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♪ <i>Michael Brody,
he's a brand new kind of man.</i> ♪

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00:00:45,789 --> 00:00:52,927
♪ <i>Brody, Brody, he'll
help people if he can.</i> ♪

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Michael Brody says he'll consider
money requests from anybody.

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He handed out $100 bills on
the street this afternoon

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and offered this reporter
a million dollars

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and a private jet flight
to Tahiti leaving tonight.

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He looked disappointed when
he heard I had to work tomorrow.

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To convince everyone, he gave
his home and office address

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and the phone numbers.

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Brody's New York office has been
flooded with phone calls from

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money-hungry Americans, and
the hall outside the office...

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Dear Mr. Brody...

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Dear Mr. Brody...

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Dear Michael...

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Dear Mr. And Mrs. Brody...

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Dear Mr. Brody...

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Now in its 22nd year,
presenting the greatest

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in World Entertainment...

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The Ed Sullivan Show.

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Now all over the world...

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all over the world,
newspapers are front

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paging the story of
21-year-old Michael James

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Brody of Scarsdale,
New York, a youngster

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who's giving away $25 million.

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Come on.

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Come on, come out here!

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This is Michael Brody.

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00:02:57,720 --> 00:02:58,582
This is Michael Brody.

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This is Michael Brody.

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This is Michael Brody.

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This is Michael Brody.

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This is Michael Brody.

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Less than 24 hours ago, he
announced to the world at large

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that he had $25 million
to give away to anyone.

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Well, I personally
think that maybe I'll

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be setting a new trend.

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Like, I think if people
like Onassis or the Kennedys

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or some of these people
use some of their money

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and give to the poor, and
if everybody just gave

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$1 million... if every
millionaire gave $1 million

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to one foundation and
said, look, let's really

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go into this.

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And let's really get the...

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let's get food to the poor.

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Dear Mr. Brody, I've
read so much about you

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in all the newspapers
and magazines.

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And I've seen you on TV.

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I admire you and
your wife very much.

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Don't know how serious you
are about all this jive,

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but I get a feeling
of your head pointing

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in the right direction.

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I'm going to give away,
I think, $50 million

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within the next year
and set up a foundation,

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like the Ford Foundation,
and give money to the poor.

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When I was a young girl, I
used to watch The Millionaire

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on TV, used to dream
about him knocking

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on my door with that
cashier's check.

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But nothing like that
ever happens in real life.

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I don't really just want to
cure the problems of the United

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States.

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I want to try and cure
the problems of the world.

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I really don't know quite how to
tell you the aim of my letter.

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I'm sure you've gotten
many just like it.

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But you said you would
give some of your money

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to anyone who asked, right?

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Well, I'm asking.

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Why are you giving
away all this money?

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Because it's the only
way to find peace.

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I mean, I'm not
giving away money.

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That's... money's the least
thing I'm giving away right now.

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What I'm giving away is a
good feeling to mankind.

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Well, this is me.

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The year was... it was '69.

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So I was 20.

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My boyfriend was selling hashish
to people he knew in Scarsdale.

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And that's kind of
how I met Michael.

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He was supposed to deliver it
to Michael, but he couldn't.

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So I brought it there.

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The door opened.

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And he just did this
big courtly bow.

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I was like, "Oh."

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There was a couple
of people there.

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And we, you know, hung out.

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He was just a beautiful person.

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You know, we just got
very close very quickly.

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And he told me the story
of his mother dying

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when he was little and...

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and being very lonely.

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And I told him about my life,
my history, where I grew up,

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and you know, and being
very lonely, basically.

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All of a sudden,
you have you know,

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sort of a missing
part of your life.

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The next day, my boyfriend
didn't know where was I.

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And he came to find me.

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"Where is Renee?"

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"Where is Renee?"

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And I was like, "Uh-oh."

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And Michael said,
well, she's not... she's

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...we're getting married.

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She's staying here with me.

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And of course, he
asked me, "Is that true?"

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You know,
"Who is this crazy guy?"

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I said, "Yeah."

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And we got married.

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Mr. Brody, first of all, how
much money are you worth?

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And what do you
intend to do with it?

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Well, right now I'd say
unlimited, because, I mean,

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if I have to give you a figure,
I'll just say $500 million, OK?

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Just like that,
you shrug it off?

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Why not?

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And what are you
going to do with it?

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Give it all away.

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Why?

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Because people need
it more than I do.

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I don't know.

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Maybe there's a little guilt
at having all that money.

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Not exactly guilt, but, it just
didn't feel right, you know?

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There's a big disparity between
the haves and the have nots.

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And the extent of it
really bothered him.

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To convince everyone, he gave
his home and office address

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and the phone numbers.

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Early today, at his suburban
home, he was mobbed.

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Scores of New Yorkers turned
up, everything from hippies

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to a dress manufacturer
trying to save his business.

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They all had a
different reason why

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the 21-year-old heir to
an oleomargarine fortune

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should help them.

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What did... what did
you say in the letter?

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I asked him for a
certain amount of money

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to put my husband
through college.

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My wife and I would like
to adopt about 25 children

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and have a house in the country.

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You know, we feel we have
enough love and understanding

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to give them proper guidance
and raise them right.

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Did you say how much
you would like have?

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No, whatever you could
find in this heart to give,

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I would greatly appreciate.

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You think you might get it?

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I don't know.

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I hope so.

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It's like you're in a movie and
you haven't seen the script.

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And every day, the director
gives you another page.

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And you don't know
where it's going.

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So are we rolling?

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Oh, OK.

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So like, we'd walk down
the street and everybody

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would recognize
him, because he was

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on the front page of every
newspaper in the world.

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Somebody would see us.

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And then 10 people would see us.

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And then there'd be a bunch
of people around us, you know.

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Michael Brody says he'll
consider money requests

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from anybody.

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And he claims that so far
he's given away $60,000.

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Did you give any
money away today?

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Oh, I gave away, uh...

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I gave away at least
$100,000 just in checks.

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We'd get cornered, you know?

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Like there would be a
mob of people, you know?

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Back it up.

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Watch out.

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And I became the bodyguard.

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He handed out $100 bills on
the street this afternoon.

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And then he went
down on Times Square

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and started playing
his guitar until police

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made him leave because he
didn't have a parade permit.

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He was just riding the
wave, going with it,

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00:09:23,996 --> 00:09:25,100
see where it took him.

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He was just kind of
living a dream, you know?

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He wanted to play music.

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He got to play music.

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He got a record contract.

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And that's when everything
kind of took off and got crazy.

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00:10:00,444 --> 00:10:02,789
Michael Brody, the
oleomargarine heir

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00:10:02,893 --> 00:10:04,617
who said he wanted to
give away his fortune,

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00:10:04,720 --> 00:10:09,720
has signed a recording
contract with RCA records.

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00:10:09,824 --> 00:10:11,375
What album are
you going to make?

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00:10:11,479 --> 00:10:13,203
I'm going to write the music
right now as I play it.

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It'll be a brand new thing.

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00:10:14,893 --> 00:10:16,720
No one's ever heard the music
before, not even myself.

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00:10:16,824 --> 00:10:18,306
You just have to dig it.

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All of a sudden, we found
we had all these hangers on

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00:10:20,962 --> 00:10:26,617
and potential managers and
helpers and friends of friends

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00:10:26,720 --> 00:10:27,893
of Michael...

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00:10:27,996 --> 00:10:30,031
people at the
house living there.

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00:10:31,410 --> 00:10:32,824
Dear Mr. And Mrs.
Brody, you are doing

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00:10:32,927 --> 00:10:34,824
the grooviest thing
for your fellow men

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00:10:34,927 --> 00:10:36,134
by sharing your money.

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00:10:36,237 --> 00:10:37,893
If it would be all
right with you,

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00:10:37,996 --> 00:10:40,824
I'd like to start a fan club
for you as soon as possible.

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00:10:40,927 --> 00:10:43,203
Please don't let me down.

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He would just yell in the
house, red alert, red alert, red

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00:10:45,927 --> 00:10:47,617
alert, you know,
leaving right now.

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00:10:47,720 --> 00:10:50,134
And whoever ran, then got to go.

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00:10:52,479 --> 00:10:57,444
The manager kind of arranged
that we would go to London

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00:10:57,548 --> 00:10:59,582
and meet with John Lennon.

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00:10:59,686 --> 00:11:02,375
At some point, he wanted
to go to Puerto Rico.

200
00:11:02,479 --> 00:11:05,720
We were invited to play with
the Grateful Dead in Hawaii.

201
00:11:05,824 --> 00:11:07,306
Of course, he didn't
want to just play.

202
00:11:07,410 --> 00:11:10,375
And then he's throwing
money at the audience.

203
00:11:10,479 --> 00:11:13,996
I mean, shoot, we did a lot
of crazy things, you know?

204
00:11:14,100 --> 00:11:16,168
I mean, fuck, to get
Walter Cronkite stoned.

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00:11:16,272 --> 00:11:16,996
Come on.

206
00:11:17,100 --> 00:11:18,582
How many people do that?

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00:11:19,962 --> 00:11:23,824
Walter Cronkite
made an appointment

208
00:11:23,927 --> 00:11:26,272
to come and interview
Michael at the house.

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00:11:26,375 --> 00:11:30,272
And he showed up
with a camera crew.

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00:11:30,375 --> 00:11:34,272
And they set up to
do this interview.

211
00:11:34,375 --> 00:11:37,306
And we were all smoking
and passing joints around.

212
00:11:37,410 --> 00:11:39,203
And Walter...

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00:11:39,306 --> 00:11:43,306
I don't think he was wasted,
but you know, we had a buzz.

214
00:11:43,410 --> 00:11:47,237
And that's the way it is,
Friday, January 16, 1970.

215
00:11:47,341 --> 00:11:51,306
This is Walter Cronkite,
CBS News, good night.

216
00:12:03,824 --> 00:12:07,824
No, I heard about this
story a few years ago.

217
00:12:16,962 --> 00:12:18,720
There are no lights in here,
right?

218
00:12:19,203 --> 00:12:20,617
There should be.

219
00:12:25,203 --> 00:12:27,893
There's this.

220
00:12:27,996 --> 00:12:30,789
Luckily we have one
light in storage.

221
00:12:30,893 --> 00:12:33,410
So a few years ago, I
was living in New York.

222
00:12:33,513 --> 00:12:36,651
I was working for a film
producer, Ed Pressman.

223
00:12:36,755 --> 00:12:39,306
And I got to LA to
visit his storage unit

224
00:12:39,410 --> 00:12:42,479
where he had a bunch
of papers from 80

225
00:12:42,582 --> 00:12:45,444
some odd films that he's
produced over the last thirty

226
00:12:45,548 --> 00:12:46,858
years.

227
00:12:46,962 --> 00:12:50,065
And while I was there,
I noticed about 12 boxes

228
00:12:50,168 --> 00:12:51,134
on the top shelf.

229
00:12:51,237 --> 00:12:52,927
And they were all marked
"Brody."

230
00:12:56,927 --> 00:12:59,996
So this is one of
the 12 boxes that

231
00:13:00,100 --> 00:13:06,582
were in the storage unit
filled with letters.

232
00:13:06,686 --> 00:13:11,203
We actually are swimming
in Brody letters here.

233
00:13:11,306 --> 00:13:14,962
I asked Ed what the letters
were about, how he got them,

234
00:13:15,065 --> 00:13:16,031
and who was Brody?

235
00:13:20,513 --> 00:13:25,755
I think I was introduced to
Michael Brody in the early '70s

236
00:13:25,858 --> 00:13:27,272
in New York.

237
00:13:39,237 --> 00:13:41,617
I had done three films...

238
00:13:41,720 --> 00:13:45,341
the early De Palma
movie, Sisters

239
00:13:45,789 --> 00:13:51,651
and Phantom of the Paradise,
and Terry Malick's Badlands.

240
00:13:54,272 --> 00:13:56,996
And it was during
that period that we

241
00:13:57,100 --> 00:13:59,686
got involved with Brody.

242
00:14:00,375 --> 00:14:03,582
I recall working
with Shep Gordon.

243
00:14:03,686 --> 00:14:06,272
Shep was from the
rock and roll world.

244
00:14:06,375 --> 00:14:08,651
He managed Alice Cooper.

245
00:14:08,755 --> 00:14:13,306
We decided to join forces
and try to produce the film.

246
00:14:14,341 --> 00:14:19,686
Michael Brody, to me, was
always the story of an idealist.

247
00:14:19,789 --> 00:14:25,306
I thought about calling the
film The Last Flower Child.

248
00:14:25,410 --> 00:14:29,720
The Ultimate Gift was
actually the title we used.

249
00:14:35,168 --> 00:14:37,686
Probably 1977.

250
00:14:43,237 --> 00:14:45,962
There were so many letters.

251
00:14:46,065 --> 00:14:49,789
I got the letters as
part of the project,

252
00:14:49,893 --> 00:14:52,927
because no one else wanted them.

253
00:14:53,789 --> 00:14:55,410
He never made the project.

254
00:14:55,513 --> 00:14:57,720
But he kept the letters.

255
00:14:57,824 --> 00:15:00,858
And I'm talking thousands
and thousands and thousands

256
00:15:00,962 --> 00:15:03,203
of letters stacked in boxes.

257
00:15:05,755 --> 00:15:08,789
They were all postmarked
January, 1970,

258
00:15:12,203 --> 00:15:14,996
all addressed to
Michael James Brody Jr.

259
00:15:27,168 --> 00:15:30,548
And they were all unopened.

260
00:16:11,513 --> 00:16:13,134
Come back to LA.

261
00:16:17,755 --> 00:16:22,686
Unopened means unanswered.

262
00:16:44,858 --> 00:16:50,272
Dear Mr. Brody, I read
about you in the paper.

263
00:16:50,375 --> 00:16:55,410
The reason I'm writing is
right now I have six children.

264
00:16:55,513 --> 00:16:58,100
We live in an old log house.

265
00:16:58,203 --> 00:17:02,306
The light bill is
two months past due.

266
00:17:04,548 --> 00:17:09,686
My husband has little work
as he cannot read or write.

267
00:17:10,444 --> 00:17:12,031
He doesn't know
I'm writing this,

268
00:17:12,134 --> 00:17:16,824
so please don't have my
name published or anything.

269
00:17:16,927 --> 00:17:21,893
If I could just receive some
help from someone like you,

270
00:17:21,996 --> 00:17:23,755
I would really appreciate it.

271
00:17:26,686 --> 00:17:30,617
Anyone who knows us will tell
you everything I wrote is true.

272
00:17:32,927 --> 00:17:35,686
Everything I make will be for
charity... records, movies.

273
00:17:35,789 --> 00:17:37,755
I'm going to do everything
I can do to make money

274
00:17:37,858 --> 00:17:39,858
for anybody that needs it.

275
00:17:39,962 --> 00:17:42,548
But it's not money, it's
love that I'm trying to sell.

276
00:17:51,168 --> 00:17:53,824
He... you know, I knew him for a
couple of years in high school.

277
00:17:59,168 --> 00:18:01,410
Michael, you know,
entertained at his home

278
00:18:01,513 --> 00:18:03,134
and played cards and lost.

279
00:18:03,237 --> 00:18:04,927
You know, I knew
people who went...

280
00:18:05,031 --> 00:18:08,720
took their allowances
to Michael Brody's house

281
00:18:08,824 --> 00:18:10,651
to double or triple their money.

282
00:18:10,755 --> 00:18:11,893
And Michael didn't care.

283
00:18:11,996 --> 00:18:14,410
Michael just wanted the company.

284
00:18:14,789 --> 00:18:18,617
So I was of course
surprised, but not entirely,

285
00:18:18,720 --> 00:18:20,686
when this came on
the television.

286
00:18:20,789 --> 00:18:23,582
And it was like, whoa, Michael.

287
00:18:23,686 --> 00:18:26,237
Well, if somebody sends you a
letter, for instance, saying

288
00:18:26,341 --> 00:18:29,375
that they have a $12,000
mortgage they want to pay off,

289
00:18:29,479 --> 00:18:30,789
you'll send them the money?

290
00:18:30,893 --> 00:18:33,893
Yes, yes, yes, yes,
yes, yes, yes, yes,

291
00:18:33,996 --> 00:18:36,237
I will give you money,
money, money, money, money,

292
00:18:36,341 --> 00:18:38,789
money, all the money
you could ever want.

293
00:18:38,893 --> 00:18:41,237
Here was this promise of
this hippie millionaire,

294
00:18:41,341 --> 00:18:43,686
who was so imbued
by love that he

295
00:18:43,789 --> 00:18:48,755
was going to share his love with
everybody by giving them money.

296
00:18:48,858 --> 00:18:52,962
It was a classic '60s situation.

