I check the meaning of the word “don” in the online free dictionary, and am told it means either “A person of great importance (arch.)” or “The head of a Mafia family”. The latter sounds like more fun, so let’s pursue it. But wait, a lady from St. Louis, Missouri, has already done so, as I found from reading the Toronto based Globe & Mail newspaper. Her name is Sarah Kendzior. Let’s see what she wrote just as she wrote it:

Screen Shot 2017-06-09 at 4.42.17 PMIn May, Americans learned that under its new seemingly autocratic administration, the subject of an investigation can fire the investigator. One month later, that fired investigator, former FBI head James Comey, appeared before the hearing to describe an executive branch that operates less like a democratic institution and more like a cross between a Mafia shakedown and an audition for The Apprentice. Transparency, checks and balances, and due process have been replaced by secret dinners, loyalty oaths and casual declarations of obstruction of justice.

Fortunately, James Comey took notes.

On Wednesday, Mr. Comey released a copy of his opening statement describing his private meetings with President Donald Trump, culled from memos he wrote immediately after their encounters. They would make a great crime novel, if the crime weren’t the desecration of democracy and we didn’t have to live in it.

According to Thursday’s testimony, Mr. Trump – like a Mafia don – demanded unquestioning loyalty from Mr. Comey. And like a good public servant, Mr. Comey said he could only offer honesty. The President bargained that down to “honest loyalty,” which can be interpreted as a demand that Mr. Comey sacrifice his professional integrity for blind devotion to Mr. Trump. “We had that thing you know,” the President said, a phrase the former FBI director claimed he did not understand but which evokes Cosa Nostra a bit too well.

Screen Shot 2017-06-09 at 4.51.17 PMThen, of course, Mr. Trump fired him.

Since taking office, the President has run the U.S. more and more like a kleptocracy – a predictable move given his shady international ties and the corrupt nature of many of his past business ventures. But while Mr. Trump evokes foreign autocrats, his management style resembles that of an American mafioso. He views NATO as akin to a protection racket, public officials as personal minions, and the GOP as bound to a vow of Omerta. Refuse to comply, like Mr. Comey did, and face consequences.

His hearing was an important alternative to the obfuscation and propaganda of the Trump administration. Unlike most U.S. pundits and politicians, Mr. Comey called a lie a lie. He noted that for the first time in his tenure, he felt obligated to document his meetings with the President because he assumed that the President may be dishonest about their encounter. He said he needed his own records to defend not only himself, but the FBI.

This is a horrifying revelation on several levels. Mr. Comey confirmed that the President could not be trusted to look out for anyone’s interest but his own, and that threats to national sovereignty were of lesser concern to him than whether he and his cronies are implicated. In other words, the person tasked with protecting the American people is a person from whom the American people need to be protected. Mr. Comey strongly affirmed that the U.S. had been attacked by Russia, and gave no indication that in their interactions, Mr. Trump found this situation undesirable.

Mr. Comey kept a diary as democracy was dying – his own job among its casualties. By recording the meetings as they occurred, Mr. Comey’s records are legally admissible, bypassing the hearsay rule. But will his efforts matter? The hearings gave no indication that the GOP is willing to act on the evidence not only of collusion, but of flagrant obstruction of justice.

Republicans who once called for a non-partisan investigation of Russian interference now seem frightened into complicity. Former staunch Kremlin critic Marco Rubio – who had dinner with President Trump a few days ago, seemingly with a side order of a loyalty oath – treated Mr. Comey like a hostile witness. John McCain, who initially led the investigation charge, was barely coherent, confusing Mr. Comey with Mr. Trump and implying Hillary Clinton’s e-mails were somehow behind it all.

Mr. Comey’s firing showed how casually the Trump administration will violate norms, and the President’s open admission that he did so in order to get Mr. Comey off his back showed how casually he will disregard laws. This disregard is based on confidence that there will be no repercussions, and the cowed performance of the GOP makes his assumption seem reasonable. Even if the investigation is carried out, and crimes are confirmed, who will act on the findings?

Likely not Attorney-General Jeff Sessions, who as Mr. Comey noted, participated in his firing despite the fact that he is supposed to have recused himself from an investigation in which he, too, is implicated. The rot of the Trump administration runs deep, and extends beyond the U.S. borders. In a heartbreaking hearing, James Comey pledged allegiance to a version of the United States that is slipping away.

“A republic, if you can keep it,” Ben Franklin famously said. Mr. Comey tried.”

Well, there you have it. I don’t necessarily agree, mind you, but mark the “necessarily”. Thank you for this, Sarah Kendzior.

In a word, neither. I’m tired of reading the endless comments on Trump by entertainers, (mostly, as we notice, negative). It goes on and on. And on. Now here’s an exercise: Think of something positive to say about him, and say it. If you can’t, it’s because your liberal streak won’t let you. Then you may be one of the closed-minded people. That’s why I don’t vote, never have, never will. I am a follower of nobody. That’s what’s interesting and even fun about being an actor; you are forced to get into the skin of your character. Which is what surprises me about the mouthings of Meryl Streep.

An actor should be like the Speaker of the House of Commons (definitely not of the U.S. Congress). No side, no prejudice, no bias. Ready instead to take a leap into the unknown. The difference between good and great and genius.

