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26 Facts About Bert Fields

1.

Bertram Harris Fields was an American lawyer noted for his work in the field of entertainment law.

2.

Bert Fields represented many of the leading film studios, as well as numerous celebrities, and lectured at both Stanford and Harvard Law Schools.

3.

Bertram Harris Fields was born on March 31,1929, in Los Angeles, California, the only child of Mildred Arlyn Rubin, a former ballet dancer, and F Maxwell Fields, an eye surgeon.

4.

Bert Fields was a member of the California and New York Bars.

5.

Bert Fields represented George Lucas in contract negotiations with The Walt Disney Company regarding Disney theme parks.

6.

Bert Fields represented Paramount Pictures in its appeal of the Buchwald v Paramount case over Coming to America, and in other civil litigation.

7.

Bert Fields represented Jeffrey Katzenberg in a landmark action against Disney, and obtained a multimillion-dollar judgement for George Harrison against his former business manager.

8.

Bert Fields represented Michael Jackson during contract talks with Sony Music, in the early 1990s and during the 1993 child molestation allegations made against Jackson.

9.

Bert Fields defended the Church of Scientology after many of its celebrity members, including Tom Cruise, John Travolta, and Chick Corea, were boycotted in Germany, where the religion is not legally recognized.

10.

Bert Fields wrote an open letter to Chancellor Helmut Kohl in the International Herald Tribune comparing the boycotts to Nazi book burnings.

11.

Bert Fields represented Bob and Harvey Weinstein through years of skirmishes between Miramax and its corporate owner, Disney, rarely making public statements until he arranged the brothers' departure, in 2005, without litigation.

12.

Bert Fields's insider's look into the world of the famous is sometimes artfully revealing.

13.

In 2018, Fields published Gloriana: Exploring The Reign Of Elizabeth I Elizabeth I, aka the Virgin Queen, was a colorful figure who still manages to stimulate the popular imagination more than 400 years after her death.

14.

Bert Fields finds plenty of intrigues to challenge conventional notions of the queen.

15.

In September 2015, Bert Fields published Shylock: His Own Story.

16.

In 2011, Bert Fields was awarded the Crystal Quill Award by the Shakespeare Center Of Los Angeles for his work on William Shakespeare.

17.

In 1997, Bert Fields conceived an open letter to then-German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, published as a newspaper advertisement in the International Herald Tribune, which drew parallels between the "organized oppression" of Scientologists in Germany and Nazi policies espoused by Germany in the 1930s.

18.

Bert Fields taught at Stanford Law School and lectured annually at Harvard Law School.

19.

Bert Fields performed and recorded professionally as a singer and vibraphonist with Les Deux Love Orchestra, led by Bobby Woods.

20.

In 1967, Bert Fields portrayed prosecutor "Hal Davies" on an episode of Dragnet.

21.

Bert Fields was the real-life lawyer for the show's creator and lead actor, Jack Webb.

22.

Bert Fields was noted as having "cultivated a dapper and urbane image, based in part on his fondness for English tailoring and English history", according to the Los Angeles Times.

23.

Bert Fields died of lung cancer in 1986, after 27 years of marriage.

24.

Bert Fields met his third wife, art expert Barbara Guggenheim, after she hired him to defend her when, in 1989, she was sued by Sylvester Stallone; they married in 1991.

25.

Bert Fields died at his home in Malibu, California, from complications of Long COVID on August 7,2022, at age 93.

26.

Bert Fields was buried at a private service at Pierce Brothers Westwood Village Memorial Park and Mortuary in Los Angeles.