297
00:19:01,513 --> 00:19:03,341
They were convinced
that they were involved

298
00:19:03,444 --> 00:19:10,755
in a cosmic connection,
that their love was

299
00:19:10,858 --> 00:19:14,341
so great that something
else had to be working.

300
00:19:21,031 --> 00:19:22,720
I figure that this is
the Age of Aquarius

301
00:19:22,824 --> 00:19:25,410
and within a very short
time, the whole world

302
00:19:25,513 --> 00:19:27,479
will be at peace.

303
00:19:27,582 --> 00:19:32,203
What I saw was just a lot of
energy, a lot of spontaneity,

304
00:19:32,306 --> 00:19:37,203
a lot of innocence, a lot of
goodness, a lot of sincerity.

305
00:19:37,306 --> 00:19:39,582
I just want everybody
to be as rich as I am,

306
00:19:39,686 --> 00:19:42,962
that means to be as happy as I
am, be as much in love as I am,

307
00:19:43,065 --> 00:19:46,306
and when everybody is, then
I'm going to cop out and split.

308
00:19:46,410 --> 00:19:48,686
I figure this will take
me about three months.

309
00:19:57,548 --> 00:20:00,100
My relationship
to the Brody story

310
00:20:00,203 --> 00:20:06,755
led me on a very long journey,
really, over 47 years.

311
00:20:10,755 --> 00:20:14,272
I was 12 in January, 1970.

312
00:20:14,375 --> 00:20:18,341
I can remember reading the
very first story about Michael

313
00:20:18,444 --> 00:20:19,824
and Renee.

314
00:20:19,927 --> 00:20:24,134
It was on the front page
of the New York Daily News.

315
00:20:24,237 --> 00:20:28,582
They met, fell in love, and went
on their honeymoon to Jamaica.

316
00:20:28,686 --> 00:20:30,237
And then, after a
week in Jamaica,

317
00:20:30,341 --> 00:20:34,410
they fly back to New York in
the chartered 707 and step

318
00:20:34,513 --> 00:20:38,962
into the media limelight
of New York City.

319
00:20:39,065 --> 00:20:42,651
He decided it would be romantic
if he had the whole 747

320
00:20:42,755 --> 00:20:46,168
to himself and his wife.

321
00:20:46,272 --> 00:20:54,444
So he bought every
seat and came back.

322
00:20:54,548 --> 00:20:56,479
He was the heir to
a margarine fortune.

323
00:20:56,582 --> 00:21:00,479
Years ago, most people never
dreamed of eating margarine.

324
00:21:00,582 --> 00:21:01,893
But times have changed.

325
00:21:01,996 --> 00:21:07,720
Brody's maternal
line, the Jelkes,

326
00:21:07,824 --> 00:21:10,306
were the first to come up with
a brand name for margarine.

327
00:21:10,410 --> 00:21:12,548
They called it Good
Luck Margarine.

328
00:21:12,651 --> 00:21:15,168
That's what I've
spread on my toast.

329
00:21:15,272 --> 00:21:16,893
Good Luck.

330
00:21:16,996 --> 00:21:19,410
New Good Luck Margarine gives
you both, preferred unsaturates

331
00:21:19,513 --> 00:21:21,237
and preferred flavor.

332
00:21:21,341 --> 00:21:25,031
I always thought I would revisit
it sometime later in my life,

333
00:21:25,134 --> 00:21:26,651
like write a book
or try to write

334
00:21:26,755 --> 00:21:30,031
a book about those events.

335
00:21:30,134 --> 00:21:34,100
I wrote a manuscript
hoping to get it published.

336
00:21:34,203 --> 00:21:35,410
It was not.

337
00:21:35,513 --> 00:21:39,479
I called it The
Oleomargarine Heir.

338
00:21:39,858 --> 00:21:42,444
It's a classically
American kind of story,

339
00:21:42,548 --> 00:21:45,375
where Michael's
mother is the daughter

340
00:21:45,479 --> 00:21:48,306
of the oleomargarine king,

341
00:21:48,410 --> 00:21:52,444
very accomplished and
fabulously wealthy.

342
00:21:52,548 --> 00:21:56,341
You know, she was a
society debutante.

343
00:21:56,444 --> 00:21:59,686
Michael James Brody Sr.
was an extraordinary

344
00:21:59,789 --> 00:22:01,651
physical specimen.

345
00:22:01,755 --> 00:22:06,134
I think he came from very
limited circumstances.

346
00:22:06,237 --> 00:22:10,720
And somehow he made it from
the steel mill in Dukane,

347
00:22:10,824 --> 00:22:12,720
Pennsylvania to Harvard.

348
00:22:15,962 --> 00:22:19,720
So he marries the heiress
of the Jelke fortune.

349
00:22:21,789 --> 00:22:24,134
And then she dies.

350
00:22:25,927 --> 00:22:28,617
Michael's mother died
when he was three.

351
00:22:29,065 --> 00:22:31,134
He grew up in a
situation... you know,

352
00:22:31,237 --> 00:22:32,582
he was the poor,
little rich kid.

353
00:22:32,686 --> 00:22:35,720
And he grew up in
a situation where

354
00:22:35,824 --> 00:22:37,686
the only people who
paid attention to him

355
00:22:37,789 --> 00:22:40,237
were housekeepers.

356
00:22:40,341 --> 00:22:44,927
His father, as far as I could
tell, was pretty remote.

357
00:22:47,789 --> 00:22:49,720
Brody's grandfather,
John F. Jelke,

358
00:22:49,824 --> 00:22:52,031
sells the company in 1948.

359
00:22:52,134 --> 00:22:53,893
He dies in the early '60s.

360
00:22:53,996 --> 00:22:59,479
About $3 million goes into
a trust for his children.

361
00:22:59,582 --> 00:23:01,065
That's the way
fortunes are made.

362
00:23:01,168 --> 00:23:05,341
They compound over decades.

363
00:23:05,444 --> 00:23:07,341
Michael gets off the airplane.

364
00:23:07,444 --> 00:23:08,962
OK, who is this kid?

365
00:23:09,065 --> 00:23:13,513
As soon as he says, I am the
grandson of John F. Jelke,

366
00:23:13,617 --> 00:23:16,479
they know that he's
part of a fortune.

367
00:23:26,031 --> 00:23:28,513
Because I was so overwhelmed,
in the beginning,

368
00:23:28,617 --> 00:23:31,720
by the mass amount
of letters, I started

369
00:23:31,824 --> 00:23:34,720
to sort through some
of them to kind of find

370
00:23:34,824 --> 00:23:36,617
those really exciting
ones, the ones that

371
00:23:36,720 --> 00:23:38,789
were a little bit thicker,
the ones that might have

372
00:23:38,893 --> 00:23:40,789
a photograph or something else.

373
00:23:44,100 --> 00:23:47,272
Dear Mr. and Mrs. Brody,
mazel tov on your marriage.

374
00:23:47,375 --> 00:23:51,341
All the happiness that you
seek should be yours forever.

375
00:23:51,444 --> 00:23:53,617
I've never seen a lot of
money, but I've always

376
00:23:53,720 --> 00:23:55,031
dreamed of having it.

377
00:23:55,134 --> 00:23:57,203
Dear ma'am, I would
like to have $6,000

378
00:23:57,306 --> 00:24:00,755
to go to Japan this summer and
make a movie on 16 millimeter

379
00:24:00,858 --> 00:24:02,341
film.

380
00:24:02,444 --> 00:24:05,306
Please send me $5,000 so I
can continue my art classes.

381
00:24:05,410 --> 00:24:09,548
My gift to you is this pencil
drawing I did of your wife.

382
00:24:09,651 --> 00:24:13,410
Some people sent religious
pamphlets, books,

383
00:24:13,513 --> 00:24:18,617
hospital bills, x-rays,
photographs of themselves,

384
00:24:18,720 --> 00:24:20,031
photographs of children.

385
00:24:29,513 --> 00:24:31,651
It wasn't just a letter.

386
00:24:31,755 --> 00:24:33,789
Dear, Mr. Brody,
my name is Nancy.

387
00:24:33,893 --> 00:24:35,513
And I'm eight years old.

388
00:24:35,617 --> 00:24:37,720
Would you please send me some
money to buy a Barbie doll?

389
00:24:38,134 --> 00:24:42,617
Mr. Brody, dear friend, I'm
an unmarried girl living

390
00:24:42,720 --> 00:24:46,651
with my mother who is a
widow of long standing.

391
00:24:46,755 --> 00:24:49,341
She is sick.

392
00:24:49,444 --> 00:24:52,824
Dear Mr. Brody, you
have so much money,

393
00:24:52,927 --> 00:24:57,375
you might even be able to
stop pollution in the US.

394
00:24:57,479 --> 00:25:02,100
You can invent an
electric car or something.

395
00:25:02,203 --> 00:25:05,720
Dear Mr. Brody, I could use
some of your extra money

396
00:25:05,824 --> 00:25:09,755
to help my three married
children get out of debt.

397
00:25:09,858 --> 00:25:12,203
I am on public welfare
because my husband

398
00:25:12,306 --> 00:25:14,341
is a drug addict
serving sentences

399
00:25:14,444 --> 00:25:19,237
in prison, because he got into
trouble as addicts always do.

400
00:25:19,341 --> 00:25:21,203
Here's a picture
of my little boy.

401
00:25:21,306 --> 00:25:24,134
Please keep a smile on his face.

402
00:25:24,237 --> 00:25:27,617
Back in 1952, I started
a boys club in my garage

403
00:25:27,720 --> 00:25:29,582
from 12 and up.

404
00:25:29,686 --> 00:25:31,100
Most of them have
problems at home.

405
00:25:31,203 --> 00:25:33,065
And here's a place for
them to talk to someone

406
00:25:33,168 --> 00:25:34,444
who believes in them.

407
00:25:34,548 --> 00:25:35,996
I would like to have
the pictures back.

408
00:25:36,100 --> 00:25:37,789
They are the only copies I have.

409
00:25:40,617 --> 00:25:42,996
We'd just sit on the floor in
the living room in Michael's

410
00:25:43,100 --> 00:25:45,168
house in Scarsdale.

411
00:25:45,272 --> 00:25:50,134
And we'd just start opening
them and reading these things.

412
00:25:50,237 --> 00:25:52,962
Since you are a neighbor of
ours, as well as a very wealthy

413
00:25:53,065 --> 00:25:57,134
man, perhaps you would
like to make a contribution

414
00:25:57,237 --> 00:26:00,996
to a cause which most people
have chosen to ignore,

415
00:26:01,100 --> 00:26:03,134
schizophrenia.

416
00:26:03,237 --> 00:26:08,306
Since schizophrenia strikes
one out of every 100 persons,

417
00:26:08,410 --> 00:26:10,479
chances are that there
were several families

418
00:26:10,582 --> 00:26:13,582
on Paddington Road that
are touched in some way

419
00:26:13,686 --> 00:26:14,617
by this disease.

420
00:26:18,100 --> 00:26:20,479
The truth is, is that we
would read the letters looking

421
00:26:20,582 --> 00:26:22,893
for the fucking obvious frauds.

422
00:26:22,996 --> 00:26:24,755
We would read the letters
looking for the ones

423
00:26:24,858 --> 00:26:27,134
that we could laugh about,
because the other ones were so

424
00:26:27,237 --> 00:26:32,789
fucking heavy that you needed
something to "sfogarti,"

425
00:26:32,893 --> 00:26:34,962
to get all of that
shit out, you know?

426
00:26:51,755 --> 00:26:55,479
Dear Mr. Brody, my name is
Ann and I'm 11 years old.

427
00:26:55,582 --> 00:27:02,168
My father George died September
1st, 1969 at the age of 51.

428
00:27:02,272 --> 00:27:05,858
For six months, I
watched him suffer.

429
00:27:05,962 --> 00:27:10,341
September 1st, he died
at 2:35 AM of cancer.

430
00:27:10,444 --> 00:27:13,031
My mother, brother, and
I took it very hard.

431
00:27:13,134 --> 00:27:16,168
This year we have many doctor
bills to pay plus our mortgage.

432
00:27:19,065 --> 00:27:21,203
Please, Mr. Brody, help us out.

433
00:27:21,306 --> 00:27:24,927
And for my father's sake
and other people's sake,

434
00:27:25,031 --> 00:27:28,962
donate something
to the cancer fund.

435
00:27:42,031 --> 00:27:43,617
Mr. Brody, just
starting from the top,

436
00:27:43,720 --> 00:27:44,720
because I don't really...

437
00:27:44,824 --> 00:27:47,168
I haven't gotten anything yet.

438
00:27:47,272 --> 00:27:50,789
What has been the response
to this rather unusual...

439
00:27:50,893 --> 00:27:54,513
Well, a lot of people have
sent me a lot of letters

440
00:27:54,617 --> 00:27:56,410
to my own home.

441
00:27:56,513 --> 00:27:58,858
And I've been taking those
letters back down to my office.

442
00:27:58,962 --> 00:28:03,479
And if you just send it to my
office at 1650 Broadway,

443
00:28:03,582 --> 00:28:04,996
Room 1409, they'll get answered.

444
00:28:05,100 --> 00:28:06,410
But if you send
them to my house,

445
00:28:06,513 --> 00:28:07,755
it's going to take another day.

446
00:28:12,237 --> 00:28:15,306
Brody's New York office has
been flooded with phone calls

447
00:28:15,410 --> 00:28:16,927
from money-hungry Americans.

448
00:28:17,031 --> 00:28:18,824
And the hall outside
the office is

449
00:28:18,927 --> 00:28:21,375
lined with people
looking for a handout.

450
00:28:21,479 --> 00:28:22,927
They all had a
different reason why

451
00:28:23,031 --> 00:28:25,548
the 21-year-old heir to
an oleomargarine fortune

452
00:28:25,651 --> 00:28:27,548
should help them.

453
00:28:27,651 --> 00:28:29,031
I walk over there...

454
00:28:29,134 --> 00:28:31,686
and you would not have
recognized the block.

455
00:28:32,824 --> 00:28:35,582
I didn't know all of the
elevators had broken down.

456
00:28:35,686 --> 00:28:38,031
All the way down the
stairwells,

457
00:28:38,134 --> 00:28:40,031
there were people lined up,

458
00:28:40,134 --> 00:28:41,617
trying to get to this
one little office.

459
00:28:41,720 --> 00:28:44,237
It was a little bit
bigger than this table.

460
00:28:44,341 --> 00:28:45,755
What do you want the money for?

461
00:28:45,858 --> 00:28:47,617
Get a home for my family.

462
00:28:47,720 --> 00:28:49,237
How much are you asking for?

463
00:28:49,341 --> 00:28:52,203
Only $3,000 or $4,000, just
enough for a down payment.

464
00:28:52,306 --> 00:28:53,582
And you?

465
00:28:53,686 --> 00:28:55,168
Well, I've been out of
work for about 17 months.

466
00:28:55,272 --> 00:28:56,548
I had two big operations and

467
00:28:56,651 --> 00:28:58,582
I'm going back for another
operation.

468
00:28:58,686 --> 00:29:00,065
I have four children.

469
00:29:00,168 --> 00:29:01,100
And I want to give
them a good Christmas

470
00:29:01,203 --> 00:29:02,272
that I didn't give them.

471
00:29:02,375 --> 00:29:05,755
What do you want the money for?

472
00:29:05,858 --> 00:29:07,513
Well, I want the money because...

473
00:29:07,617 --> 00:29:09,410
well, first of all,
I'm here because I want

474
00:29:09,513 --> 00:29:10,927
to be exposed to the public.

475
00:29:11,031 --> 00:29:13,203
And second of all, I
need money because...

476
00:29:13,306 --> 00:29:14,065
What do you do?

477
00:29:14,168 --> 00:29:15,513
I act and I dance.

478
00:29:15,617 --> 00:29:18,134
And I am looking for exposure.

479
00:29:18,237 --> 00:29:22,168
I think I'd like
about about $5,000.

480
00:29:22,272 --> 00:29:25,927
To look at that group
of people and see

481
00:29:26,031 --> 00:29:28,375
the excitement in their faces...

482
00:29:28,479 --> 00:29:31,720
I'm getting ready to get rich.

483
00:29:31,824 --> 00:29:33,927
I went, oh, my god, this
is so out of control.

484
00:29:36,065 --> 00:29:37,341
Hello?

485
00:29:37,996 --> 00:29:40,237
Sweetheart, not
today... not right now.

486
00:29:40,341 --> 00:29:41,996
Please give us seven days.

487
00:29:42,100 --> 00:29:43,513
And I don't speak Spanish.

488
00:29:43,617 --> 00:29:45,858
I'll have to... I
can't... no comprende.

489
00:29:45,962 --> 00:29:47,927
One day, I get a
call from my mom.

