The Barry Diller Story: The Life and Times of America's Greatest Entertainment Mogul

Diller has been in the media spotlight for more than 30 years. After working in the mailroom at the William Morris Agency, he moved to ABC at age 24 and two years later was named v-p of prime-time programming, in charge of buying feature films for the network. While at ABC, he helped launch the made-for-television movie as well as the television miniseries, and began making contacts with the Hollywood elite. Bored at ABC, Diller, then 32, was appointed chairman of Paramount Pictures, where he assembled a team that included Michael Eisner and Jeffrey Katzenberg. Although Diller had a strong track record at Paramount, he clashed with Martin Davis, chairman of Paramount's parent company, Gulf + Western, and jumped at the chance to start the ""fourth TV network,"" which was being created by Rupert Murdoch and was to be called Fox Broadcasting, in 1986. The section of the book dealing with the development of Fox is the most enlightening, with Mair showing that the establishment of Fox was due to Diller's vision and tenacity as well as to luck. Mair (Oprah: The Real Story) devotes a great deal of time to the Joan Rivers talk show, which was intended to be an important show for Fox but turned into a fiasco, with Fox canceling it after only a short run and Rivers's husband commited suicide. Mair documents Diller's post-Fox days, which included investing in and running QVC and failing to acquire CBS and Paramount, as well as Diller's current position as head of Silver King Communications. Although Mair notes some of Diller's shortcomings, such as his abrasive management style, this is a highly flattering portrait, one that does a nice job of tracing Diller's career but only skims the surface in examining what makes him tick. (May)