega was in the papers all the time.

He was involved in drug running,

and he was not beloved by the United States...

...but he was a wonderful story.

So I flew down with a photographer

from the New York Post.

We arrived in pitch black,

and soldiers with rifles surrounded us,

and I was terrified.

They took us on a dark road--

we didn't know where we were--to Noriega.

Most of the people who come to him,

cigar ashes are coming down their shirt.

They're fat guys,

or they're gonna ask him really tough questions.

I don't even know what to ask him.

Where is Panama? You go to Bermuda.

You make a left. Where the hell is Panama?

What is he gonna do?

Put me in jail? What's he gonna do?

He's gonna love me.

jaunty music

It was the New York take that he took to.

[Noriega] Yeah.

[interviewer] You have a lot of sympathy

for people who are very controversial.

Especially if I'm getting a story.

[laughs]

dramatic music

upbeat music

[reporter] It's hard to believe that,

seven years ago, this city faced bankruptcy.

Everywhere there is the thump of pneumatic drills,

the whine of a dumper truck,

a coppery smell of quick money.

[interviewee] In the 80s,

there was a mood of excitement

and energy coming back.

[Auletta] Wall Street had come back

and was printing money for the city.

[Honerkamp] You know, this was pre-AIDS.

It was lots of fun in New York.

Everybody was fooling around.

[Wayne] And that was the beginning

of the golden age

of the gossip culture.

The golden age, I tell you.

[Honerkamp] New York City was full

of larger-than-life personalities at that time.

[Linda] Back then, New York embraced characters.

You went to a place like Elaine's,

there were newspaper editors, there were TV journalists,

there were famous actors,

gangsters, there were mafia members,

there were politicians,

and everybody would table-hop, night after night,

and that's how you got scoops.

[Bobby] Gossip columnists.

They need you as much as you need them.

I took a lot of people to Elaine's.

People like Lauren Bacall, Clint Eastwood,

and then I would call a columnist.

[Honerkamp] People like Bobby Zarem,

who had significant clients,

wanted to drop a lead

that they're gonna be considered for a movie.

Maybe they were, maybe they weren't,

but then it would be on Page Six,

and that made it seem like they were.

[Chandler] I don't think that you can overestimate

the power of columns like Page Six in the '80s.

You know, if you wanted to get something out,

you put it on Page Six.

It was like having a huge megaphone

that the whole city could hear.

[interviewer] As the editor of Page Six

in the New York Post, he has the power

to make and break the famous,

the infamous, and the fabulous.

I like to think that we're sort of

a mini-intelligence service,

-you know... -[interviewer] Yeah.

And that all this information is coming in,

and we're keeping dossiers on everyone, and--

You're the J. Edgar Hoover of New York.

[Ben] Richard was kind of a reserved guy.

He was tall and handsome. Didn't give a lot away.

People got intimidated by him sometimes,

and they would just natter on in his presence.

His phone rang all day, every day.

The amount of information

that does pour in is pretty amazing.

I think, if they're not trying to promote themselves

or something that they're selling,

then they're trying to, you know,

destroy an enemy

or wound somebody who they don't like.

[Rush] Richard Johnson asked if I'd help put out Page Six.

Initially, I sort of didn't want anyone to know

I was doing this.

I mean I had graduated from the august

Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

But the more time I spent there, the more

I would look forward to going into work at Page Six.

soft synth music

What I liked about it was the marching orders

that I presume Rupert Murdoch had given the editors

was that it should be less

about trivial people than power.

[Ben] The gossip pages were the most attractive part

of the New York Post,

and there's no question that the gossip columns

is what sold the New York Post every day.

[Cindy] In the early days, they actually wanted me

to take Page Six, and I said, "I can't take Page Six.

First of all, it is written by committee,

and the only thing I have is a personality.

If you like it, fine. If you don't like it,

also okay, but that's what it is."

[Rush] I think you come to a Cindy column

to see what Cindy thinks about something

and how she's going to say it. She is a pro stylist.