490
00:29:48,031 --> 00:29:51,306
And she says, "Look, I saw
this guy, Michael Brody...

491
00:29:51,410 --> 00:29:53,686
I think that's his name...
came into a lot of money.

492
00:29:53,789 --> 00:29:55,168
And I got a feeling
this guy just

493
00:29:55,272 --> 00:29:59,582
might be able to help
me with the studio."

494
00:29:59,686 --> 00:30:02,858
She was, as we would say
today, quite a go-getter.

495
00:30:02,962 --> 00:30:06,444
She was an owner
of beauty shops.

496
00:30:06,548 --> 00:30:10,341
Probably the most popular
one was Bunny's Wig Wam.

497
00:30:10,444 --> 00:30:12,755
She was never afraid to
do something different.

498
00:30:12,858 --> 00:30:15,824
And of course, being my
mother, I loved her dearly.

499
00:30:16,962 --> 00:30:19,686
It was mentioned that
Michael lived in Scarsdale.

500
00:30:19,789 --> 00:30:24,065
She went... had no idea
what his address was...

501
00:30:24,168 --> 00:30:27,203
went to several gas
stations and pretended

502
00:30:27,306 --> 00:30:32,272
to be a maid that was
looking for the Brody house.

503
00:30:32,375 --> 00:30:36,996
It's like the needle in
the haystack kind of story.

504
00:30:37,100 --> 00:30:41,755
Michael opens the door
and says, who are you?

505
00:30:41,858 --> 00:30:44,479
And she says, I'm who
you've been waiting for.

506
00:30:44,582 --> 00:30:46,996
Bunny, you were one
of the beneficiaries

507
00:30:47,100 --> 00:30:48,996
of Mike's largesse.

508
00:30:49,100 --> 00:30:49,789
What happened?

509
00:30:49,893 --> 00:30:50,651
Tell us about it.

510
00:30:50,755 --> 00:30:51,893
Well, I called Mike.

511
00:30:51,996 --> 00:30:53,203
He told me to come
up to Scarsdale.

512
00:30:53,306 --> 00:30:55,858
And I went up to Scarsdale.

513
00:30:55,962 --> 00:30:58,272
And he was very
interested in what

514
00:30:58,375 --> 00:31:00,100
I was trying to do in Harlem.

515
00:31:00,203 --> 00:31:02,996
She convinced him
to become a partner

516
00:31:03,100 --> 00:31:06,513
in what later would become
Astral Recording Studios.

517
00:31:06,617 --> 00:31:08,755
We're setting up
Astral Sound Recording

518
00:31:08,858 --> 00:31:12,065
Studios at 105 East 106 Street.

519
00:31:12,168 --> 00:31:15,410
Mike come along and said he
wanted to be my 50% partner.

520
00:31:15,513 --> 00:31:16,720
And he cosigned the note.

521
00:31:16,824 --> 00:31:18,031
And that's it.

522
00:31:18,134 --> 00:31:19,513
So you have the
budget all planned.

523
00:31:19,617 --> 00:31:21,513
All planned, all set
up when I met Mike.

524
00:31:21,617 --> 00:31:23,306
And he's my God.

525
00:31:23,410 --> 00:31:25,651
I say that at this point.

526
00:31:25,755 --> 00:31:27,444
I'm going, "Whoa."

527
00:31:27,548 --> 00:31:30,168
This is all in like
two or three days.

528
00:31:30,272 --> 00:31:32,651
Shortly thereafter,
they go to the bank,

529
00:31:32,755 --> 00:31:35,134
he takes out some serious money.

530
00:31:35,237 --> 00:31:37,134
How soon do you think
you'll be in production?

531
00:31:37,237 --> 00:31:38,824
Well, if this keeps
on, maybe tomorrow.

532
00:31:38,927 --> 00:31:40,789
So he makes a major announcement
that if anybody listening

533
00:31:45,582 --> 00:31:51,272
to him needs money for a good
cause, here's your answer...

534
00:31:51,375 --> 00:31:52,686
Michael Brody.

535
00:31:52,789 --> 00:31:55,272
And so someone yells,
well, how do we do this?

536
00:31:55,375 --> 00:31:57,755
And Michael looks at
Bunny and he says,

537
00:31:57,858 --> 00:31:58,927
what's your address again?

538
00:31:59,031 --> 00:32:00,444
Bunny?

539
00:32:00,548 --> 00:32:02,237
What's... well, I don't
know the address there.

540
00:32:02,341 --> 00:32:04,237
And she says 1650 Broadway.

541
00:32:04,341 --> 00:32:06,375
And what suite are we in?

542
00:32:06,479 --> 00:32:07,444
And she says, we?

543
00:32:07,548 --> 00:32:08,617
All of a sudden we became we.

544
00:32:08,720 --> 00:32:10,720
And he gives the address out.

545
00:32:10,824 --> 00:32:15,100
1650 Broadway Room 1409.

546
00:32:15,203 --> 00:32:17,031
Bingo.

547
00:32:17,134 --> 00:32:19,065
Why are you here
to see Mr. Brody?

548
00:32:19,168 --> 00:32:21,548
My wife is expecting a
baby, and after that, she'll

549
00:32:21,651 --> 00:32:23,203
need an operation.

550
00:32:23,306 --> 00:32:24,893
And I'd like to
help my mother out.

551
00:32:24,996 --> 00:32:27,237
She's still in the ghetto
with my little sister.

552
00:32:27,341 --> 00:32:28,617
What do you do for a living?

553
00:32:28,720 --> 00:32:30,306
I'm a plumber's helper.

554
00:32:30,410 --> 00:32:32,686
And you can't make the money,
so you come here to get it.

555
00:32:32,789 --> 00:32:33,996
They say nobody gives it to you.

556
00:32:34,100 --> 00:32:35,789
I'm like, I got to see this.

557
00:32:35,893 --> 00:32:37,686
There are people in my family
that are starving in the South.

558
00:32:37,789 --> 00:32:40,617
And I figured even if just a
little bit, it will help them,

559
00:32:40,720 --> 00:32:41,582
I'm glad to do it.

560
00:32:41,686 --> 00:32:43,031
I mean, it's all I want.

561
00:32:43,134 --> 00:32:47,134
And plus, well, I can
use a few dollars myself.

562
00:32:47,237 --> 00:32:48,617
But mostly for them.

563
00:32:48,720 --> 00:32:52,272
Do you Mr. Brody is
perhaps a little crazy?

564
00:32:52,375 --> 00:32:53,893
No.

565
00:32:53,996 --> 00:32:55,100
If he really means this, I
think it's a wonderful thing...

566
00:32:55,203 --> 00:32:56,168
if he really means it.

567
00:32:56,272 --> 00:32:57,444
What are you here for, sir?

568
00:32:57,548 --> 00:32:58,720
Well, I originally came here...

569
00:32:58,824 --> 00:33:00,548
I came here to ask for money.

570
00:33:00,651 --> 00:33:04,444
But by just standing here, I
realized a lot of other people

571
00:33:04,548 --> 00:33:06,272
need the money more than I do.

572
00:33:06,375 --> 00:33:08,548
I've come to the
conclusion that my problems

573
00:33:08,651 --> 00:33:11,755
aren't half as bad as these
other peoples' problems here.

574
00:33:11,858 --> 00:33:14,582
I think that if he can give
the money to more needy cases

575
00:33:14,686 --> 00:33:17,548
than myself, then why
would I take the money?

576
00:33:22,479 --> 00:33:24,479
Dear Mr. Brody,
I guess you might

577
00:33:24,582 --> 00:33:26,755
figure me to be a freeloader.

578
00:33:26,858 --> 00:33:28,927
It's not true.

579
00:33:29,031 --> 00:33:30,858
Whenever possible, I too
give to those I can help.

580
00:33:30,962 --> 00:33:33,168
"I'm going to give
away, I think, $50 million."

581
00:33:33,272 --> 00:33:35,789
I'll gladly try to
help your cause.

582
00:33:35,893 --> 00:33:39,168
Enclosed, find all I can
afford to give at this time.

583
00:33:39,272 --> 00:33:43,341
I hope you'll understand this
is from the heart, not a joke.

584
00:33:53,513 --> 00:33:55,824
Please leave a message
after the tone.

585
00:33:56,824 --> 00:33:57,962
Hi, my name is Melissa.

586
00:33:58,065 --> 00:33:59,410
I'm looking for
a Holly Hodgkins.

587
00:33:59,513 --> 00:34:01,513
I'm not sure if I
have the right number.

588
00:34:01,617 --> 00:34:03,996
I'm sorry to leave
such a strange message

589
00:34:04,100 --> 00:34:06,962
out of the blue, but if this
is the right number for...

590
00:34:07,065 --> 00:34:07,582
Hello?

591
00:34:07,686 --> 00:34:08,237
Hello?

592
00:34:08,341 --> 00:34:08,824
Hello?

593
00:34:08,927 --> 00:34:10,065
Hello?

594
00:34:10,168 --> 00:34:10,858
No, you do not have
the right number.

595
00:34:10,962 --> 00:34:11,927
Oh, OK.

596
00:34:12,031 --> 00:34:14,065
There's no Holly Hodgkins here.

597
00:34:14,168 --> 00:34:15,789
OK, thank you.

598
00:34:15,893 --> 00:34:16,893
Thanks.

599
00:34:21,720 --> 00:34:23,755
Hi, I'm trying to
reach Holly Hodgkins.

600
00:34:23,858 --> 00:34:25,962
I'm not sure if I
have the right number,

601
00:34:26,065 --> 00:34:30,065
but I am looking for a Holly
Hodgkins who lived in Concord,

602
00:34:30,168 --> 00:34:32,444
New Hampshire, in 1970.

603
00:34:34,789 --> 00:34:39,065
The number you have dialed
has been disconnected.

604
00:34:39,168 --> 00:34:40,617
So those are the
only three numbers

605
00:34:40,720 --> 00:34:42,927
I have for Holly Hodgkins.

606
00:34:44,444 --> 00:34:46,893
This person wants
money for a trailer

607
00:34:46,996 --> 00:34:50,272
so he can move away
from his in-laws.

608
00:34:50,375 --> 00:34:53,755
This man owes
$2,000 to his pusher

609
00:34:53,858 --> 00:34:57,306
from his years of taking dope.

610
00:34:57,410 --> 00:34:59,548
This is a widow who
owes a doctor money.

611
00:34:59,651 --> 00:35:03,134
Her husband died of leukemia,
and she wants to buy...

612
00:35:05,272 --> 00:35:08,582
It's
Holly Hodgkins!

613
00:35:08,686 --> 00:35:10,651
Hello?

614
00:35:16,755 --> 00:35:20,410
So first off, thank you so
much for calling me back.

615
00:35:20,513 --> 00:35:26,306
And I just wanted to ask you
if you remember someone named

616
00:35:26,410 --> 00:35:30,306
Michael Brody who in 1970
announced that he was

617
00:35:30,410 --> 00:35:33,203
going to give away $25 million?

618
00:35:56,824 --> 00:36:01,375
I wrote this letter
to Mr. Michael Brody Jr.

619
00:36:01,479 --> 00:36:04,168
I don't really have a real
good recollection of writing

620
00:36:04,272 --> 00:36:06,410
it, and I'm hoping
when I read it,

621
00:36:06,513 --> 00:36:09,720
it will jog my
memory a little bit.

622
00:36:11,479 --> 00:36:12,272
Aw.

623
00:36:17,203 --> 00:36:19,686
Dear Mr. Brody, I
have read and heard

624
00:36:19,789 --> 00:36:22,513
that you have inherited
a large sum of money

625
00:36:22,617 --> 00:36:28,410
and would like to give portions
of it to those who deserve it.

626
00:36:28,513 --> 00:36:30,720
Who could deserve it more
than the children who

627
00:36:30,824 --> 00:36:33,858
are either deaf or have
a hearing impairment

628
00:36:33,962 --> 00:36:36,237
and other physical handicaps?

629
00:36:36,341 --> 00:36:38,686
I am not an old lady
preaching to you,

630
00:36:38,789 --> 00:36:41,168
but I am a 14-year-old
girl who is

631
00:36:41,272 --> 00:36:46,548
a sister of a brother
with a hearing loss.

632
00:36:46,651 --> 00:36:49,306
People see handicapped
children always seem to

633
00:36:49,410 --> 00:36:57,927
pity them, instead
of doing something about it.

634
00:36:58,031 --> 00:37:00,031
This may be you too.

635
00:37:00,134 --> 00:37:04,548
If you saw my brother, I'm
sure you and those old ladies

636
00:37:04,651 --> 00:37:06,479
wouldn't have pity.

637
00:37:06,582 --> 00:37:11,341
He's the smartest,
liveliest little devil

638
00:37:11,444 --> 00:37:20,306
that, without his hearing aid,
you would probably never guess

639
00:37:20,410 --> 00:37:24,375
he lived in a world of silence.

640
00:37:30,375 --> 00:37:32,893
If you would like
to help Andrew...

641
00:37:32,996 --> 00:37:38,582
that's my brother... and
all his little friends,

642
00:37:38,686 --> 00:37:43,513
give a donation towards Easter
Seal Rehabilitation Center.

643
00:37:46,548 --> 00:37:50,479
If you could see what
could be done, you...

644
00:37:51,375 --> 00:37:54,444
you would be very gratified.

645
00:37:54,548 --> 00:37:56,375
Goodbye and thank
you for reading

646
00:37:56,479 --> 00:37:59,548
this letter and good luck.

647
00:37:59,651 --> 00:38:03,237
Sincerely, Holly Hodgkins.

648
00:38:03,341 --> 00:38:03,962
Peace.

649
00:38:12,996 --> 00:38:15,031
I remember writing this now.

650
00:38:22,134 --> 00:38:23,686
Oh my.

651
00:38:25,858 --> 00:38:32,548
I've had a very simple
life, and money has never

652
00:38:32,651 --> 00:38:37,548
been really a huge option
to me in my adult life.

653
00:38:37,651 --> 00:38:39,651
I just really wanted
to have enough just

654
00:38:39,755 --> 00:38:44,375
to get by and be able
to do the things that I

655
00:38:44,479 --> 00:38:46,755
wanted to do for my kids.

656
00:38:46,858 --> 00:38:52,479
And I probably felt the
same way when I was 14.

657
00:38:57,237 --> 00:39:01,479
I wish that Mr. Brody
had have read this.

658
00:39:02,858 --> 00:39:04,962
Has this been an ordeal
since your husband

659
00:39:05,065 --> 00:39:06,237
made this announcement?

660
00:39:06,341 --> 00:39:07,858
Has it been tough on you?

661
00:39:07,962 --> 00:39:11,410
It hasn't been any tougher
than people are making it.

662
00:39:11,513 --> 00:39:14,203
Did you find that
people are greedy?

663
00:39:14,306 --> 00:39:16,237
I don't think anyone
is inherently greedy.

664
00:39:16,341 --> 00:39:19,100
It's just the environment
now, the way it is.

665
00:39:19,203 --> 00:39:20,203
People don't have enough.

666
00:39:20,306 --> 00:39:21,237
You mean the whole world?

667
00:39:21,341 --> 00:39:23,548
It's not greed, it's need.

668
00:39:23,651 --> 00:39:26,306
There were times when
all the people went away,

669
00:39:26,410 --> 00:39:30,548
and it was just us in the house,
and we'd just get up and have

670
00:39:30,651 --> 00:39:32,306
breakfast and talk.

671
00:39:32,410 --> 00:39:37,272
And on one of those days, this
guy came to the kitchen door,

672
00:39:37,375 --> 00:39:41,617
and he basically broke
in, and he had a gun.

673
00:39:41,720 --> 00:39:46,858
And he said, "You give me
some money, or I'll shoot you."

674
00:39:46,962 --> 00:39:47,858
Or whatever.

675
00:39:47,962 --> 00:39:50,410
And I went into the closet...

676
00:39:50,513 --> 00:39:53,272
there was an alarm that
connected to the police,

677
00:39:53,375 --> 00:39:55,168
but it didn't work.

678
00:39:55,272 --> 00:39:57,858
And Michael started
talking to the guy,

679
00:39:57,962 --> 00:40:02,237
and he was a grave digger,
and he was out of work.

680
00:40:02,341 --> 00:40:06,789
He didn't have any money, and he
was desperate and his family and...

681
00:40:06,893 --> 00:40:09,444
so Michael gave him money.

682
00:40:09,548 --> 00:40:14,686
And he felt bad for him, and
he just wrote him a check.

683
00:40:14,789 --> 00:40:19,065
So the guy put the gun away,
went away, and that was it.

684
00:40:27,617 --> 00:40:29,341
Watch the way, watch the way.

