Few Surprises in ESPN Simpson Documentary

I’m more interested in watching the ESPN-produced documentary, “O.J.: Made in America”, which debuted last night, than I was the FX melodrama series aired earlier this year, primarily because it is a documentary.

Granted, documentaries can be skewed to favor a point of view or even “prove” something that isn’t, but at least documentaries are composed of actual footage and interviews with real people.

While the first part, carried on ABC last night, contained few surprises for me, I was surprised at what Dave Nemetz, writing for The Hollywood Reporter, in “‘O.J.: Made in America’: 8 Things We Learned From Part 1“, said he learned that he didn’t know.

The one thing I didn’t know about was Simpson’s father’s sexual orientation. In fact, I don’t ever recall any mention of his father.

But the rest? That Simpson was a living legend in L.A., that he didn’t want to get political and could talk himself out of trouble, was almost a bust in the NFL, his breakthrough role in TV ads, his mediocre acting ability–at least, in his roles as an actor–and his early encounters Nicole Brown was pretty much common knowledge to those who (1) are old enough to remember, (2) lived in L.A. and (3) paid attention to sports. Maybe Nemetz benefited from none of that.

One thing I did learn that Nemitz didn’t mention was how far back former LAPD officer Ron Shipp and Simpson’s relationship goes. Back to Shipp’s school years. I had thought it was much more recent–dating from when Simpson lived in his house in Brentwood.

While my knowledge of last night’s Part I was based on being old enough and exposed to sports enough and living in L.A., it will be interesting to see what I learn from Part II, which airs Tuesday night, as it focuses on my direct, first-hand knowledge of Simpson’s 1994-95 murder trial and many of the issues that swirled around that.

Stay tuned.

 

 

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/oj-made-america-part-1-901650

Twinkle, Twinkle

No wonder the skies over L.A. were dark at night in 1995. All the stars were shining inside the Criminal Courts Building.

More stars come to court.

Another chambers meeting.

Barbara Walters.

2/27/95

 

 Lesser stars appear.

Margolick and McFadden.

Questions are the same.

2/28/95

Barbara Walters needs no identification here. David Margolick reported for the New York Times at the time of the Simpson trial and Cynthia McFadden, although a veteran television journalist by the time the Simpson trial broke out, was a relatively new reporter with ABC in 1995. She has since risen in the TV news business to her current position of NBC’s senior legal and investigative correspondent.

Abrams Says He–Everybody–Knew Simpson was Guilty

Here’s a headline that got my attention today:

Dan Abrams Recalls OJ’s Incriminating Shoes

And here’s one of the questions from a Q&A with Abrams in the Hamptons magazine, which was posted on mediabistro.com/fishbowlny:

     “I have to say how amazing it is that you, as a young lawyer, got to cover the O.J.Simpson murder trial. Did you know that O.J. Simpson was guilty?”

     And Abrams answer:

     “Anyone who watched that trial knew that OJ Simpson was guilty. But more importantly, anyone who watched the civil trial… O.J. Simpson had to testify during the civil case, and that’s when his story completely fell apart. There were shoe prints found at the scene — I think it was size 13 Bruno Magli shoes. Simpson had claimed that he would never wear such ugly shoes, and yet as the civil trial was about to start, a newsletter from the Buffalo Bills from eight months before the murder [showed] him wearing those ugly shoes.”

     I don’t know about everyone knowing Simpson was guilty, but I do remember Dan as a young lawyer — and TV reporter. His employer was Court TV. Both Dan and Court TV were new kids on the block back in 1992. That was the year Dan joined Court TV and that was the year Court TV made its bones on the national scene with its coverage of the Rodney King beating trial.

     (That trial began less than three months after I became the Los Angeles Superior Court’s information officer and media liaison, so I was a new kid on the block then, too.)

     Dan has had a remarkable career, which has included hosting “The Abrams Report” on MSNBC before becoming general manager of that cable network, founded the internet media network Mediaite, chief legal anchor for ABC News and serving as host of ABC’s “Nightline.” His writing has appeared in several major publications and he is author of the book Man Down: Proof Beyond a Reasonable Doubt That Women Are Better Cops, Drivers, Gamblers, Spies, World Leaders, Beer Tasters, Hedge Fund Managers and Just About Everything Else.” And he’s part owner of a restaurant in TriBeca. Busy, busy guy!

http://www.mediabistro.com/fishbowlny/hamptons-magazine-dan-abrams-ali-wentworth-oj-simpson_b232948

Not Such a Nice Girl — or Boy — After All

Jake Tapper, previously an ABC corespondent and now with CNN, on the NPR program Wait, Wait … Don’t Tell Me — of all places — told about having a date with Clinton White House intern Monica Lewinsky before news of her relationship to the president had broken. Some time after that date, Tapper was on a scuba-diving vacation with his father in the Cayman Islands when he saw the headline in the Caymanian Compass. His reaction?

“Oh, my god!”  http://www.npr.org/2012/12/01/166240236/jake-tapper-of-abc-news-plays-not-my-job

That was my reaction to the news many years earlier that O.J. Simpson was the primary suspect in the murder of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown, and her friend, Ron Goldman — except that I had never dated Simpson. In fact, I hadn’t even met him. But like just about everybody else in the country, I knew him.

Or thought I did.

Football great, Hertz and HoneyBaked Ham pitchman, Naked Gun movie actor, all-around good guy.

Seeing him in the courtroom, interacting with his defense attorneys and others during his 1994 pretrial proceedings and his 1995 trial,  didn’t do much to challenge that image, despite evidence alleging otherwise. At most, the self-centered sense of entitlement that isn’t uncommon with gifted athletes who are courted and coddled from high school — and even earlier — on through scholarships and ivory-towered college sports program, began to bleed through.

An example was his lawyers bringing special food to the courtroom for his lunch so he wouldn’t have to suffer the “mystery-meat” sandwich and apple sack lunches given jail inmates in courthouse lockup. That lasted until word got to the trial judge, Lance Ito, who ordered it stopped.

I got a better sense of another Simpson during his 1997 civil trial that resulted in a $33.5 million judgment against him. Unlike the criminal trial, Simpson was not in custody, so he frequently held forth in the Santa Monica courthouse corridors.

One day a high school student whose teacher had arranged to help me out as a volunteer said she didn’t want to be around him because he hit on her. Interestingly, she was a pretty, shapely blonde.

I never actually “met” or talked to Simpson until his 2008 Las Vegas trial on robbery and kidnapping charges  trial. It was an awkward moment. I was going into the courtroom during a break in the proceedings and he was coming out. We met in the doorway.

Although we had never spoken, I knew that he knew who I was. How could he not? I was in the courtroom almost every day of both his ’95 criminal trial and his ’97 civil trial.

After we each said “hi” as we stood there in that Las Vegas courtroom doorway, what to say next. So I blurted out, “How are you?”

Well, duh. He had a ten-year-old $33.5 million judgment against him that he hadn’t paid a penny toward. The ivory tower of his youth and glory days had crumbled to dust. He was the ongoing butt of endless jokes. And he was, yet again, on trial for crimes that could land him in prison for years. (And did!) So, how the heck did I think he was?

And what the heck was I doing at that trial in Las Vegas, anyway? I no longer worked for any court in the country and had long-ago moved out of California.

Although the Simpson trial in Las Vegas would be interesting, the only reason I went was to see my friend Dominick Dunne who had been diagnosed with what was expected to be a terminal illness. (And it was.)

So, have you known, or thought you knew, someone who turned out to be vastly different from the image they presented or passed themselves off to be? Someone who gave you an “Oh, my god!” moment?