She has her own way of arranging words on a page.

disquieting music

[Arzt] Well, it's very speedy.

It's a New York rat-a-tat-tat style.

Very machine gun-like.

[Rick] I have gotten chewed out by clients

by the way Cindy has reported something that I was a part of.

But she's gonna write it in her style,

which is a little snarky.

[Cindy] I am totally New York.

I write New York.

I sound New York.

You're not gonna read me in Wichita, Kansas.

What the hell do I care?

I don't even know where Wichita, Kansas, is.

I was walking along Park Avenue,

and there was a great, aged madam in furs,

and she had a teeny, teeny, teeny, little dachshund

about 2 inches above the cement.

And she was bent down, in her mammoth fur coat,

and she was screaming at him, "Don't you understand English?"

To a German dog, and I thought,

"That's only in New York,"

and so I wrote about it.

And then it became part of the column.

[whiplash]

It's the largest single broadcast station

transaction in history.

It's part of an even bigger deal

involving more than $2 billion

and the sale of seven Metro Media stations,

including this one, Channel 5, to media mogul Rupert Murdoch.

Murdoch would have access to almost 20 percent

of the homes in America that have TV sets,

more than 15 million of them altogether.

light music

[Chandler] Murdoch wanted to buy a group of stations

from a company called Metro Media,

which included stations in New York,

Boston, Chicago, LA.

He was gonna launch a fourth TV network

to go up against NBC, ABC, CBS,

and he was gonna call it the Fox Network.

[Arzt] But he had a problem.

He could not own Metro Media

if he was not a citizen.

Hey, how are you?

[Roger] After the election,

Roy Cohn arranged for Rupert Murdoch

to meet the president in the Oval Office.

[Chandler] When Rupert Murdoch rang the White House,

they would say, "Oh, the owner of the New York Post is on,"

and the president would get on the phone.

It was important for Murdoch to have a platform

that had influence like that,

because a lot of his businesses are regulated

by the federal government,

so you know, it helped.

[Arzt] Sure enough, Reagan helped him out of this crisis

and helped speed up his citizenship.

[proctor] The Constitution and the laws.

[all] The Constitution and the laws.

Reagan is the president and a conservative

who gets support from the New York Post

and knows that Murdoch is a staunch ally.

And so the Reagan administration supports

the new American citizen to own 20th Century Fox

and eventually Fox News.

Look at the power Murdoch's gotten

because of the ownership of things

like the New York Post.

There are some people who are saying

that it'll take you 20 years

to get your Fox Network on a par with the big three.

Are you prepared to wait that long?

- Sure. I certainly intend to live that long,

but I don't believe in the 20 years.

-[Bryant] Why? What... -It will certainly take us...

-[Bryant] Are you predicting? -...three or four years.

It could be five years. It depends

whether we break through in some big areas.

You said the big three are aping each other.

What are you prepared to offer that they aren't?

Wait and see.

pensive music

I get this call saying, "Come to New York.

Mr. Murdoch wants to see you."

So the next morning, I met with Rupert.

He was charming.

He laid out this idea

of this kind of tabloid news show

called A Current Affair.

He said, "It's just going to be a different news show.

We're going to do stories nobody else does."

The Utah polygamist siege ended today,

and we're going to revisit a polygamist family.

It was a tabloid newspaper translated into television.

It got to the harder stories pretty quick.

Burt Reynolds kissed you. Okay, sounds good.

You know what?

I'm not gonna interview Burt Reynolds, Scott.

I'm gonna interview you.

[Maury] We found our stories

from little newspapers in small towns.

We're chasing down the trail of this Chippendale

murder-for-hire plot, and it's got a lot of elements.

I mean, anytime you have murder for hire,

I mean that's A Current Affair .

[Maury] We believe that you get eyeballs

with classic Shakespearean themes.

-Love...lust...conflict -Out!

[Maury] Money...death.

[reporter] Authorities dug up not only Bert Montoya's body,

but six other corpses as well.