685
00:40:33,237 --> 00:40:35,479
When he came out of his
Manhattan apartment today,

686
00:40:35,582 --> 00:40:37,513
the sidewalk was
jammed with people

687
00:40:37,617 --> 00:40:39,031
wanting a piece of the action.

688
00:40:39,134 --> 00:40:41,100
And Brody's behavior
was eccentric,

689
00:40:41,203 --> 00:40:43,065
even for an eccentric
millionaire.

690
00:40:43,168 --> 00:40:44,962
Did you give any
money away today?

691
00:40:45,065 --> 00:40:47,755
Yeah, I gave about several
hundred dollar bills away.

692
00:40:47,858 --> 00:40:49,410
I get at least
$60,000 away today.

693
00:40:49,513 --> 00:40:51,755
But look, leave me alone,
because if you take everything

694
00:40:51,858 --> 00:40:55,031
I have from me right now, then
I won't have anything to give.

695
00:40:55,134 --> 00:40:57,410
Give me at least a
month now, I say.

696
00:40:57,513 --> 00:40:58,789
Everybody, stay away from me.

697
00:40:58,893 --> 00:41:00,548
Do your job.

698
00:41:00,651 --> 00:41:02,375
Within a month, you'll have
all the things that you want.

699
00:41:02,479 --> 00:41:04,582
If you want love, if you want
money... whatever you want,

700
00:41:04,686 --> 00:41:05,410
you'll have.

701
00:41:07,962 --> 00:41:10,513
You'd think it would be fairly
easy to give away money,

702
00:41:10,617 --> 00:41:13,410
but it turns out even
that can get complicated.

703
00:41:13,513 --> 00:41:16,341
Since he said he wanted to get
rid of most of those millions

704
00:41:16,444 --> 00:41:19,927
to promote brotherhood,
he's been promoting bedlam.

705
00:41:20,031 --> 00:41:24,962
Dear Mr. Brody, as you embark
on the road of utter exhaustion

706
00:41:25,065 --> 00:41:27,686
and delusion, I pray for
you, because you will

707
00:41:27,789 --> 00:41:30,479
be envied, hated, and hurt.

708
00:41:30,582 --> 00:41:33,479
The whole world will
hear of your generosity,

709
00:41:33,582 --> 00:41:35,134
and you know what
they will think?

710
00:41:35,237 --> 00:41:36,824
They will think that
you have gone out

711
00:41:36,927 --> 00:41:38,824
of your money-giving mind.

712
00:41:38,927 --> 00:41:41,651
I don't have a cent right now...
not until the banks open up

713
00:41:41,755 --> 00:41:42,479
tomorrow.

714
00:41:42,582 --> 00:41:43,927
So what can I do?

715
00:41:44,031 --> 00:41:45,410
Now, I'm not going to
give any money out...

716
00:41:45,513 --> 00:41:46,893
first of all, if anybody
bothers me anymore,

717
00:41:46,996 --> 00:41:48,479
I'm going to cancel
the whole thing,

718
00:41:48,582 --> 00:41:51,203
just go down to the West
Indies, and just be alone.

719
00:41:51,306 --> 00:41:52,858
I'm not going to
make any records.

720
00:41:52,962 --> 00:41:55,134
I'm going to just tell the
whole world to.

721
00:41:55,237 --> 00:41:56,031
Thank you very much.

722
00:41:56,134 --> 00:41:57,237
Thank you.

723
00:41:57,341 --> 00:41:58,686
I believe that
what you are doing

724
00:41:58,789 --> 00:42:00,237
is right as long as
you believe in it.

725
00:42:00,341 --> 00:42:02,444
And I do hope that
you will find a way

726
00:42:02,548 --> 00:42:04,375
to get rid of your
money in some other way

727
00:42:04,479 --> 00:42:08,410
than doling it out in dribbles,
because the masses can and will

728
00:42:08,513 --> 00:42:09,306
get meaner.

729
00:42:10,824 --> 00:42:12,789
At the moment, his bank
says he's overdrawn,

730
00:42:12,893 --> 00:42:16,237
but that more cash may go into
his checking account Monday.

731
00:42:16,341 --> 00:42:19,513
Obviously, a lot of
people certainly hope so.

732
00:42:19,617 --> 00:42:23,824
We went back to his father's
apartment on 62nd Street.

733
00:42:23,927 --> 00:42:27,893
And at some point,
somebody said,

734
00:42:27,996 --> 00:42:29,582
Michael, look out the window.

735
00:42:32,168 --> 00:42:33,410
We looked out the
window, and there

736
00:42:33,513 --> 00:42:35,168
were hundreds, thousands...

737
00:42:35,272 --> 00:42:36,789
I don't know how
many people were

738
00:42:36,893 --> 00:42:39,617
in the street waiting for
him to come out so that they

739
00:42:39,720 --> 00:42:41,513
could ask him for money.

740
00:42:42,134 --> 00:42:45,272
Whatever you do, please
don't let those shouters

741
00:42:45,375 --> 00:42:47,444
and screamers get you down.

742
00:42:47,548 --> 00:42:48,858
Gnats!

743
00:42:48,962 --> 00:42:51,617
Get away from it all
before it's too late.

744
00:42:51,720 --> 00:42:54,996
He took a handful of $20s and
threw it out the window just

745
00:42:55,100 --> 00:42:57,582
to watch the madness.

746
00:42:57,686 --> 00:43:00,927
All people kept asking
for was just money,

747
00:43:01,031 --> 00:43:04,237
and no one was listening
to the larger message.

748
00:43:04,341 --> 00:43:06,789
Are you upset that people
want money that badly?

749
00:43:06,893 --> 00:43:07,548
Yes.

750
00:43:07,651 --> 00:43:08,444
They're sick.

751
00:43:08,548 --> 00:43:09,927
Why do you say that?

752
00:43:10,031 --> 00:43:11,410
Because they don't need money.

753
00:43:11,513 --> 00:43:14,134
What they need is food,
shelter, and love.

754
00:43:14,237 --> 00:43:18,548
And when they realize that,
then the world will be at peace.

755
00:43:18,651 --> 00:43:21,479
So I think he was getting
exasperated at that point.

756
00:43:24,824 --> 00:43:26,617
He just enjoyed the spectacle.

757
00:43:26,720 --> 00:43:28,410
He enjoyed standing
in the window

758
00:43:28,513 --> 00:43:30,100
and throwing $20 bills
out in the street

759
00:43:30,203 --> 00:43:31,686
and watching people
knock each other

760
00:43:31,789 --> 00:43:33,341
over trying to get to them.

761
00:43:40,824 --> 00:43:45,582
What I saw was a guy I know
who was out of control,

762
00:43:45,686 --> 00:43:47,031
and I wanted to tell that story.

763
00:43:50,479 --> 00:43:51,927
I thought I could write
a really good script.

764
00:43:54,100 --> 00:43:56,582
Exterior clouds.

765
00:43:56,686 --> 00:44:00,168
The berserk shriek of a 707
as it passes just over us

766
00:44:00,272 --> 00:44:04,513
and casts a giant shadow on
the golden clouds beneath.

767
00:44:04,617 --> 00:44:06,824
Titles begin.

768
00:44:14,858 --> 00:44:20,375
We talked about Richard Dreyfuss
playing the Michael Brody part.

769
00:44:20,479 --> 00:44:22,651
The people I worked
with in '76, they

770
00:44:22,755 --> 00:44:24,513
wanted John Travolta
to play Brody.

771
00:44:27,134 --> 00:44:30,168
I had been involved in
exploitation pictures.

772
00:44:30,272 --> 00:44:34,927
I'd written a picture
called Acapulco Gold.

773
00:44:35,031 --> 00:44:37,927
So I was ready to
try to take the shot.

774
00:44:43,100 --> 00:44:45,031
Billy Wilder.

775
00:44:45,134 --> 00:44:46,824
Black comedy.

776
00:44:46,927 --> 00:44:49,272
I was making a major
motion picture.

777
00:44:49,375 --> 00:44:52,927
I was basically going for
the gold ring with this,

778
00:44:53,031 --> 00:44:55,893
and it fell apart.

779
00:44:55,996 --> 00:44:58,893
I assume we went through
a couple of drafts

780
00:44:58,996 --> 00:45:03,306
before we threw in the towel.

781
00:45:03,410 --> 00:45:09,824
I kept the cartons of letters
that were sent to Brody,

782
00:45:09,927 --> 00:45:16,065
and every so often, I would go
into a box and take a letter

783
00:45:16,168 --> 00:45:22,341
and open it and was fascinated
by what might be discovered.

784
00:45:26,755 --> 00:45:32,686
Dear Mike, I'm the mother of
a son named Paul, 21 years old

785
00:45:32,789 --> 00:45:36,272
in Vietnam, risking his
life, like many others,

786
00:45:36,375 --> 00:45:37,755
for every one of us.

787
00:45:40,893 --> 00:45:42,789
I thought I'd die when he left...

788
00:45:42,893 --> 00:45:44,479
my pride and joy.

789
00:45:50,306 --> 00:45:54,031
I pray God to help me and beg
him to bring my son back home

790
00:45:54,134 --> 00:45:56,375
again safe.

791
00:45:56,479 --> 00:45:58,272
This picture of
my son Paul and I

792
00:45:58,375 --> 00:46:01,410
was taken the day before
he left for Vietnam.

793
00:46:12,686 --> 00:46:17,065
I guess it was too sad for Brody
to keep reading these letters.

794
00:46:27,168 --> 00:46:30,617
Dear Sir,

795
00:46:31,962 --> 00:46:33,927
I know the possibility
of you ever receiving

796
00:46:34,031 --> 00:46:35,444
this letter are about
one in a million,

797
00:46:35,548 --> 00:46:37,858
but I'm so desperate
at this stage for help

798
00:46:37,962 --> 00:46:40,237
that I just got to try
for the sake of my family,

799
00:46:40,341 --> 00:46:42,168
as well as myself.

800
00:46:42,996 --> 00:46:45,065
I have five children.

801
00:46:45,168 --> 00:46:46,617
They're all good
kids, and it hurts

802
00:46:46,720 --> 00:46:49,065
to know they have to
suffer for my stupidity.

803
00:46:52,031 --> 00:46:55,893
I'm so in debt that I'm on the
verge of a nervous breakdown.

804
00:46:58,962 --> 00:47:00,582
Lately, I've even been
entertaining the thought

805
00:47:00,686 --> 00:47:02,824
of suicide.

806
00:47:06,203 --> 00:47:08,031
But when I look at my
wonderful wife and kids,

807
00:47:08,134 --> 00:47:12,582
I just can't bring
myself to do it.

808
00:47:16,444 --> 00:47:20,513
We're existing, and
that's about all.

809
00:47:20,617 --> 00:47:23,651
We've reached the bottom
and just about the end.

810
00:47:23,755 --> 00:47:26,134
Respectfully yours
and grateful to you

811
00:47:26,237 --> 00:47:30,100
from the bottom of my
heart, Donald Thomas Moore.

812
00:47:40,031 --> 00:47:41,479
This is for you.

813
00:47:46,617 --> 00:47:51,272
What do you possibly think
she said in the letter?

814
00:47:51,375 --> 00:47:54,720
I think that she
wanted to make it funny

815
00:47:54,824 --> 00:47:59,651
and wanted it to stand
out, so of course she

816
00:47:59,755 --> 00:48:03,686
mentioned her children,
herself, and just maybe

817
00:48:03,789 --> 00:48:05,755
her dreams and aspirations.

818
00:48:05,858 --> 00:48:07,341
I mean, I was only
two years old,

819
00:48:07,444 --> 00:48:09,755
so I couldn't
possibly imagine what

820
00:48:09,858 --> 00:48:11,479
dreams... maybe another child?

821
00:48:11,582 --> 00:48:13,651
She may have wanted... no, she
didn't want another child.

822
00:48:13,755 --> 00:48:15,548
She may have wanted
a typing business.

823
00:48:15,651 --> 00:48:17,513
Well, slowly just take it out.

824
00:48:17,617 --> 00:48:19,548
Notebook paper, really?

825
00:48:19,651 --> 00:48:21,651
And she typed it
on notebook paper?

826
00:48:21,755 --> 00:48:22,341
What is that?

827
00:48:22,444 --> 00:48:23,617
A staple.

828
00:48:23,720 --> 00:48:24,513
No it's not.

829
00:48:24,617 --> 00:48:25,306
No!

830
00:48:25,410 --> 00:48:26,617
That's hilarious.

831
00:48:26,720 --> 00:48:27,410
That's her.

832
00:48:27,513 --> 00:48:28,168
Oh...

833
00:48:28,272 --> 00:48:28,858
A safety pin.

834
00:48:28,962 --> 00:48:29,824
...my god.

835
00:48:31,720 --> 00:48:32,858
I am writing this letter in...

836
00:48:32,962 --> 00:48:33,513
Louder.

837
00:48:33,617 --> 00:48:34,755
Louder.

838
00:48:34,858 --> 00:48:36,168
I am writing this
letter in response

839
00:48:36,272 --> 00:48:39,134
to an article on you
in today's edition

840
00:48:39,237 --> 00:48:42,065
of the New York Daily News
concerning your desire

841
00:48:42,168 --> 00:48:44,272
to help others less
fortunate than you.

842
00:48:44,375 --> 00:48:46,824
I believe you are an
answer to my prayers

843
00:48:46,927 --> 00:48:50,927
and my last desperate attempt
to revive the Badger Home Typing

844
00:48:51,031 --> 00:48:55,168
Service business, which
I started in March 1966.

845
00:48:55,272 --> 00:48:57,306
My name is Jacqueline
Badger, and my telephone

846
00:48:57,410 --> 00:48:59,927
is disconnected, or else I
would have called you up.

847
00:49:04,858 --> 00:49:07,134
This is East Harlem, El
Barrio... it has many names.

848
00:49:07,237 --> 00:49:10,651
Spanish Harlem, El Barrio...

849
00:49:10,755 --> 00:49:11,893
Washington Projects.

850
00:49:14,686 --> 00:49:15,858
This is where we lived.

851
00:49:15,962 --> 00:49:17,272
This is where it
all started for me.

852
00:49:17,375 --> 00:49:20,410
I was born in this
building, basically.

853
00:49:20,513 --> 00:49:26,237
And we lived here for 35 years.

854
00:49:26,341 --> 00:49:32,582
I need $100 and 10 new
Remington Rand typewriters,

855
00:49:32,686 --> 00:49:35,824
standard office size
preferred, and other supplies

856
00:49:35,927 --> 00:49:41,134
so that I can teach typing
to residents of East Harlem,

857
00:49:41,237 --> 00:49:45,375
so that mothers can get
off of welfare and work.

858
00:49:45,996 --> 00:49:48,444
Personally feel a commitment
and duty is calling me.

859
00:49:48,548 --> 00:49:50,617
If I don't do it,
it won't get done.

860
00:49:50,720 --> 00:49:54,444
I want to be a teacher more
than anything else in the world.

861
00:49:54,548 --> 00:49:57,513
You can read.

862
00:49:57,617 --> 00:49:59,789
I must be successful
in my mission.

863
00:49:59,893 --> 00:50:03,203
I cannot accept
failure or defeat.

864
00:50:03,306 --> 00:50:05,031
Mistakes, yes.

865
00:50:05,134 --> 00:50:06,582
Problems, yes.

866
00:50:06,686 --> 00:50:08,168
Difficulties, yes.

867
00:50:08,272 --> 00:50:10,203
But I refuse to
give up my dream.

868
00:50:10,306 --> 00:50:11,479
I hear you.

869
00:50:11,582 --> 00:50:12,824
Mm.

870
00:50:12,927 --> 00:50:13,513
Mm.

871
00:50:13,617 --> 00:50:16,306
Yep, that's her.

872
00:50:16,410 --> 00:50:17,203
She refuses.

873
00:50:26,410 --> 00:50:27,789
How much money in all is there?

874
00:50:27,893 --> 00:50:29,272
It's an unlimited
amount right now.

875
00:50:29,375 --> 00:50:30,755
I'll tell you, it's unlimited.

876
00:50:30,858 --> 00:50:32,548
It just depends on
whether people will just

877
00:50:32,651 --> 00:50:34,203
do their own jobs
and leave me alone.

878
00:50:34,306 --> 00:50:35,789
If they crowd me,
I've got nothing.

879
00:50:35,893 --> 00:50:37,100
Are people crowding you now?

880
00:50:37,203 --> 00:50:38,513
They're trying to
kill me right now.

881
00:50:38,617 --> 00:50:39,341
What do you mean?

882
00:50:39,444 --> 00:50:40,031
They're crazy.

883
00:50:40,134 --> 00:50:41,237
I'm sorry.

884
00:50:41,341 --> 00:50:42,513
I'm sorry to be in
such a bad mood.

