MR. AND MRS. HOLLYWOOD: Edie & Lew Wasserman and Their Entertainment Empire

As a top executive at MCA, Lew Wasserman was one of the biggest agents in the movie industry, then topped that by becoming one of the most powerful studio heads ever, orchestrating the gradual takeover of Universal Studios starting in 1958. His wife, Edie, was equally powerful in the realm of the "Hollywood Wives," throwing parties where other executive spouses mixed with starlets like Janet Leigh. Sharp, the Boston Globe 's Hollywood correspondent, covers much of the same territory as Connie Bruck's recent Wasserman bio, When Hollywood Had a King (Forecasts, Apr. 28), but the attention she gives to Edie adds celebrity gossip to the mix as well as a new facet on the matter of MCA's ties to organized crime. She also sheds light on new aspects of Lew's career, like his guiding hand in the development of early videodisc technology. The book clarifies the frosty relationship between Lew and Ronald Reagan while revealing how Reagan may have colluded with MCA while heading the Screen Actors Guild, depriving SAG members of potentially lucrative residual benefits. While Bruck remains a better source on MCA's early years, Sharp offers additional insights into how Wasserman transformed a talent agency into a studio that produced nearly half of all prime-time programming in the late 1970s, then found creative ways to keep all the profits for itself. Drawing upon more than 450 interviews, Sharp blends corporate maneuvering and personal scandals into a gripping portrait of the original power couple. 16-page photo insert not seen by PW . (Dec.)