That's what tabloid journalism is all about.

[Chandler] We were looking at stories

that you wouldn't see

on ABC, or CBS, or NBC.

These were stories that they would have put in the trash.

I mean, they would have ripped it off the wire,

and it would have been in the garbage.

Just print that out,

and just give me one more track, and that'll be it.

A Current Affair was staffed

by a lot of journalists who'd worked on Murdoch's newspapers.

[Maury] Steve Dunleavy came over

from the New York Post, where he was legend.

[producer] Give me a level, Steve.

[Steve] The Quindoys lashed out at Jackson's reputation

as a pied piper of children.

[Maury] He would call anybody, go anywhere.

He was the most indefatigable, classic, tabloid reporter.

[Auletta] He was a Murdoch loyalist.

He did for A Current Affair

what he did in the New York Post.

Sensationalized, in-your-face kind of stories.

You wouldn't pose nude for anyone?

I would not pose nude for anybody.

Let me show you something.

You have posed nude.

[gasps]

suspenseful music

[Maury] Oh, boy, did the legitimate news business

go after us.

I mean, I remember Tom Shales

just skewered me in a column.

He called me every S word in the word.

He called me smarmy, and sleazy, and sordid.

There were a lot of people at Fox Television,

including Barry Diller, who was running Fox Studios

at the time, who did not like A Current Affair.

So Rupert bankrolled it out of his own pocket

and not through the Fox line items.

I mean Rupert has this great reputation as a gambler,

and he gambled plenty on this show.

Our big break came less than a year later.

electronic music

[narrator] Things just weren't supposed to end that way.

Not for Jennifer Levin. Not for Robert Chambers.

[Jeane] I distinctly remember. It was 1986.

I came home, I turned on the TV, and here's this show,

and they're talking about real, live,

like, New York City crime.

Robert Chambers had killed Jennifer Levin in Central Park.

[Maury] It was the Robert Chambers

preppy murder in New York Central Park

where, during rough sex with Robert Chambers

and this woman, she died.

And that was a huge, huge story.

And we followed that story every single day.

[Brennan] We did a reenactment.

We just reenacted the entire night.

We used one of the copy boys

and a girl who worked on the staff.

I was alternately fascinated and appalled.

Here they are, telling me

a crime story that's very tabloidesque.

I mean the Post was reporting

on the story every day,

but they're telling me more than I can read.

And they're making these people real.

In New York City, a new twist to an already sensational case.

Robert Chambers has been sentenced to a maximum

of 5 to 15 years in prison

for killing Jennifer Levin in Central Park.

But her relatives tonight are saying

that he should be in prison for the rest of his life,

based on new evidence suggesting

that he felt no remorse.

It is a home videotape shot at a party

that Chambers attended

just before his trial for the murder.

[all] We all fall down!

[Brennan] We came across

this sick little piece of video,

this tape of Robert Chambers with a couple of girls.

He's screwing the head on this doll,

and he said, "Oh, I killed her."

- My name is...

-Oops. -[hysterical laughter]

I think I killed her.

[Brennan] We had to buy it off this guy, but it was like

"money in a brown paper bag" kind of thing, you know.

And it was an amazing piece of tape.

I mean, I really don't know why everyone is so surprised.

I mean here's a guy that was able to murder Jennifer,

go home, take a shower, take a nap,

and, you know--and now, so he's making fun of it.

I mean, this is just in keeping with his character.

It was a really sad story,

but it certainly got everybody's attention.

That made A Current Affair.

Hello, everyone. I'm Maury Povich.

Rupert syndicated the entire show,

coast to coast.

That show became the number one backer,

financially, of the Fox television network.

[Brennan] A Current Affair was

Rupert's weapon he kept in his back pocket.

I think he wanted to let Barry know that,

"You're not the only one who knows how to do TV."

[Maury] And then everybody copied us.

Inside Edition.

Hard Copy, a copycat of A Current Affair.

They started up.

Drama. Lust. Crime.