885
00:50:42,617 --> 00:50:43,410
Let me... let me...
no, that's OK...

886
00:50:43,513 --> 00:50:44,479
I'm really tired.

887
00:50:44,582 --> 00:50:46,306
I haven't slept for 60 hours.

888
00:50:46,410 --> 00:50:47,341
If you don't let me sleep, I'm
going to die of a heart attack.

889
00:50:47,444 --> 00:50:48,720
I'm only human.

890
00:50:48,824 --> 00:50:50,341
We appreciate you've
been working hard too.

891
00:50:50,444 --> 00:50:51,824
How do you think people
have been treating you

892
00:50:51,927 --> 00:50:54,444
since all this came out?

893
00:50:54,548 --> 00:50:56,272
They shouldn't treat
me any more than they

894
00:50:56,375 --> 00:50:57,755
treat a bum on the street.

895
00:50:57,858 --> 00:50:59,548
But you're richer than
the bum on the street.

896
00:50:59,651 --> 00:51:01,893
Well, if they started treating
the bums on the street

897
00:51:01,996 --> 00:51:04,065
like they treat me, then
we wouldn't have anything

898
00:51:04,168 --> 00:51:05,858
to worry about, would we?

899
00:51:05,962 --> 00:51:06,720
I've got to cool it.

900
00:51:06,824 --> 00:51:07,651
I'm tired.

901
00:51:07,755 --> 00:51:08,893
Yeah, let him rest now.

902
00:51:08,996 --> 00:51:10,720
Michael alternated
between everyone

903
00:51:10,824 --> 00:51:14,410
just loves me for my money
and wanting their affection.

904
00:51:17,203 --> 00:51:20,100
That had started in
the press of the crowd.

905
00:51:20,203 --> 00:51:26,548
That had started fairly
early in this process.

906
00:51:26,651 --> 00:51:29,237
They were being followed
by at least two members

907
00:51:29,341 --> 00:51:30,789
of the media...

908
00:51:30,893 --> 00:51:33,893
Nancy Moran for the New
York Times and Ed Bradley.

909
00:51:33,996 --> 00:51:37,444
I never was able to
access his reporting.

910
00:51:37,548 --> 00:51:38,410
Have you?

911
00:51:38,651 --> 00:51:39,479
Right.

912
00:51:42,651 --> 00:51:45,375
I mean, I talked to him.

913
00:51:45,479 --> 00:51:48,996
He told me things that I'm
going to go to the grave

914
00:51:49,100 --> 00:51:52,237
with, because I
told him I would.

915
00:51:52,341 --> 00:51:56,651
People are lighting up,
smoking pot, and Ed's smoking.

916
00:51:56,755 --> 00:51:59,755
I think Nancy might
have taken a puff.

917
00:52:00,755 --> 00:52:03,375
Nancy Moran came to the house
and made a relationship with

918
00:52:03,479 --> 00:52:04,858
Renée.

919
00:52:04,962 --> 00:52:07,168
There she is talking to
this friendly reporter

920
00:52:07,272 --> 00:52:10,237
and being absolutely honest
and absolutely straight.

921
00:52:10,341 --> 00:52:13,893
And Renee thinks this
person is a friend of hers.

922
00:52:17,100 --> 00:52:22,824
Her article really
focuses on the drug usage.

923
00:52:22,927 --> 00:52:24,617
The whole thing was
conceived on drugs.

924
00:52:24,720 --> 00:52:27,272
He was just using everybody
and pretending and he never

925
00:52:27,375 --> 00:52:29,686
had any money and he wasn't
going to give it away...

926
00:52:29,789 --> 00:52:32,720
you know, a really nasty,
nasty article.

927
00:52:32,824 --> 00:52:36,789
So that was a big betrayal,
and that really hurt.

928
00:52:36,893 --> 00:52:39,410
That's what I think
turns everybody away,

929
00:52:39,513 --> 00:52:43,582
because the drug usage is linked
to the giveaway, where Brody

930
00:52:43,686 --> 00:52:46,272
says, I came up with
the idea of the giveaway

931
00:52:46,375 --> 00:52:47,996
while I was high on acid.

932
00:52:48,100 --> 00:52:51,272
And I think people connected,
"Ah, we've been hoodwinked."

933
00:52:53,168 --> 00:52:54,996
♪ <i>Now if you're tired
or a bit run down,</i> ♪

934
00:52:55,100 --> 00:52:58,755
♪ <i>can't seem to get your feet
off the ground, maybe you</i> ♪

935
00:52:58,858 --> 00:53:01,168
♪ <i>oughta try a little bit
of LSD.</i> ♪

936
00:53:01,272 --> 00:53:05,789
Dear Mr. Brody, why do you
think that money is everything?

937
00:53:05,893 --> 00:53:08,134
Maybe you could help
the people on drugs.

938
00:53:08,237 --> 00:53:11,479
After all, you know what
it's like to be on that junk.

939
00:53:11,582 --> 00:53:17,548
♪ <i>LSD for you and me.</i> ♪

940
00:53:17,651 --> 00:53:19,996
Don't brag about being on drugs.

941
00:53:20,100 --> 00:53:22,100
It's nothing to be proud of.

942
00:53:30,686 --> 00:53:32,444
Michael Brody was
stoned as hell,

943
00:53:32,548 --> 00:53:35,410
and he wouldn't take it anymore.

944
00:53:37,065 --> 00:53:38,686
I mean, how can you
ignore a story that

945
00:53:38,789 --> 00:53:42,134
comes at you on a Pan Am
jet that the kid's rented

946
00:53:42,237 --> 00:53:45,306
all for himself and
his wife, lands at JFK,

947
00:53:45,410 --> 00:53:47,065
and announces that
he's got this fortune

948
00:53:47,168 --> 00:53:48,237
and he's going to give it away?

949
00:53:48,341 --> 00:53:49,479
I mean, it's a natural story.

950
00:53:49,582 --> 00:53:51,789
It's one you want to follow.

951
00:53:51,893 --> 00:53:54,824
Back in 1974, I was
one of several people

952
00:53:54,927 --> 00:53:59,824
who helped to launch High Times
Magazine to promote and extol

953
00:53:59,927 --> 00:54:01,341
the drug culture.

954
00:54:01,444 --> 00:54:04,617
His story was wonderfully
appropriate for High Times

955
00:54:04,720 --> 00:54:08,272
because he was a
culture hero of sorts.

956
00:54:08,375 --> 00:54:11,617
To millions, he was fantasy
incarnate... rich, reckless,

957
00:54:11,720 --> 00:54:14,168
lovable, and blessed
with an uncanny ability

958
00:54:14,272 --> 00:54:15,962
to bamboozle the world.

959
00:54:16,065 --> 00:54:18,858
To others, he was a true
spawn of the '60s, heralding

960
00:54:18,962 --> 00:54:21,617
the new decade with
gonzo generosity.

961
00:54:21,720 --> 00:54:24,444
And of course, he was
famous for being high.

962
00:54:28,651 --> 00:54:30,513
I think it's a cautionary tale...

963
00:54:30,617 --> 00:54:33,651
a young man who had
all these gifts...

964
00:54:33,755 --> 00:54:36,651
he had this money, he
had this opportunity,

965
00:54:36,755 --> 00:54:38,617
he had all the attention...

966
00:54:38,720 --> 00:54:41,479
how he went and let his
chase for celebrity,

967
00:54:41,582 --> 00:54:45,651
his chase for
attention destroy him.

968
00:54:45,755 --> 00:54:51,686
I intend to offer North
Vietnam $10 billion

969
00:54:51,789 --> 00:54:56,100
if they will finally quit
fucking around with the war.

970
00:54:59,548 --> 00:55:04,720
He released this statement
that he had a plan

971
00:55:04,824 --> 00:55:07,100
to end the war in Vietnam.

972
00:55:07,203 --> 00:55:09,651
I offered the whole
world $1 billion.

973
00:55:09,755 --> 00:55:13,720
Nixon and the North
Vietnam delegation

974
00:55:13,824 --> 00:55:16,617
to share in my $1 billion...

975
00:55:16,720 --> 00:55:18,203
they can all have it.

976
00:55:18,306 --> 00:55:22,789
Michael plunks down maybe
$650 to get a helicopter ride

977
00:55:22,893 --> 00:55:25,893
from New York City
to Washington.

978
00:55:25,996 --> 00:55:29,168
We got on a helicopter at
the 59th Street Bridge,

979
00:55:29,272 --> 00:55:32,962
and he tells the pilot
that he wants to go land

980
00:55:33,065 --> 00:55:35,065
on the White House lawn.

981
00:55:35,168 --> 00:55:36,686
He had a plan.

982
00:55:36,789 --> 00:55:39,100
I think it was pay off the
North Vietnamese... give them

983
00:55:39,203 --> 00:55:40,548
money or something.

984
00:55:40,651 --> 00:55:41,893
Brody had promised
he'll confront

985
00:55:41,996 --> 00:55:44,479
Nixon about the
Vietnam peace plan

986
00:55:44,582 --> 00:55:46,720
and why Nixon was
standing in the way.

987
00:55:46,824 --> 00:55:49,789
The altitude dropped
to 5,000 feet.

988
00:55:49,893 --> 00:55:51,617
As they approached
Wisconsin Avenue,

989
00:55:51,720 --> 00:55:53,824
a composed voice came
over the copter radio.

990
00:55:55,237 --> 00:55:56,651
Now the guy is
telling me, listen,

991
00:55:56,755 --> 00:56:00,031
I'm getting messages here
from the Secret Service.

992
00:56:00,134 --> 00:56:01,513
It's telling me
that if we attempt

993
00:56:01,617 --> 00:56:03,168
to land on the White
House lawn, they're

994
00:56:03,272 --> 00:56:04,996
going to blow us out of the sky.

995
00:56:05,100 --> 00:56:07,582
The helicopter pilot
was getting these...

996
00:56:07,686 --> 00:56:08,479
"Turn, sir!"

997
00:56:08,582 --> 00:56:09,548
"Restricted area."

998
00:56:09,651 --> 00:56:11,100
"Attention helicopter!"

999
00:56:11,203 --> 00:56:12,755
Michael just kept
giving him money.

1000
00:56:12,858 --> 00:56:15,272
"The airspace below 10,000
feet over the White House

1001
00:56:15,375 --> 00:56:16,375
is restricted."

1002
00:56:16,479 --> 00:56:18,134
No, no, keep going, keep going.

1003
00:56:18,237 --> 00:56:20,789
And of course, he kept taking
it, going a little further.

1004
00:56:20,893 --> 00:56:22,548
"We repeat, if you
enter the airspace,

1005
00:56:22,651 --> 00:56:26,858
we will have no choice but
to blow you out of the sky."

1006
00:56:26,962 --> 00:56:29,789
And finally, I think, he
realized he couldn't do this.

1007
00:56:29,893 --> 00:56:31,203
So he went to the airport.

1008
00:56:34,134 --> 00:56:37,824
We jump in a cab, and we
go to the White House.

1009
00:56:37,927 --> 00:56:41,548
And we get to the White
House, and he tells them

1010
00:56:41,651 --> 00:56:43,893
that we're here to see Nixon.

1011
00:56:43,996 --> 00:56:46,444
And...

1012
00:56:48,272 --> 00:56:51,444
They were essentially told that
President Nixon doesn't see

1013
00:56:51,548 --> 00:56:53,651
anybody without an appointment.

1014
00:56:53,755 --> 00:56:58,375
So they take us in a room and
they question us, whatever.

1015
00:56:58,479 --> 00:57:00,858
And as it turned out, I
had an outstanding warrant

1016
00:57:00,962 --> 00:57:03,134
from Las Vegas.

1017
00:57:03,237 --> 00:57:05,341
So Brody, you came down
here today from New York.

1018
00:57:05,444 --> 00:57:06,582
Why?

1019
00:57:06,686 --> 00:57:08,375
I came down here
today from New York

1020
00:57:08,479 --> 00:57:11,962
to offer to end
the war in Vietnam.

1021
00:57:12,065 --> 00:57:14,755
I came down here with $100
billion worth of support.

1022
00:57:14,858 --> 00:57:16,824
I came down here with
a sure-fire peace plan

1023
00:57:16,927 --> 00:57:18,789
has already been
accepted by the North

1024
00:57:18,893 --> 00:57:23,479
Vietnamese, already been cleared
through every channel possible.

1025
00:57:23,582 --> 00:57:25,755
But I came down here,
and President Nixon

1026
00:57:25,858 --> 00:57:27,996
showed how much he cared by
arresting the person that

1027
00:57:28,100 --> 00:57:31,513
came around with me by the
FBI on a federal warrant

1028
00:57:31,617 --> 00:57:33,272
for something he did.

1029
00:57:33,375 --> 00:57:34,617
I'm just blown away.

1030
00:57:34,720 --> 00:57:36,341
I'm so distraught
about the whole thing.

1031
00:57:36,444 --> 00:57:38,272
I can't believe that we're
living in a country like that.

1032
00:57:38,375 --> 00:57:41,272
I came down here to give him
$100 billion and a lot of love.

1033
00:57:41,375 --> 00:57:42,927
And what did he
give me in return?

1034
00:57:43,031 --> 00:57:46,444
Eventually, I think, Michael
went back to New York

1035
00:57:46,548 --> 00:57:47,858
and put up my bail.

1036
00:57:47,962 --> 00:57:52,272
But I did spend a day
or two in the D.C. jail,

1037
00:57:52,375 --> 00:57:54,168
which wasn't great, by the way.

1038
00:57:54,272 --> 00:57:55,479
I don't recommend it.

1039
00:58:10,513 --> 00:58:11,306
All righty.

1040
00:58:11,410 --> 00:58:12,893
Thank you, ma'am.

1041
00:58:15,893 --> 00:58:17,651
Wow, you even had some pictures,

1042
00:58:17,755 --> 00:58:19,375
excuse me!

1043
00:58:21,858 --> 00:58:24,893
Dear Mr. Brody,
you seem to be one

1044
00:58:24,996 --> 00:58:28,203
of the few people
alive today that

1045
00:58:28,306 --> 00:58:33,548
have any true compassion
for the Negro race.

1046
00:58:33,651 --> 00:58:36,686
That is why I am writing.

1047
00:58:36,789 --> 00:58:39,513
My name is Bruce M. Stephens.

1048
00:58:39,617 --> 00:58:43,789
I am a 27-year-old
Negro beautician,

1049
00:58:43,893 --> 00:58:47,582
and I have been doing
hair for five years.

1050
00:58:50,410 --> 00:58:57,513
I was originally born in Aiken
County here in South Carolina.

1051
00:58:57,617 --> 00:59:00,617
We moved to Greenwich,
Connecticut,

1052
00:59:00,720 --> 00:59:03,100
when I was six years old.

1053
00:59:03,203 --> 00:59:08,962
I became a beautician,
a truck driver,

1054
00:59:09,065 --> 00:59:12,134
and I ended up a
minister, and I'm here

1055
00:59:12,237 --> 00:59:14,237
with you guys this morning.

1056
00:59:14,341 --> 00:59:18,479
If you were willing
to advance or arrange

1057
00:59:18,582 --> 00:59:22,824
a loan of about
$10,000, I would be

1058
00:59:22,927 --> 00:59:27,651
able to open a very clean,
well-ventilated shop with all

1059
00:59:27,755 --> 00:59:29,582
the modern conveniences.

1060
00:59:29,686 --> 00:59:35,237
It would be the first truly
integrated shop in Westchester

1061
00:59:35,341 --> 00:59:39,582
with White, Black,
and Spanish operators

1062
00:59:39,686 --> 00:59:45,100
so that we would be able to
do all races of people's hair

1063
00:59:45,203 --> 00:59:46,858
in one place.

1064
00:59:46,962 --> 00:59:54,203
This would better prepare them
to live in the world with peace

1065
00:59:54,306 --> 00:59:58,755
and happiness for by
coming into intimate

1066
00:59:58,858 --> 01:00:04,686
and compromising
contact with each other,

1067
01:00:04,789 --> 01:00:08,858
you learn that there is
truly not much differences

1068
01:00:08,962 --> 01:00:11,824
in people on the inside.

1069
01:00:11,927 --> 01:00:15,237
And on the outside, it
is only the difference

1070
01:00:15,341 --> 01:00:19,272
of color and hair.

1071
01:00:19,375 --> 01:00:22,237
Thank you for your
patience and kindness.

1072
01:00:22,341 --> 01:00:25,375
Sincerely, Bruce M. Stephens.

1073
01:00:25,479 --> 01:00:29,237
Well, you see, I think we
live under the illusion

1074
01:00:29,341 --> 01:00:32,306
that money will make you happy.

