David Begelman was an American film producer, film executive and talent agent who was involved in a studio embezzlement scandal in the 1970s.
22 Facts About David Begelman
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David Begelman was in the United States Army Air Forces during World War II.
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David Begelman then became a student at New York University.
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David Begelman left in 1960 to co-found the talent agency Creative Management Associates with Freddie Fields.
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At CMA, Fields and David Begelman pioneered the movie "package", where the talent agency put their stars, directors and writers together on a single project.
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David Begelman left CMA in 1973 to take over the floundering Columbia Pictures.
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David Begelman used his package method at Columbia, dramatically changing the company's image by producing such hits as Shampoo, Funny Lady and Close Encounters of the Third Kind.
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David Begelman had never received the money, and discovered that his signature on the cashed check had been forged.
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David Begelman was ultimately fined and sentenced to community service and a public service, anti-drug documentary for the forgeries.
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The studio discovered that David Begelman had embezzled an additional $65,000 through other forged checks.
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The David Begelman scandal led to a rift between Columbia executives.
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David Begelman McClintick broke the story in The Wall Street Journal in 1978, later turning it into a best-selling book, Indecent Exposure.
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Garland's estranged husband at the time, Sid Luft, hired an attorney to audit her income from the time David Begelman began representing her with fellow agent Freddie Fields.
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Luft's attorney eventually determined that the check went to a holding company with a business address in New York City owned by David Begelman, and was further traced to a personal account of David Begelman.
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In January 1980, David Begelman returned to the production world and became COO and president of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer signing a four-year contract worth $1.9 million.
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In 1981, MGM acquired United Artists and in October, David Begelman was appointed as chairman and CEO of UA but with the exception of Fame, Clash of the Titans, and Poltergeist, he was unable to repeat his success at Columbia and was dismissed in 1982.
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Under Sherwood, David Begelman backed WarGames, Mr Mom, The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension, and Blame It on Rio.
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When investor Nelson Bunker Hunt pulled out of Sherwood in 1984, David Begelman took the slack and founded Gladden Entertainment with the remaining assets and repartnering with McNall.
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At the 1993 Cannes Film Festival, David Begelman revealed that the company had a distribution deal with MGM, Live Entertainment and Rank Film Distributors for 10-film and $150-million.
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David Begelman became depressed over his Gladden Entertainment bankruptcy and failure to find funding for Gladden Productions.
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David Begelman was found shot dead in a room at the Century Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles on August 7,1995, at the age of 73.
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David Begelman's death was ruled a suicide; he was interred at Hillside Memorial Park Cemetery in Culver City.