They started covering those themes too.

Our Cindy Adams is out in the heart of Hollywood,

where she's surrounded by some visitors.

Some out-of-towners, it looks like, Cindy.

Today, we're going to answer the burning question,

how do aliens make love?

Cindy Adams also came over from the New York Post.

What do you wear when you go to sleep, pajamas?

Nothing. I sleep in nothing.

-[Cindy] Double bed? -King size.

-[Cindy] King size bed. -Mm-hmm.

Peter builds this set and a throne

and puts Cindy on the throne.

As your hard-hitting, thought-provoking, incisive,

in-depth, thinking reporter,

I am here to get to the dark roots of it all.

[interviewer] Why did they build a throne for you?

Why not?

I was a smartass, smart-mouth queen.

He said, "You know, feed Cindy's ego.

Do it the way she would love to do it,"

and then she bought right into it.

One of the people I interviewed was Raquel Welch,

back in the days when she was somebody, and she came in.

She didn't like the lighting. She didn't like the studio.

She didn't like her makeup. She didn't like anything,

and she definitely didn't like me.

Well, that's okay. So she got on, and I said

to her--I remember my very first warm, fuzzy question.

Would you say you're difficult?

Um...

[Cindy] Okay.

Just wondered if you thought that you were an easy pussycat.

Do I think I'm an easy pussycat?

I really don't--you know, I don't have an answer

to that question,

but I'm... this is not...finished.

[Cindy] We didn't mean to offend you.

I didn't mean to offend.

[Raquel] Somebody said to me, "You're making a big mistake,

because she's a barracuda."

A barracuda? Me? A barracuda?

[interviewer] She called you a barracuda.

-Oh, she did? -[interviewer] Uh-huh.

Oh, she might be right.

[laughs]

[interviewer] Was Cindy difficult to work with?

There's no problem with Cindy when you put her on a throne.

[laughs]

She did a good job, and she broke a lot of stories.

Our Cindy Adams has known Imelda and Ferdinand Marcos

for the better part of 25 years.

And Cindy's just back from Hawaii

with this exclusive tonight. Cindy?

Thank you, Maury.

Well, it's about ten hours by jet

and a whole lifetime away from Manila,

but life hasn't changed

all that much inside the Marcos compound.

It's Mr. President, and it's Madame First Lady.

I met Imelda Marcos in Persepolis

in 1971,

and we became friendly, and I would visit her.

I had schlepped over to Downtown Manila.

gentle music

[interviewee] Imelda and Ferdinand Marcos,

her husband--

they fled the Philippines.

He was a ruthless strongman dictator.

They had robbed and cheated everywhere,

and Imelda was famous

for the thousands of pairs of shoes she had.

[reporter] A composed Imelda Marcos

went into federal court this morning

to enter a not guilty plea to the indictments

which were filed against her earlier this month.

[reporter] Mrs. Marcos and her husband are charged

with looting the Philippines of at least $100 million.

That was a big story at the time.

The Marcoses.

The next thing you know, Imelda's on A Current Affair.

[Cindy] Today, the Marcoses

are residents of the United States.

They feel the press here has done them wrong.

They want to tell their story.

I didn't think that she had done anything so wrong,

and with my mentality,

if she had done something wrong, so what?

You know, she's one of my friends.

It's Cindy testing. It's Cindy testing.

[reporter] The former first lady of the Philippines

made a bizarre entrance in federal court yesterday.

She seemed to be dressed more for a summer ball,

in the Halloween chill.

[reporter] Mrs. Marcos spoke to the Post's Cindy Adams

about why she wore her national dress,

a low-cut gown, to her arraignment on Monday.

Her answer?

[lawyer] Well, I think that--

dramatic music

[Ben] Cindy has not covered Imelda

particularly critically. I would suggest

that Imelda is someone who should be covered critically,

and we shouldn't necessarily take her word for anything,

but Cindy is cozy with those kinds of people.