1075
01:00:32,410 --> 01:00:35,237
You see, most of us never
have the opportunity

1076
01:00:35,341 --> 01:00:37,686
to find out that money
won't make you happy.

1077
01:00:37,789 --> 01:00:40,306
So we're always in
the pursuit of money,

1078
01:00:40,410 --> 01:00:42,755
thinking once we get the
money, we'll be happy.

1079
01:00:42,858 --> 01:00:46,755
No, that's the biggest
lie from the devil.

1080
01:00:50,479 --> 01:00:55,203
Numerous reports of unhonored
checks and unfulfilled promises

1081
01:00:55,306 --> 01:00:59,065
began to trickle in yesterday in
the aftermath of Michael James

1082
01:00:59,168 --> 01:01:04,237
Brody Jr.'s pledge to give
his fortune to the needy.

1083
01:01:11,168 --> 01:01:14,237
Apparently, a bunch of his
checks started bouncing.

1084
01:01:20,755 --> 01:01:21,686
Back it up!

1085
01:01:23,548 --> 01:01:24,927
What's a matter with you people?

1086
01:01:25,031 --> 01:01:26,410
Are you all insane?

1087
01:01:26,513 --> 01:01:27,375
Just back it up.

1088
01:01:27,479 --> 01:01:28,306
Let's go!

1089
01:01:28,410 --> 01:01:29,065
Back it up right now.

1090
01:01:29,168 --> 01:01:30,858
Back it up.

1091
01:01:30,962 --> 01:01:32,031
Please!

1092
01:01:32,858 --> 01:01:35,237
I haven't slept for 72 hours.

1093
01:01:35,341 --> 01:01:36,479
Right?

1094
01:01:36,582 --> 01:01:37,651
When there was no
money, nobody cared.

1095
01:01:37,755 --> 01:01:39,548
I intend to answer every call.

1096
01:01:45,513 --> 01:01:46,893
It is.

1097
01:01:50,824 --> 01:01:51,789
Yes.

1098
01:01:51,893 --> 01:01:54,100
To bring peace to the world.

1099
01:01:55,893 --> 01:01:59,548
Dear Mr. Brody, I'm
sincerely trying

1100
01:01:59,651 --> 01:02:02,100
to understand what
it is you are doing.

1101
01:02:04,582 --> 01:02:06,134
Are you happy?

1102
01:02:06,237 --> 01:02:08,789
When the world realizes
all it has is paper

1103
01:02:08,893 --> 01:02:10,962
and that they're killing
each other over paper...

1104
01:02:11,065 --> 01:02:14,203
Is that what your attitude
is about money, Mike,

1105
01:02:14,306 --> 01:02:15,203
that it's just paper?

1106
01:02:15,306 --> 01:02:16,513
Yes.

1107
01:02:16,617 --> 01:02:18,548
It's all just a lot
of paper, and people

1108
01:02:18,651 --> 01:02:20,272
are silly to get this
excited about it.

1109
01:02:20,375 --> 01:02:21,410
Yes.

1110
01:02:21,927 --> 01:02:24,858
What is happiness?

1111
01:02:24,962 --> 01:02:29,444
Can you make others happy,
and not with your money,

1112
01:02:29,548 --> 01:02:31,651
but yourself?

1113
01:02:33,513 --> 01:02:35,755
Can you make me happy?

1114
01:02:35,858 --> 01:02:38,134
I am the phoniest
thing that ever was.

1115
01:02:38,237 --> 01:02:39,444
Well, what do you mean by that?

1116
01:02:39,548 --> 01:02:40,996
Listen to this man right here.

1117
01:02:41,100 --> 01:02:42,444
I'm a big phony.

1118
01:02:42,548 --> 01:02:44,893
I am not going to do a
damn thing for anybody.

1119
01:02:44,996 --> 01:02:45,651
You're right.

1120
01:02:45,755 --> 01:02:46,927
I'm a big phony.

1121
01:02:47,031 --> 01:02:48,893
Well what are you
hanging out for, man?

1122
01:02:48,996 --> 01:02:50,686
I'm a big phony!

1123
01:02:50,789 --> 01:02:51,755
I'm not real!

1124
01:02:51,858 --> 01:02:54,272
If I die, the whole world dies.

1125
01:02:54,375 --> 01:02:56,100
So go ahead and kill me.

1126
01:02:58,686 --> 01:03:00,755
Well, here's today's installment
in the strange adventures

1127
01:03:00,858 --> 01:03:05,789
of the 21-year-old oleomargarine
heir, Michael Brody Jr. That's

1128
01:03:05,893 --> 01:03:07,927
the young New Yorker who
professes to be trying

1129
01:03:08,031 --> 01:03:09,410
to give away his fortune.

1130
01:03:09,513 --> 01:03:11,789
Now, he claims he has
ended the Vietnam War

1131
01:03:11,893 --> 01:03:15,893
and has 500 jets standing
by to bring the troops home.

1132
01:03:15,996 --> 01:03:21,272
He also says, "I may be the
greatest con man in the world."

1133
01:03:21,375 --> 01:03:22,237
Fuck it.

1134
01:03:22,341 --> 01:03:24,134
It lasted a week, basically.

1135
01:03:24,237 --> 01:03:29,444
He landed on Saturday the
10th, and by the 19th,

1136
01:03:29,548 --> 01:03:31,341
the whole thing collapsed.

1137
01:03:31,444 --> 01:03:32,272
It took a week.

1138
01:03:35,065 --> 01:03:37,893
Michael James Brody Jr.

1139
01:03:38,755 --> 01:03:41,410
I'd do it 10 million times
over again if I had a choice.

1140
01:03:45,582 --> 01:03:47,927
It was a pretty intense 10 days.

1141
01:03:54,962 --> 01:03:56,651
There's a lot of
questions for Brody

1142
01:03:56,755 --> 01:03:58,513
about the size of his fortune...

1143
01:03:58,617 --> 01:03:59,720
$25 million...

1144
01:03:59,824 --> 01:04:00,962
$50 million...

1145
01:04:01,065 --> 01:04:03,134
Oh, I've got $100 million
right now.

1146
01:04:03,237 --> 01:04:05,100
Maybe more... a
billion, trillion.

1147
01:04:05,203 --> 01:04:06,858
How much money are you
going to give away?

1148
01:04:06,962 --> 01:04:09,375
I hope to give a trillion
dollars away this year.

1149
01:04:09,479 --> 01:04:10,720
Do you have a trillion dollars?

1150
01:04:10,824 --> 01:04:11,755
Not right now.

1151
01:04:11,858 --> 01:04:13,065
Give me a chance to make it.

1152
01:04:13,168 --> 01:04:14,789
He was not very
good with numbers.

1153
01:04:18,927 --> 01:04:20,789
It was kind of like great PR.

1154
01:04:20,893 --> 01:04:22,582
What kind of tricks
are you going

1155
01:04:22,686 --> 01:04:26,031
to do to get the attention, to
get the interest in what you

1156
01:04:26,134 --> 01:04:27,306
want to do?

1157
01:04:27,410 --> 01:04:29,617
I think it was in
the spirit of that.

1158
01:04:29,720 --> 01:04:31,100
How much money in all is there?

1159
01:04:31,203 --> 01:04:33,237
It's an unlimited amount
right now, I'll tell you.

1160
01:04:33,341 --> 01:04:34,375
It's unlimited.

1161
01:04:34,479 --> 01:04:36,617
But it's not money, it's love.

1162
01:04:36,720 --> 01:04:40,789
I don't think he really believed
that he had $100 billion

1163
01:04:40,893 --> 01:04:43,617
or $10 billion.

1164
01:04:43,893 --> 01:04:46,720
You need to know one basic
fact about Mr. Money...

1165
01:04:46,824 --> 01:04:49,893
he's not a magician and can't
pull money out of a hat.

1166
01:04:50,651 --> 01:04:55,996
I knew very shortly that
he did not have $25 million

1167
01:04:56,100 --> 01:05:00,065
or anything like it.

1168
01:05:00,168 --> 01:05:01,996
I think he started out
the whole adventure

1169
01:05:02,100 --> 01:05:03,789
with about $1.2 million.

1170
01:05:06,720 --> 01:05:10,272
Michael basically believed that
he could actualize this dream

1171
01:05:10,375 --> 01:05:13,375
by proclaiming its reality.

1172
01:05:13,479 --> 01:05:14,927
He had actualized
the record contract,

1173
01:05:15,031 --> 01:05:16,582
he had actualized
The Sullivan Show,

1174
01:05:16,686 --> 01:05:19,444
he had actualised
headlines around the world.

1175
01:05:19,548 --> 01:05:21,996
OK, look at this...
anything can happen.

1176
01:05:23,962 --> 01:05:27,410
Basically, it's a
fucking Andy Warhol

1177
01:05:27,513 --> 01:05:30,548
15-minutes-of-fame story.

1178
01:05:30,651 --> 01:05:37,100
And there's one of
those every day.

1179
01:05:43,031 --> 01:05:48,168
This is the Rosebud Reservation
here in South Dakota.

1180
01:05:48,272 --> 01:05:53,203
In its own way, it's
beautiful out here

1181
01:05:53,306 --> 01:06:04,720
with just the openness,
the serenity of it.

1182
01:06:04,824 --> 01:06:07,720
It's so calm.

1183
01:06:09,134 --> 01:06:11,548
But it's a hard life out here.

1184
01:06:26,065 --> 01:06:29,858
Dear Mr. Brody, I'm writing
this letter in hopes

1185
01:06:29,962 --> 01:06:32,203
that you can help me.

1186
01:06:32,306 --> 01:06:35,272
I'm married and
have four children.

1187
01:06:35,375 --> 01:06:39,341
I'm not one to beg for
anything, but you have

1188
01:06:39,444 --> 01:06:41,996
offered to help poor people.

1189
01:06:42,100 --> 01:06:44,410
I need help very bad.

1190
01:06:46,686 --> 01:06:49,893
My husband and I came from
the Rosebud Reservation

1191
01:06:49,996 --> 01:06:56,927
in South Dakota to make a
decent living for our children.

1192
01:06:57,031 --> 01:07:01,031
It's been very hard,
and we've always

1193
01:07:01,134 --> 01:07:03,893
managed to survive
the hardships,

1194
01:07:03,996 --> 01:07:10,548
because we had faith in each
other and a great deal of love.

1195
01:07:10,651 --> 01:07:17,927
Unfortunately, my husband had
a nervous breakdown a month ago

1196
01:07:18,031 --> 01:07:20,203
and is unable to work.

1197
01:07:20,306 --> 01:07:26,479
I guess there was too
much pressure on him.

1198
01:07:28,410 --> 01:07:34,996
We've lived in slums
for so long that I'm

1199
01:07:35,100 --> 01:07:40,444
beginning to think we'll
never live any better.

1200
01:07:40,548 --> 01:07:44,444
If things don't change,
we have no choice

1201
01:07:44,548 --> 01:07:47,065
but to go back to
the reservation

1202
01:07:47,168 --> 01:07:52,203
and be poor along with the
rest of the Indian people.

1203
01:07:52,306 --> 01:07:54,341
Please help us.

1204
01:07:57,065 --> 01:08:01,065
Sincerely, Mr. and Mrs.
Dewey Broken Leg.

1205
01:08:06,272 --> 01:08:10,306
My husband and I met in
Hot Springs, South Dakota.

1206
01:08:10,410 --> 01:08:13,548
I was 17 and he was 18.

1207
01:08:15,237 --> 01:08:17,168
I fell in love with him.

1208
01:08:17,272 --> 01:08:20,962
That was my first impression.

1209
01:08:21,237 --> 01:08:26,031
I didn't know Dad had a
nervous breakdown like that.

1210
01:08:26,134 --> 01:08:28,237
I just remember him
as a kid all the time,

1211
01:08:28,341 --> 01:08:29,755
just getting up
and going to work.

1212
01:08:29,858 --> 01:08:33,893
That's just... I'm just
completely shocked.

1213
01:08:34,927 --> 01:08:36,031
Well...

1214
01:08:36,755 --> 01:08:38,444
My mom kept things...

1215
01:08:38,548 --> 01:08:42,100
didn't want us kids to worry.

1216
01:08:42,203 --> 01:08:47,100
I think that was probably at
the turning point in my life

1217
01:08:47,203 --> 01:08:57,513
where I knew, as a woman, I
had to be strong and do it.

1218
01:09:01,651 --> 01:09:05,341
I felt the Brody
story had many things,

1219
01:09:05,444 --> 01:09:11,134
but I was always interested
in Renee's story.

1220
01:09:11,237 --> 01:09:15,100
Renee and Michael met, I
think, 18 days before they got

1221
01:09:15,203 --> 01:09:16,548
married.

1222
01:09:16,651 --> 01:09:19,341
And then, I think, it gets
really wacky after there

1223
01:09:19,444 --> 01:09:21,341
for Renee.

1224
01:09:21,444 --> 01:09:24,203
And within a month,
she's pregnant.

1225
01:09:29,272 --> 01:09:34,203
Well, he wanted to be pregnant.

1226
01:09:34,306 --> 01:09:36,824
We were in the post
office up in Woodstock,

1227
01:09:36,927 --> 01:09:38,410
and I had birth control pills.

1228
01:09:38,513 --> 01:09:41,065
And he took them out of
my purse and threw them

1229
01:09:41,168 --> 01:09:42,444
in the garbage can.

1230
01:09:42,548 --> 01:09:44,272
And he said, we're
going to have a son.

1231
01:09:44,375 --> 01:09:47,927
And it wasn't very soon
after I was pregnant,

1232
01:09:48,031 --> 01:09:50,031
and we had a son...

1233
01:09:50,134 --> 01:09:52,479
Jaime.

1234
01:09:55,582 --> 01:10:00,927
My father, Michael James
Brody Jr., had a bit of fame

1235
01:10:01,031 --> 01:10:05,341
back in the early 1970s
and had some ideas

1236
01:10:05,444 --> 01:10:09,686
and got them out
into the wild world.

1237
01:10:09,789 --> 01:10:11,651
Well, this is a bit
of my collection

1238
01:10:11,755 --> 01:10:15,824
here of Jelke and
Michael Brody Jr.

1239
01:10:15,927 --> 01:10:19,444
materials that I've collected.

1240
01:10:19,548 --> 01:10:23,065
Over the years, I've
collected quite a bit.

1241
01:10:23,168 --> 01:10:25,341
Press photos.

1242
01:10:25,444 --> 01:10:27,134
Here's some of the High Times.

1243
01:10:27,237 --> 01:10:28,824
Got a few of them
over the years.

1244
01:10:28,927 --> 01:10:30,755
One promotional album.

1245
01:10:30,858 --> 01:10:32,548
The yearbook.

1246
01:10:32,651 --> 01:10:35,548
I play the game of life
with a strong heart.

1247
01:10:46,375 --> 01:10:51,651
One, two, three, four, five,
six, seven, eight, nine, 10,

1248
01:10:51,755 --> 01:10:54,479
11, 12, 13, 14, 15...

1249
01:10:54,582 --> 01:10:58,617
there's like 40 or
50 of these in here.

1250
01:11:04,548 --> 01:11:07,686
They used to be in the shed in
the back of my grandfather's

1251
01:11:07,789 --> 01:11:08,858
house.

1252
01:11:08,962 --> 01:11:10,272
As a little boy,
I remember playing

1253
01:11:10,375 --> 01:11:11,617
on this mountain of mail.

1254
01:11:14,651 --> 01:11:19,720
When I met Jaime and Renee, I
learned that Jaime had

1255
01:11:19,824 --> 01:11:21,582
letters as well.

1256
01:11:24,513 --> 01:11:27,824
And he took me to where
he stored the letters,

1257
01:11:27,927 --> 01:11:32,686
and I saw that it was probably
three or four times the amount

1258
01:11:32,789 --> 01:11:34,962
of letters that I had.

1259
01:11:51,410 --> 01:11:55,996
It's going to take an army
to go through them all.

1260
01:12:01,272 --> 01:12:05,548
Dear Mr. Brody, I am 17 years
old, and in my 17 years,

1261
01:12:05,651 --> 01:12:09,686
I have lived in a world of
fighting and destruction.

1262
01:12:09,789 --> 01:12:11,651
I have been taking
nervous medicine

1263
01:12:11,755 --> 01:12:13,686
since I was eight years old.

1264
01:12:13,789 --> 01:12:15,479
And why?

1265
01:12:15,582 --> 01:12:18,410
Because I live with my
mother and stepfather.

1266
01:12:18,513 --> 01:12:19,824
He's always drunk.

1267
01:12:19,927 --> 01:12:22,686
He's always drunk, and
she's always getting

1268
01:12:22,789 --> 01:12:26,513
beat up, at least twice a week.

1269
01:12:26,617 --> 01:12:29,755
We hardly ever have
nothing to eat,

1270
01:12:29,858 --> 01:12:34,927
and I do nothing
but shake and cry.

1271
01:12:36,617 --> 01:12:40,582
I almost tried to kill
myself a couple of times.

1272
01:12:40,686 --> 01:12:44,168
Before it happened, I
realized that maybe someday,

1273
01:12:44,272 --> 01:12:48,479
I really have
something to live for.

1274
01:12:48,582 --> 01:12:50,341
Please write back
to me even if you

1275
01:12:50,444 --> 01:12:52,410
don't think that
I need the money,

1276
01:12:52,513 --> 01:12:57,755
because I just want someone
to talk to, to help me.

1277
01:12:57,858 --> 01:12:58,996
I need it.

1278
01:12:59,100 --> 01:13:00,479
God bless you always,
Joanne Youngins.

1279
01:13:09,513 --> 01:13:14,375
Brought back a lot of memories.

1280
01:13:14,479 --> 01:13:16,927
Really did.

1281
01:13:17,031 --> 01:13:17,651
Yeah.

1282
01:13:24,686 --> 01:13:27,927
All this is very sad and
it was very hard on me,

1283
01:13:28,031 --> 01:13:30,824
but I look at the
person I am today,

1284
01:13:30,927 --> 01:13:32,375
and I'm very proud
of who I am today.

1285
01:13:32,479 --> 01:13:34,065
I'm a good, decent,
honest human being

1286
01:13:34,168 --> 01:13:36,893
that would help anybody,
just like my mother.

1287
01:13:36,996 --> 01:13:39,134
And if it wouldn't
have been for her,

1288
01:13:39,237 --> 01:13:41,031
I would probably
never feel this way.

1289
01:14:01,031 --> 01:14:02,203
Oh, really?

1290
01:14:07,065 --> 01:14:10,479
My mother.

1291
01:14:10,582 --> 01:14:13,755
This is from my mother.

1292
01:14:19,134 --> 01:14:20,548
OK...
I'm nervous.

1293
01:14:28,479 --> 01:14:32,134
Dear Mr. Brody, I read
about you in the paper.

1294
01:14:32,237 --> 01:14:33,617
I have six children.

1295
01:14:33,720 --> 01:14:36,617
We live in an old log house.

1296
01:14:36,720 --> 01:14:39,479
The light bill is
two months past due.

1297
01:14:39,582 --> 01:14:42,100
My husband does not
know I am writing this,

1298
01:14:42,203 --> 01:14:45,548
so please don't have my
name published or anything.

1299
01:14:45,651 --> 01:14:50,720
If I could just receive some
help from someone like you,

1300
01:14:50,824 --> 01:14:53,100
I would really appreciate it.

1301
01:14:53,203 --> 01:14:57,893
Anyone who knows us will tell
you everything I wrote is true.

1302
01:14:57,996 --> 01:15:02,962
God bless you for what you
are doing, Isabelle Nave.

1303
01:15:07,651 --> 01:15:10,824
I had no idea she wrote to him.

1304
01:15:13,168 --> 01:15:15,444
I had no idea.

1305
01:15:25,168 --> 01:15:29,203
Let's see here.

1306
01:15:29,306 --> 01:15:36,720
It's from Michael James Brody
Jr. Enterprises, 1650 Broadway,

1307
01:15:36,824 --> 01:15:38,789
and I think that's
coffee that you're

1308
01:15:38,893 --> 01:15:41,065
getting a picture of as well.

1309
01:15:41,168 --> 01:15:44,031
In reply to your
correspondence, you are probably

1310
01:15:44,134 --> 01:15:46,617
aware this office has been
swamped with thousands

1311
01:15:46,720 --> 01:15:48,893
of letters regarding the
promises of

1312
01:15:48,996 --> 01:15:50,927
Michael James Brody Jr.

1313
01:15:51,031 --> 01:15:52,479
Out of courtesy
to the public,

1314
01:15:52,582 --> 01:15:55,410
Bunny Jones, assisted
by a volunteer staff,

1315
01:15:55,513 --> 01:15:59,444
is answering as many letters
as is physically possible.

1316
01:15:59,548 --> 01:16:03,306
We can do no more than ask
you to believe in Mr. Brody

1317
01:16:03,410 --> 01:16:04,582
as we do.

1318
01:16:04,686 --> 01:16:05,444
He's not a phony.

1319
01:16:05,548 --> 01:16:07,134
He's for real.

1320
01:16:07,237 --> 01:16:09,651
The only thing people have to
do is really believe in him.

1321
01:16:09,755 --> 01:16:11,513
If they believed in
him and let him alone,

1322
01:16:11,617 --> 01:16:13,203
he'll really work out.

1323
01:16:13,306 --> 01:16:15,962
Miss Jones believes Mr. Brody
will honor his commitments

1324
01:16:16,065 --> 01:16:19,927
and his promises to the
fullest extent of his physical

1325
01:16:20,031 --> 01:16:22,548
and financial ability.

1326
01:16:22,651 --> 01:16:25,651
Any decision in this
regard will ultimately

1327
01:16:25,755 --> 01:16:29,582
be made by Mr. Michael
James Brody Jr.

1328
01:16:29,686 --> 01:16:31,031
Very truly,

1329
01:16:31,134 --> 01:16:35,203
Bunny Jones, which is
signed by Bunny Jones.

1330
01:16:35,306 --> 01:16:37,375
I got a call from
the post office

1331
01:16:37,479 --> 01:16:39,927
that it was either
six 8-foot bags

1332
01:16:40,031 --> 01:16:43,927
or eight 6-foot bags
stacked with mail from all

1333
01:16:44,031 --> 01:16:45,582
over the world.

1334
01:16:45,686 --> 01:16:48,134
We were told, "Look, if you guys
don't come and get this mail,

1335
01:16:48,237 --> 01:16:49,479
we're going to have to burn it.

1336
01:16:49,582 --> 01:16:51,203
We can't be responsible."

1337
01:16:51,306 --> 01:16:54,720
And unfortunately, sadly, we
couldn't do anything about it.

1338
01:16:54,824 --> 01:16:56,100
We just had nowhere to put it.

1339
01:16:56,203 --> 01:16:57,617
And then at that
point, Michael had

1340
01:16:57,720 --> 01:17:02,858
started to get a little shaky.

1341
01:17:06,927 --> 01:17:10,100
I mean, if Michael Brody
was just a pothead,

1342
01:17:10,203 --> 01:17:13,341
I don't think any of
this would have happened.

1343
01:17:14,031 --> 01:17:15,893
Do you know much about PCP?

1344
01:17:21,237 --> 01:17:24,858
Phencyclidine, PCP, is something
that I wouldn't recommend

1345
01:17:24,962 --> 01:17:26,203
to anyone at any time.

1346
01:17:32,548 --> 01:17:35,962
It makes you feel like you've
got all this power and energy,

1347
01:17:36,065 --> 01:17:37,203
and you really don't.

1348
01:17:43,893 --> 01:17:49,479
Michael had a big flaw, which
was his consumption of PCP.

1349
01:17:49,582 --> 01:17:52,548
PCP absorbs all the
niacin in your body,

1350
01:17:52,651 --> 01:17:55,065
and it throws your
psyche out of whack.

1351
01:17:55,168 --> 01:17:58,651
And I used to give niacin pills
all the time to counteract it.

1352
01:17:58,755 --> 01:18:02,134
Somebody should have done
a serious intervention

1353
01:18:02,237 --> 01:18:03,410
to stop him.

1354
01:18:03,513 --> 01:18:04,858
Nobody did.

1355
01:18:04,962 --> 01:18:08,755
It seemed like everybody
was willing to let it just

1356
01:18:08,858 --> 01:18:13,100
proceed and see what happened.

1357
01:18:14,237 --> 01:18:16,479
I think all these things...

1358
01:18:16,582 --> 01:18:19,065
it was just such
a disillusionment.

1359
01:18:19,168 --> 01:18:25,168
He couldn't do what he wanted to
do, and nobody believed in him.

1360
01:18:25,272 --> 01:18:29,789
And he just started getting
very depressed and upset.

1361
01:18:34,203 --> 01:18:37,168
It was very tumultuous.

1362
01:18:37,272 --> 01:18:41,720
He ended up in a mental hospital
or a clinic or something,

1363
01:18:41,824 --> 01:18:44,479
and we kind of split up.

1364
01:18:51,824 --> 01:18:57,651
I went to California
in a VW bus with Jaime.

1365
01:19:05,651 --> 01:19:08,444
I think he thought, why
was I leaving and going

1366
01:19:08,548 --> 01:19:09,962
across the country?

1367
01:19:10,065 --> 01:19:13,755
But he was kind of forcing
me to, because he was not

1368
01:19:13,858 --> 01:19:16,720
getting it together.

1369
01:19:22,548 --> 01:19:26,306
I wanted us to be together, and
I wanted things to get sane,

1370
01:19:26,410 --> 01:19:31,617
and I wanted for us together
to have a life with Jaime,

1371
01:19:31,720 --> 01:19:35,582
and for him to get
healthy and be happy.

1372
01:19:35,686 --> 01:19:39,375
That's what I wanted.

1373
01:19:44,962 --> 01:19:46,686
And then I got the call.

1374
01:19:50,962 --> 01:19:54,686
Michael James Brody
made headlines in 1970

1375
01:19:54,789 --> 01:19:58,651
when he announced he would give
away a $25 million inheritance.

1376
01:19:58,755 --> 01:20:00,789
Brody, who was then
21, wrote checks

1377
01:20:00,893 --> 01:20:04,306
to just about anybody who asked
for one, until his hometown

1378
01:20:04,410 --> 01:20:05,962
bank refused to cash them.

1379
01:20:06,065 --> 01:20:08,272
Now, his story has
taken a sad turn.

1380
01:20:08,375 --> 01:20:11,306
Federal agents arrested the
youthful millionaire yesterday

1381
01:20:11,410 --> 01:20:13,100
at his home in
Norwalk, Connecticut.

1382
01:20:13,203 --> 01:20:16,306
They said Brody made several
threatening calls to the White

1383
01:20:16,410 --> 01:20:19,272
House, first threatening
to set fire to himself,

1384
01:20:19,375 --> 01:20:22,100
then threatening the
life of President Nixon.

1385
01:20:26,582 --> 01:20:28,893
Brody was released on
bail, but today, he

1386
01:20:28,996 --> 01:20:31,306
was arrested again,
charged with arson

1387
01:20:31,410 --> 01:20:35,927
after a real fire destroyed
his $100,000 rented home.

1388
01:20:36,031 --> 01:20:41,375
This time, he was committed to a
hospital for psychiatric tests.

1389
01:20:41,479 --> 01:20:47,858
He ended up in one of the sort
of country club hospitals.

1390
01:20:47,962 --> 01:20:49,410
If there are any
murderers out there,

1391
01:20:49,513 --> 01:20:51,203
if you want to stab
somebody in the throat,

1392
01:20:51,306 --> 01:20:53,617
don't stab the person you're
stabbing in the throat.

1393
01:20:53,720 --> 01:20:56,168
Call me and put me in his place.

1394
01:20:56,272 --> 01:20:57,755
I'll die for you.

1395
01:21:01,237 --> 01:21:04,100
So I struggled with that
a lot, because the lens

1396
01:21:04,203 --> 01:21:06,168
we would now have, I think
many people would just

1397
01:21:06,272 --> 01:21:10,100
say, he's mentally ill,
right from the beginning.

1398
01:21:10,203 --> 01:21:11,548
There are signs there.

1399
01:21:11,651 --> 01:21:13,065
Give me a gun so I can
blow out my brains,

1400
01:21:13,168 --> 01:21:14,893
so I can descend to
hell, in three days

1401
01:21:14,996 --> 01:21:18,100
be resurrected in heaven, and
be reborn into a better world.

1402
01:21:18,203 --> 01:21:21,858
The whole Messiah complexes
and stuff... these things

1403
01:21:21,962 --> 01:21:24,341
are now defined as
mental illnesses.

1404
01:21:24,444 --> 01:21:26,548
But back then, I don't
know exactly what

1405
01:21:26,651 --> 01:21:28,789
they would have been called.

1406
01:21:29,789 --> 01:21:32,513
They started giving
him Thorazine

1407
01:21:32,617 --> 01:21:37,582
so that he didn't have any
episodes or psychotic events

1408
01:21:37,686 --> 01:21:41,306
or freaking out.

1409
01:21:41,410 --> 01:21:44,237
That really was the
real end, was Thorazine.

1410
01:22:02,237 --> 01:22:04,134
He was a mess.

1411
01:22:04,237 --> 01:22:08,548
He just couldn't
pull back from that.

1412
01:22:16,720 --> 01:22:21,789
Dear Michael, please
excuse the informality.

1413
01:22:21,893 --> 01:22:24,824
Although you may not remember
me, I took care of you

1414
01:22:24,927 --> 01:22:28,927
when you lived in Levittown.

1415
01:22:29,031 --> 01:22:33,272
I remember you as a very
handsome, blond, curly haired,

1416
01:22:33,375 --> 01:22:36,893
little, unhappy boy.

1417
01:22:38,203 --> 01:22:41,927
Despite the numerous toys
and bicycles that you had,

1418
01:22:42,031 --> 01:22:48,134
you always seemed very
angry and irritable.

1419
01:22:48,237 --> 01:22:51,479
I was always struck by the
absence of true concern

1420
01:22:51,582 --> 01:22:53,755
for your well-being.

1421
01:22:53,858 --> 01:22:59,237
And frankly, having met
several of your nannies,

1422
01:22:59,341 --> 01:23:03,272
I could appreciate
the loneliness

1423
01:23:03,375 --> 01:23:08,479
that you must have
felt.

1424
01:23:08,582 --> 01:23:11,548
By now, you understand that
money isn't gonna make you

1425
01:23:11,651 --> 01:23:16,203
happy, isn't gonna make you
more secure within yourself.

1426
01:23:16,306 --> 01:23:22,272
It may even further demoralize
you with all the greed.

1427
01:23:22,375 --> 01:23:26,237
For whatever it's
worth, I would suggest

1428
01:23:26,341 --> 01:23:29,513
that you defer all
decisions regarding

1429
01:23:29,617 --> 01:23:34,651
the distribution of your money
and concentrate on coming

1430
01:23:34,755 --> 01:23:37,617
to terms with yourself.

1431
01:23:40,065 --> 01:23:45,341
Sincerely yours,
Naftalie Rapoport, MD.

1432
01:23:49,375 --> 01:23:52,789
OK, so this is the last
chapter, which is entitled,

1433
01:23:52,893 --> 01:23:54,513
"The War is Over."

1434
01:23:57,203 --> 01:23:59,272
January was gloomy
and cold, and Brody

1435
01:23:59,375 --> 01:24:03,410
turned to drinking nearly
a case of beer a day.

1436
01:24:03,513 --> 01:24:05,651
The Thorazine made
him catatonic.

1437
01:24:05,755 --> 01:24:07,272
He did not like
to get out of bed.

1438
01:24:07,375 --> 01:24:10,134
He lamented his condition,
his lack of money.

1439
01:24:10,237 --> 01:24:14,134
Many days he had trouble
dressing and bathing himself.

1440
01:24:16,100 --> 01:24:20,444
On January 26, Brody slipped out
of the rented house on Glasgow

1441
01:24:20,548 --> 01:24:22,031
Turnpike in Woodstock.

1442
01:24:22,134 --> 01:24:23,858
Renee was upstairs
with their son.

1443
01:24:23,962 --> 01:24:25,789
She didn't know Brody had left.

1444
01:24:28,203 --> 01:24:32,237
He turned on to Du Bois Road,
and then after 100 yards,

1445
01:24:32,341 --> 01:24:35,582
into the driveway in front of
the old farmhouse with a metal

1446
01:24:35,686 --> 01:24:38,065
roof tucked under
several spreading maples.

1447
01:24:38,168 --> 01:24:39,824
Nobody was home.

1448
01:24:39,927 --> 01:24:42,168
Brody let himself
in with the key

1449
01:24:42,272 --> 01:24:44,031
hidden above the front door.

1450
01:24:44,134 --> 01:24:46,375
He went to the closet
in the upstairs hallway.

1451
01:24:46,479 --> 01:24:50,134
It was where Robert Du Bois
kept this hunting rifles.

1452
01:24:50,237 --> 01:24:53,720
Across the backyard, a weathered
wooden shed was visible.

1453
01:24:53,824 --> 01:24:56,203
It contained dozens
of cardboard boxes

1454
01:24:56,306 --> 01:24:58,168
full of letters and
telegrams Brody had

1455
01:24:58,272 --> 01:25:00,065
received three years earlier.

1456
01:25:00,168 --> 01:25:03,237
Only a few had been opened.