[Rick] I don't know what it is about authoritarians

that Cindy loves, but she's got a lot of--

the biggest ones are her friends.

[Chandler] That kind of turned out to be

the secret of Cindy's success.

She had relationships with a lot of people.

The more controversial the better,

as far as Cindy was concerned. She loved controversial people.

Look, when there's a front-page story

about a bad person,

every single day, there are stories

about how bad they are,

how they should go to jail,

how they should be killed,

get rid of them, they're awful,

when you're going to get the opportunity

to talk to them,

the only shot you have is to do the other side.

You can't do the same thing that the papers are doing

every day,

so of course I would be nice to them.

It's the only way I could get a story.

I'll tell you one thing.

You've gotten thinner through this trial.

[laughs]

She's sympathetic. She's loyal,

whether it's Imelda or any of these people

who we consider less than savory.

Everyone may not like them,

but that's what gossip is about.

They are the people who make news,

and she's trying to make news.

Those were my friends, at that point.

I didn't know the nice little kids.

I knew these people,

so you have to talk to these people.

bright orchestral music

Roy Cohn gave a dinner party one night.

It was a small dinner, maybe 20 people.

Four or five of us at a table.

And there's this guy next to me,

and I said to him, "Who are you?"

And he said, "My name is Donald Trump."

So I said, "Okay, so what's a Donald Trump?"

Standing behind him was Roy Cohn,

and Roy Cohn said,

"One day, this kid

is going to own New York."

I present to you...

[reporter] He's been called a master builder,

a man of vision and great creative powers.

He's also been called an egomaniac,

a ruthless and dangerous figure.

Which is going to be spectacular,

something that New York has never seen,

with elevators on the outside, and atriums,

and the largest ballroom in the city.

[reporter] He is Donald Trump,

New York's controversial developer.

[Ben] Donald Trump always wanted to be famous,

and how you become famous in New York City

is you get in the gossip columns.

In the 1980s, he used to pretend

to be his own spokesman called John Barron,

so John Barron would call up the papers and plant items

about what a great guy Donald Trump was.

And of course,

you would be speaking to Donald Trump himself.

[Greenberg] Okay.

One day, I played my voice messages,

and it was like, "Hello, Linda. This is John Smith.

Donald Trump is being surrounded by models

at the restaurant," and I just--beep.

Delete. My brother said, "Is that not a scoop?"

I said, "It's him with a fake voice."

And he's the one who says fake news.

He was always creating fake news.

[Auletta] Most prominent people,

if a gossip reporter calls 'em,

they don't respond. They don't answer the call.

Donald had the opposite approach.

"I'm gonna talk to them."

He would always get on the phone.

He was always promoting something.

Anything to advance his cause.

sinister music

Trump had been schooled by Roy Cohn

in the art of manipulating tabloids.

[Auletta] And what did he learn from Roy Cohn?

Attack. Never admit you're wrong.

Leak to the press.

Have your friends, particularly in the gossip press,

and everything'll be fine.

[reporter] Developer Donald Trump says

he's now built the world's tallest concrete skyscraper.

[reporter] The 59-story building is located

at Fifth Avenue and 57th Street.

18 of the floors are retail and commercial space,

with 38 floors occupied

by some 266 luxury condominiums.

[Cuozzo] When he built Trump Tower,

he was such a master self-promoter.

He would say some celebrity was interested

in buying an apartment in his building.

[interviewer] Tell us a little bit about the people

and what's happening in the building.

Well, I can say, and as you know,

and as we discussed,

I can't talk about the people going in,

but I think we have probably the most exceptional group

of people going into any single building

that's really-- that's ever happened.

[reporter] Speculation that the Princess of Wales

didn't just fly to America for a weekend with friends

have been raised with press reports

from the United States.

The press reports claim the Princess wants to move

to the famous Trump Tower, saying she met with the owner,

millionaire developer Donald Trump,

to discuss the purchase.

[Cindy] I would do whatever Donald told me,

but I didn't say she did move.

I said she was maybe going to.

There are all sorts of ways to do it.

You use "It is rumored that,"

you say "There's word that,"

"What you're hearing people whisper about is,"

or the famous word alleged.

"It is alleged. It is alleged.

It is alleged."

And then you can get away with anything.

Probably just missed Flo Anthony.

Page Six.

[Rush] People talked to us because they had an agenda.

Now, you know, we're not naive.

We know we are being used.

We're all playing the same game.

I'll scratch your back. You scratch mine, right?

I know this about you.

I won't print it

if you promise to give me something.

Another story down the road.

A quid pro quo.

Favor trading,

the same as it's been since time immemorial.

What are you gonna do for me? That's the lifeblood of gossip.

There was an old press agent

named Sy Presten who had really low-grade clients.

Chock Full o' Nuts,

and The Gym Source, and Nirvana restaurant.

So Sy would go out and try to scare up gossip,

and he would give you tips,

and they would have nothing to do with his clients.

But if he landed two items

that had nothing to do with his clients,

then, in the old gossip rule, you owed him an item.

bouncing electronic music

And that's why, in Page Six, you often saw items

that were odd, like some celebrity

ordered gym equipment from The Gym Source.

So sometimes, the gossip world was about favor trading

and access,

but it was also about settling scores.

And Rupert Murdoch knew

how to play the gossip game as well as anyone.

[Rush] Frequently, the gossip column

is kind of the SWAT team

for the publisher to besmirch a rival

or extract some kind of vengeance.

There was a kind of payback

that, you know, Page Six could be used for.

[bell rings]

tranquil music

In the 1980s, the New York Post

was in a terrible feud with Paul Newman.

Basically, Paul Newman's name was banned from the paper,

unless it was negative.

[Rush] He had made a crack about the New York Post.

At the time, it had been reported

that he was 6 feet tall,

and somebody told Page Six

that he couldn't possibly be that height,

and so Richard Johnson made it his business to disprove

that Paul Newman was as tall as people thought he was.

And then there was Ted Kennedy.

[Chandler] Kennedy despised Murdoch

because the Post was very, very critical of him.

[Rush] Clearly, he was staunchly liberal,

and his politics conflicted

with those of the New York Post,

and so that, you know, made him fair game.

melancholy music

- The paper just creamed Kennedy.

- You could not write enough negative stories about him.

Anything about Ted's partying

or horn-dogging was to be pursued.

[reporter] Michele Cassone,

a cookie-sized daughter of a Connecticut baker,

reported that senator

Ted Kennedy wandered throughout a party

without the benefit of his pants.

No pants?

No pants.

Murdoch also owned Boston Herald at the time,

which, of course, is Ted Kennedy's home ground.

We had a columnist up there called Howie Carr

who would write stuff about Ted in every column.

You know, fat, fat Ted.

[reporter] For more than a decade,

media mogul Rupert Murdoch

has fashioned the Post in the sassy,

impudent style that is the trademark

of his tabloids in Australia and London.

But Murdoch's expanding empire ran afoul

of Massachusetts senator Ted Kennedy.

There was a law on the books in the United States

that you could not own a television station

and a newspaper in the same city.

[reporter] Murdoch had an exemption,

until his archenemy,

Senator Edward Kennedy, killed it.

Mr. Murdoch was well aware of the law

when he acquired his television stations

in Boston and New York.

He had a choice then, and he has a choice now.

He can keep his newspaper,

or he can keep his broadcasting station,

but he can't keep them both.

[Chandler] So you either had to give up the paper

or give up the TV stations.

He obviously wasn't gonna give up the TV stations,

because he'd just bought them,

so he was forced to sell the New York Post.

Now, the FCC has given Murdoch until March 6th

to sell the New York Post,

but Murdoch says that he can't find a buyer

for the money-losing newspaper, so it may fold.

[Cuozzo] We had a lot of people

walking through the office, and sort of kicking the tires,

and looking around, for months on end.