1457
01:25:03,341 --> 01:25:11,962
Nothing was working, and he
just couldn't do it anymore.

1458
01:25:12,065 --> 01:25:18,065
And then one day,
I just slept late.

1459
01:25:18,168 --> 01:25:19,617
I don't know how or why.

1460
01:25:19,720 --> 01:25:21,789
And the next thing
I know, my father

1461
01:25:21,893 --> 01:25:25,824
called and said that he
had gone over to his house,

1462
01:25:25,927 --> 01:25:28,651
taken his deer rifle, and
shot himself, and he was dead.

1463
01:25:28,755 --> 01:25:35,100
And that was that,
and it was over.

1464
01:25:49,341 --> 01:25:51,444
I don't think I can do
this anymore more today.

1465
01:25:51,548 --> 01:25:53,031
That's OK.

1466
01:25:55,168 --> 01:25:58,996
Remember Michael Brody, the oleo
fortune heir who in 1970 tried

1467
01:25:59,100 --> 01:26:00,858
to give away $25 million?

1468
01:26:00,962 --> 01:26:03,755
Well today, he was found dead
in Upstate New York, apparently

1469
01:26:03,858 --> 01:26:06,065
from a self-inflicted
gunshot wound.

1470
01:26:06,168 --> 01:26:08,134
Brody was 24 years old.

1471
01:26:23,134 --> 01:26:30,548
When Michael died, for me,
it was total devastation.

1472
01:26:32,513 --> 01:26:34,617
My whole feeling was just
like, go out in the woods

1473
01:26:34,720 --> 01:26:36,272
and just stop living.

1474
01:26:36,375 --> 01:26:37,410
Just go away.

1475
01:26:37,513 --> 01:26:38,306
I just can't do this.

1476
01:26:38,410 --> 01:26:41,617
I can't go on.

1477
01:26:41,720 --> 01:26:43,927
But then, there was Jaime.

1478
01:26:44,031 --> 01:26:49,375
There was just no way
that I could not go on.

1479
01:26:49,479 --> 01:26:54,513
But it was really, really
difficult for, I don't know,

1480
01:26:54,617 --> 01:26:57,375
a long time.

1481
01:27:00,375 --> 01:27:02,272
He came to me in the dream.

1482
01:27:02,375 --> 01:27:08,341
And I walked up these
stairs, and he was there.

1483
01:27:08,444 --> 01:27:10,858
And we sat, and
he held my hands,

1484
01:27:10,962 --> 01:27:14,789
and he talked to
me for a long time.

1485
01:27:14,893 --> 01:27:19,134
But I don't remember
anything he said.

1486
01:27:20,410 --> 01:27:25,031
I was very glad for that.

1487
01:27:26,031 --> 01:27:27,720
I don't know how
much she's actually

1488
01:27:27,824 --> 01:27:30,168
dealt with this, because these
things were not really dealt

1489
01:27:30,272 --> 01:27:32,237
with back in that time either.

1490
01:27:32,341 --> 01:27:34,582
Here's a picture of us together.

1491
01:27:34,686 --> 01:27:36,893
I don't know if there's
any other real photos of us

1492
01:27:36,996 --> 01:27:38,617
together.

1493
01:27:38,720 --> 01:27:42,479
I mean, I certainly didn't grow
up with very much information.

1494
01:27:42,582 --> 01:27:43,444
I didn't have photos.

1495
01:27:43,548 --> 01:27:44,927
I didn't have videos.

1496
01:27:45,031 --> 01:27:50,100
I didn't have much with
regard to my father.

1497
01:27:58,341 --> 01:28:00,203
Well, everyone has
their relationships

1498
01:28:00,306 --> 01:28:02,651
with their parents, and
this is my relationship

1499
01:28:02,755 --> 01:28:05,272
with my parents.

1500
01:28:17,306 --> 01:28:21,341
When I look at it from the
perspective of someone else,

1501
01:28:21,444 --> 01:28:24,375
I'm like, what a horrible story.

1502
01:28:24,479 --> 01:28:27,100
This is just not a good story.

1503
01:28:27,203 --> 01:28:30,168
This is just not a fun thing.

1504
01:28:30,272 --> 01:28:31,789
Some people love the past.

1505
01:28:31,893 --> 01:28:34,582
They look back, they remember
all their happy times,

1506
01:28:34,686 --> 01:28:37,410
they're still
having happy times.

1507
01:28:37,513 --> 01:28:41,996
But I don't find
that to be true.

1508
01:28:42,100 --> 01:28:46,824
So many things I would
have done differently.

1509
01:28:46,927 --> 01:28:49,858
That's not true for everybody.

1510
01:28:49,962 --> 01:28:50,962
So.

1511
01:29:02,272 --> 01:29:03,893
If you forget the
money for a second,

1512
01:29:03,996 --> 01:29:07,100
what he was trying to do...

1513
01:29:07,203 --> 01:29:10,100
it had good intention.

1514
01:29:10,203 --> 01:29:11,582
Yeah.

1515
01:29:11,686 --> 01:29:14,755
But it's not money, it's
love that I'm trying to sell.

1516
01:29:18,203 --> 01:29:20,341
Was it all an LSD trip?

1517
01:29:20,444 --> 01:29:23,031
Is at all a prank?

1518
01:29:23,134 --> 01:29:25,651
Is it a cruel joke?

1519
01:29:25,755 --> 01:29:26,789
Was he sincere?

1520
01:29:26,893 --> 01:29:27,686
Was he a victim?

1521
01:29:27,789 --> 01:29:29,996
Was he a victimizer?

1522
01:29:31,927 --> 01:29:34,065
It's a hard story to tell.

1523
01:29:34,168 --> 01:29:38,306
And what lessons can be learned
of it, I still don't know.

1524
01:29:46,203 --> 01:29:49,927
I think that the best
way to tell Brody's story

1525
01:29:50,031 --> 01:29:53,479
is by telling the
story of the letters.

1526
01:30:06,410 --> 01:30:11,582
Well, look, that the letters
are sitting in boxes in closets

1527
01:30:11,686 --> 01:30:15,927
somewhere is beside the point.

1528
01:30:16,031 --> 01:30:19,858
It doesn't mean a
fucking thing to me.

1529
01:30:19,962 --> 01:30:23,065
What means something
to me is that there's

1530
01:30:23,168 --> 01:30:27,375
that many needy
people in the world

1531
01:30:27,479 --> 01:30:29,134
that we're not taking care of.

1532
01:30:35,341 --> 01:30:38,444
I think the letters are
worth saving and worth

1533
01:30:38,548 --> 01:30:42,100
preserving, because when you
turn the focus to the letter

1534
01:30:42,203 --> 01:30:46,100
writers, you're seeing into
what is really happening

1535
01:30:46,203 --> 01:30:48,686
in the country and the
world at that time,

1536
01:30:48,789 --> 01:30:50,444
and you're able
to look at what's

1537
01:30:50,548 --> 01:30:55,410
happening now at this time,
and you can see the parallels.

1538
01:30:55,513 --> 01:30:58,341
The fact that all of these
letters were unopened

1539
01:30:58,444 --> 01:31:01,203
represents to me just
thousands of voices

1540
01:31:01,306 --> 01:31:05,100
that were left in 1970 unheard.

1541
01:31:06,686 --> 01:31:08,996
My mother.

1542
01:31:09,100 --> 01:31:11,824
I want to open up
every single letter.

1543
01:31:11,927 --> 01:31:15,548
I want to honor
all of those people

1544
01:31:15,651 --> 01:31:25,306
by reading their stories, and
I want to give them a voice.

1545
01:31:25,410 --> 01:31:28,203
Dear Mr. Brody, you
are like a ray of light

1546
01:31:28,306 --> 01:31:29,996
in a world of darkness.

1547
01:31:30,100 --> 01:31:32,927
And even if you can't fulfill
our wish, we want to thank you.

1548
01:31:33,031 --> 01:31:33,582
Thank you.

1549
01:31:33,686 --> 01:31:34,962
Thanks.

1550
01:31:35,065 --> 01:31:36,755
In the meantime, I
would like to tell you

1551
01:31:36,858 --> 01:31:40,927
that I feel much better for just
being able to write this down.

1552
01:31:41,031 --> 01:31:42,720
I just had a good cry.

1553
01:31:42,824 --> 01:31:44,237
Thank you.

1554
01:31:44,341 --> 01:31:46,858
Whether you help me or whether
you will ever read this,

1555
01:31:46,962 --> 01:31:49,168
I don't know.

1556
01:31:49,272 --> 01:31:52,410
If you do, I would like to
invite you to Dallas, Texas,

1557
01:31:52,513 --> 01:31:53,444
for dinner.

1558
01:31:53,548 --> 01:31:56,203
My wife is an excellent cook.

1559
01:31:56,479 --> 01:32:00,237
So even if you don't send me
one penny, let me be a friend.

1560
01:32:00,341 --> 01:32:04,375
I feel so very much alone with
no one to tell my troubles,

1561
01:32:04,479 --> 01:32:06,617
but I do make a great listener.

1562
01:32:06,720 --> 01:32:11,858
I have no idea if this
letter will even get to you,

1563
01:32:11,962 --> 01:32:14,755
but I'm still hopeful.

1564
01:32:14,858 --> 01:32:16,858
You see, Mr. Brody, I am silly.

1565
01:32:16,962 --> 01:32:18,651
I still have hope
and faith that love

1566
01:32:18,755 --> 01:32:21,203
can pull the human race
through the giant mess it

1567
01:32:21,306 --> 01:32:22,755
has gotten itself into.

1568
01:32:25,375 --> 01:32:28,306
And if you don't give
anyone anything else,

1569
01:32:28,410 --> 01:32:30,479
you have made a
lot of people, me

1570
01:32:30,582 --> 01:32:35,479
included, stop and think, what
is the most important thing

1571
01:32:35,582 --> 01:32:38,100
in life to me?

1572
01:33:19,824 --> 01:33:21,065
Oh, that's the one.

1573
01:33:21,168 --> 01:33:22,134
Picture, maybe?

1574
01:33:22,237 --> 01:33:23,824
Something very interesting.

1575
01:33:25,134 --> 01:33:28,272
50-year-old rubber bands.

1576
01:33:28,375 --> 01:33:30,479
Still good.

1577
01:33:30,927 --> 01:33:34,031
So when you are opening
a letter, if you could

1578
01:33:34,134 --> 01:33:37,548
be as careful as possible.

1579
01:33:40,306 --> 01:33:44,651
You just put the letter
opener in as fast as you can.

1580
01:33:44,755 --> 01:33:46,686
Dear Mr. Brody, I
am a 12-year-old boy

1581
01:33:46,789 --> 01:33:49,927
who has long since given up
believing in Santa Claus.

1582
01:33:50,031 --> 01:33:52,272
Since reading about
you in the paper,

1583
01:33:52,375 --> 01:33:53,927
maybe there is a Santa Claus.

1584
01:33:54,031 --> 01:33:55,203
Ooh, look at this one.

1585
01:33:55,306 --> 01:33:55,962
Oh boy.

1586
01:33:56,065 --> 01:33:56,686
What is that?

1587
01:33:56,789 --> 01:33:57,375
Sandpaper.

1588
01:33:57,479 --> 01:33:58,893
Sandpaper.

1589
01:33:58,996 --> 01:34:01,065
Dear Mr. Brody, as you
can see, things are rough.

1590
01:34:01,168 --> 01:34:02,720
Oh, that's cool.

1591
01:34:02,824 --> 01:34:05,720
Dear Mrs. Brody, please don't
think I'm some kind of nut

1592
01:34:05,824 --> 01:34:08,410
because I've taken the
liberty of writing to you.

1593
01:34:08,513 --> 01:34:11,306
I would like you to consider
appearing in a motion picture

1594
01:34:11,410 --> 01:34:12,651
I'm about to produce.

1595
01:34:12,755 --> 01:34:14,203
It's my fourth
independent production.

1596
01:34:14,306 --> 01:34:16,306
The title the film
is tentatively,

1597
01:34:16,410 --> 01:34:17,893
"Hell is a Private Affair."

1598
01:34:19,479 --> 01:34:22,927
Dear Michael and Renee
Brody, I greet you.

1599
01:34:23,031 --> 01:34:28,617
I am Roger Sunderland, minister
of words, emotional volcano,

1600
01:34:28,720 --> 01:34:32,893
sometimes pothead, digger
of real communication,

1601
01:34:32,996 --> 01:34:35,686
mechanical and economic idiot.

1602
01:34:35,789 --> 01:34:37,237
I also paint.

1603
01:34:37,341 --> 01:34:40,479
And then there is a slide.

1604
01:34:40,582 --> 01:34:41,686
This person wrote a book.

1605
01:34:41,789 --> 01:34:42,858
Oh, wow.

1606
01:34:42,962 --> 01:34:44,237
It's a couple of
pages, and then they

1607
01:34:44,341 --> 01:34:47,410
enclosed a bunch of envelopes.

1608
01:34:47,893 --> 01:34:51,272
I mean, I just wish there were
more people like this today.

1609
01:34:51,375 --> 01:34:54,479
Suddenly, I feel like all
of my problems are so small.

1610
01:34:58,203 --> 01:35:02,065
Dear Sir, as a general rule,
it takes money to make money.

1611
01:35:02,168 --> 01:35:04,203
I have the ideas,
you have the money.

1612
01:35:04,306 --> 01:35:05,996
One idea concerns
the manufacture

1613
01:35:06,100 --> 01:35:09,824
of a cereal bowl constructed
with a two level interior.

1614
01:35:09,927 --> 01:35:12,306
The cereal is placed
in the upper level,

1615
01:35:12,410 --> 01:35:15,306
the milk on the lower
level, assuring that it

1616
01:35:15,410 --> 01:35:17,168
will remain crisp and crunchy.

1617
01:35:19,927 --> 01:35:21,031
Michael, congratulations.

1618
01:35:21,134 --> 01:35:23,100
Happy bride, happy
pair, happy all.

1619
01:35:23,203 --> 01:35:26,100
Our thing is to create
an easy way for everybody

1620
01:35:26,203 --> 01:35:30,582
to be able to cultivate the
highest quality marijuana.

1621
01:35:30,686 --> 01:35:32,617
We have already
begun the research.

1622
01:35:32,720 --> 01:35:33,582
All right.

1623
01:35:35,479 --> 01:35:39,755
Dear Mike, my wedding is
February 7 at 2:30 PM.

1624
01:35:39,858 --> 01:35:42,962
Stop by if you have
nothing better to do.

1625
01:35:43,065 --> 01:35:44,479
Does she tell him where to go?

1626
01:35:44,582 --> 01:35:46,927
I don't think so.

1627
01:35:47,031 --> 01:35:49,031
Dear Mr. And Mrs.
Brody Jr., I tried

1628
01:35:49,134 --> 01:35:52,306
to call you at home, but because
of the great amount of calls

1629
01:35:52,410 --> 01:35:55,686
flooding the Scarsdale area,
I received a wrong number.

1630
01:35:55,789 --> 01:35:58,720
And the poor guy who answered
must have been getting calls

1631
01:35:58,824 --> 01:36:03,513
all night, because when I asked
for Mr. Brody, he replied,

1632
01:36:03,617 --> 01:36:06,237
if I was Mr. Brody, I wouldn't
give you a goddamn cent,

1633
01:36:06,341 --> 01:36:12,548
and hung up, which goes to show
you there's humor in everything

1634
01:36:12,651 --> 01:36:13,858
if you can find it.

1635
01:36:15,996 --> 01:36:20,962
Dear Mr. Brody, I feel you will
become an ideal and a leader

1636
01:36:21,065 --> 01:36:22,375
among young people.

1637
01:36:22,479 --> 01:36:24,065
You are so refreshing.

1638
01:36:24,168 --> 01:36:26,134
But I've been thinking
of you and composed these

1639
01:36:26,237 --> 01:36:28,789
two enclosed songs about you.

1640
01:36:28,893 --> 01:36:30,375
Please, please give it a listen.

1641
01:36:30,479 --> 01:36:31,100
Oh.

1642
01:36:31,203 --> 01:36:32,100
Holy Shit.

1643
01:36:32,203 --> 01:36:33,582
Well?

1644
01:36:33,686 --> 01:36:44,237
♪ <i>Michael Brody, jet king
flies alone with love.</i> ♪

1645
01:36:44,341 --> 01:36:53,651
♪ <i>Brody, Brody loves
the open skies above.</i> ♪

1646
01:36:54,858 --> 01:37:04,893
♪ <i>Michael Brody, he's a
brand new kind of man.</i> ♪

1647
01:37:04,996 --> 01:37:13,548
♪ <i>Brody, Brody... he'll
help people if he can.</i> ♪