And none of them had the least real interest in

or ability to buy the New York Post.

[buyer] Is this the last Post ?

[seller] No. It will not be.

It's about the end of this, huh?

[seller] Oh, no.

There was a "Save the Post" rally

out in front of the building, on South Street.

Save our jobs. We got families.

That's right.

[Cuozzo] All the guys there from the unions

and everybody afraid that, you know,

this great institution would disappear for good,

and it went right down to the wire.

[reporter] If the New York Post had died this morning,

doubtless, some editor would have invented a headline

that said, "Post publisher pulverizes paper."

Instead, a much more upbeat banner,

in typical tabloid typeface.

[Cuozzo] Rupert found Peter Calico,

a prominent real estate developer, and very wealthy,

and good friend of Donald Trump.

He had no media background or experience,

but he wanted the Post. His intentions were good.

[Rupert] I'm very happy to be able to announce...

[reporter] Owner Rupert Murdoch proclaimed

the paper's salvation at two o'clock this morning.

It's good to be in business.

[Chandler] In New York, Murdoch sold the newspaper.

In Boston though, he decided,

because he was so upset with Kennedy,

that he would actually keep the newspaper

and sell the TV station.

I went to the editor of the Boston Herald,

and we waged a campaign against Ted Kennedy.

We were on his case 24/7,

and Murdoch just loved it.

This was a picture of Joey's 80th birthday.

It was in a Helmsley hotel.

Imelda was there.

Gotti was there.

It was some of the best people

who have since been in jail.

I mean, it was one of those parties.

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I thought I'd throw a little party for Joey.

This is Joey's 80th birthday.

His. Not mine.

[Cuozzo] Cindy--among her many, many aptitudes in life

is that she's the greatest party organizer

that ever lived.

-[partygoer] Hello. -Hi, Jared.

All the girls love me. I can't help it.

[Cuozzo] In the same room, you had Alan Alda, Tony Bennett,

the governor, Donald Trump, and Barbara Walters.

You get all these extraordinary people.

And I think that this is the party of the year.

Everybody who's anybody is here tonight.

Out!

Henny Youngman told the funniest jokes I've ever heard.

Nice to see Imelda here.

She's been in Israel, planting a shoe tree.

Joey, you look like you did 20 years ago: old.

Joey Adams. Sex takes a holiday.

I really want to thank you, on behalf of my Joey,

that you all came.

That the mayor, and the governor,

and so many of the people

that make up the fabric of New York are here.

It's very meaningful to us,

and I cannot tell you how thrilled I am

or as thrilled as I can ever be,

at $175 a head.

The big joke that went around was if you're indicted,

you're invited.

It was true. There were all sorts of people

who were in trouble in one way or another.

[Cindy] We had Gotti, who was going to jail.

Happy birthday, Joey

[Cindy] Imelda was acquitted.

Happy birthday

[Cindy] And Leona Helmsley.

She got into a problem,

and they were gonna send her to the can.

Harry and Leona Helmsley,

one of the world's wealthiest couples,

are charged tonight with cheating on their income taxes.

[reporter] The Helmsleys owned vast amounts of real estate,

including the Empire State Building

and a chain of luxury hotels.

Their worth could be as high as $10 billion.

The government charges that the Helmsleys renovated

their $11 million Connecticut estate

and wrote the cost off

as a business expense on their taxes.

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[Cindy] Leona Helmsley was

the queen of New York for a while.

She was married to Harry Helmsley.

Harry Helmsley was the number one realtor.

He'd been married a few times. He met Leona.

She was in the realty business.

She married him. She's not stupid.

[reporter] Queen Leona,

mistress of, watchdog of,

every elegant touch at her palace.

Comfortable?

Am I comfortable? I make a living.

[Auletta] By all accounts,

she was a miserable human being and dictatorial,

authoritarian, abusive to her staff.

-What do you do? -[guard] Security.

Security. We don't need security here.

Let's go outside. We have people outside.

-It's being repaired. -No, no. That's dirt.

How do you repair dirt? Let's get it up.

[Auletta] The tabloids went after her

because she was sensational gossip

and attracted readers.

The New York Post didn't do her any favors.

I mean she was great copy, and they just savaged her.

[interviewee] In fact, it was a reporter

named Ransdell Pierson

who worked at the Post who first showed

how she was cutting corners and not paying her taxes.

[Ransdell] She's a tough bird.

I would pit her up against people who have really,

you know, been in the gutter and have done those crimes.

[Cuozzo] Supposedly, people who worked for her

in the Connecticut estate that they owned

quoted Leona Helmsley as saying,

"Only the little people pay taxes."

If the Helmsleys are convicted,

they face penalties of four years in jail

and fines of $5,000 on each felony count.

I am not going to jail. I've done nothing wrong.

I have done nothing wrong. I'm innocent.

My only crime is that I'm Leona Helmsley.

Cindy was one of Leona's biggest defenders.

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[interviewer] Why were you so willing to defend her?

What kind of a question is that?

Listen, I knew them from the old days.

I knew Harry. I knew her in her heyday,

when she was giving glamorous parties.

I didn't think she had hurt anybody,

if she was fixing up a home. I didn't think that that

was some dreadful thing to put her away.

[Leona] Okay.

[Cindy] I thought, "Take $5 million,

if that's what it is."

Give it to the poor. Take her money away.

Do something good for humanity,

and give me a front page.

Talking to you, you get the feeling

that you are a survivor. That you will survive, no...

-Oh, I am a-- -[Cindy] ...matter what.

I'm a survivor. I'm a survivor.

I really and truly-- I don't like doing

anything wrong.

[Cindy] If anything happens, what are your reserves?

How will you survive it?

In what direction? If I went to jail?

I'm not going to jail. I've done nothing.

Oh, she went to jail, kids.

Time has run out for hotel tycoon

turned tax cheat Leona Helmsley.

As of four o'clock this morning,

she has a new address:

a Kentucky jail.

[reporter] Leona was found guilty

of evading more than $1 million

in federal income tax,

guilty of charging $4 million in personal expenses

to the Helmsley businesses.

Does she have any friends at all?

Not a lot, no, and you know,

when you have friends because of power,

and you suddenly lose the power...

[interviewer] Yeah. Goodbye friends.

There's nobody. There's nobody.

She's got this big, indoor swimming pool, in Connecticut.

There's nobody in it but the maids and the lawyers.

Look, we all have our good points

and our bad points.

One of my limited good points

is intense loyalty.

If somebody's been good to me,

I will pay them back forever and ever.

But if you were evil to me,

I'll get you either in this life or the next one.

My mother was in her 80s. Very fragile.

Not well mentally. She had Alzheimer's.

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She was in Florida, and after Leona

got out of prison, she said to me,

"Oh, I have this big home and this big pool,

and you must have your mother come over."

She pushed me, so my team--

her nurses-- took her over there.

I get a phone call.

They have brought the marshals

in from Miami to throw my mother out,

because the team of guys who were taking care of her

that I loved were gay,

and Leona didn't want anybody gay in her pool.

And as a result, she had the marshals come in

and throw my 85-year-old mother out.

I explained to Leona,

"I will see that you are assassinated.

I will kill you, maybe, myself.

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You do that to my mother,

the only creature I loved

in my entire whole life,

and you think I'm just going to walk away?

I'm going to walk away with your head, Leona."

She has an edge, you know,

in what she says and what she writes.

You know, if you get on the wrong side of Cindy,

she can be merciless.

Merciless.

I never spoke to her again.

I mean, I only had one thought in my head,

and that was to have her done.

Killed. Shot. Banged.

Run over. Pick your thing. Poisoned.

You have to watch, you see, that I'm doing this for you,

but you have to watch,

because if I come off saying all of these things--

and that's the part that you do.

I will find you.

You understand that? I will locate you.

[interviewer] I am fully aware.

[laughs] Okay.

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