I am a liScreen Shot 2017-02-18 at 11.22.40 PMfetime member of the New York Players, created by Edwin Booth, (some say as a penance for his brothers dastardly act, remember Lincoln?). My wife was the president for a while, until they offed her, for activism, I guess.

So I was welcomed as a guest at the Garrick Club in London, surrounded by aScreen Shot 2017-02-18 at 11.20.43 PMctors and oil paintings and extraordinary gentlemen (no lady members, sorry,) of the theatre, as well as gentlemen not of the theatre, there to relax in the texture of the place. The conversation mostly stayed clear of the political. Wonderful and intelligent eccentricity abounded, in the faces and in good and useful conversation, which was mostly of the anecdotal kind. Boy, I miss it.

Meryl, beware. Even if you want us to think of you as a sublime actor, we may no longer let you. Your fans will want you to assume a reliably liberal, political, identity. Take a hint from Glenda (Jackson). She got it out of her system, and now she’s back.

And I’m back, to Hollywood.

I posted this 3 months ago, in August. I hope he will turn out to be exciting in his new presidency. The U-turns being undergone by certain – and you know who I mean – celebrities, and refusal and possibly exodus of some of them to other countries, will be fascinating. And how about Politically Incorrect Bill Maher? He will become completely irrelevant to the scene from now on, unless he can spin it somehow.

Having sat through those two mind-numbing Conventions and wondering at the utter futility of all that talk, insults ad hominem/ad nauseam, spewing through the mouths of the candidates, their supporters and media spectator pundits – thumbs up or thumbs down as in the days of ancient Rome – I figured that Trump has probably got it made. We should resign ourselves to the fact that he will probably be the next occupant of the White House. Our loss is that we cannot then continue to poke fun at him in the way we’ve been doing. (Here I must reveal my secret admiration of him: that he financed his own campaign.)

But relax, take a swig or a puff or a snort, or whatever best opens your mind, and listen up.

He may amaze yet because he is not a conventional thinker, and his lack of politically engineered experience may clear the field, like a computer reboot, format, or system upgrade.Screen Shot 2016-08-11 at 11.21.14 AM

I don’t think he looks for wars. He looks for solutions. If he’d been there in 1939, he might have done a deal with Hitler to look East instead of West. Thus, Hitler would have had the challenge of containing Communism instead of us, there’d have been no Battle of the North Atlantic, no U-boats, and the deaths of 70 million scapegoats might not have had to be mourned by their grandparents, parents, brothers, sisters and children. Of course, we’ll never know.

But that’s past. How about the future?

How might he deal with todays’ fears from terrorism, and ISIS? The U.S, UK, France, Germany, and the rest of Europe seem to be out of ideas on that score. The ideology of PC thinking paralyzes the U.N. and its members. Would Trump do any better? Well, he’s perfectly capable of thinking the following. He might say

“Pay mercenaries. Hire headhunters. Professionals seeking bounties, and motivate them with lots of cash. Attract Gurkha warriors, who would know what to do with decapitating the enemy with their curved kukri weapons. Torture? Brutality? They would do as ISIS does, and make money while doing it. Any person wearing a black hood gets it.”

Countries would look the other way. They’d say ‘Deal with it, don’t tell us how.’

Most people can’t think like that. Certainly not Hillary or Obama. But if it worked, then the billions currently spent on security could be spent creating new businesses and jobs.

One might care to notice that America gained its empire by buying with cash, not killing and conquering. Alaska? California? Louisiana? St. Thomas? Purchases all.

So, I’m leaning more towards the acceptability of Trump. I think he’d be up for the challenge of true Democratic Capitalism. He could be exciting. Yes, it’s all about the money, yes.

Remember, it was the Bard who said “Where ignorance is bliss, ’tis folly to be wise”. Perhaps the time has come.

The BBC’s Radio Times, published from 1929 to the present, has been digitized as a database, and is now searchable up to 2009. Just remember to put titles and names in quotes, or it will come up with each word individually. You can copy-edit it, just like Wikipedia, or add information if you know it. The curators will first check out your edits before accepting them. (Genome=Genetic makeup of an organism. Thus says the BBC.)

http://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/

 

A friend in England named Steve, a begetter of all things Will Hay, sent me this movie clip which is quite fun to watch.

The Telegraph ran an obit today on classical pianist and composer Peter Katin. They ran a Pathe clip about “Three boys making a name for themselves” back in 1945. The third was jazz musician Victor Feldman, who died a few years ago. As I commented at the end of the piece “Two down and one to go – yikes, that’s me!”

An extraordinary new book written by a devoted Lynn Redgrave fan, and boasting about how she effected the outcome of her divorce action against me, has just been published and is available on Amazon.

Letters to Lynn Redgrave: Martial Enlightenment for Modern Women (and Men) by Jeri Massi

Jeri Massi is a fourth degree black belt in Taekwon Do Chung Do Kwan, a Master. She holds belts in other martial arts, including Shotokan karate and Tang Soo Do. She writes

“I am a woman martial arts master. In 1999, When actress Lynn Redgrave’s then husband John Clark was harassing her, I asked her to let me instruct her in the principles of martial enlightenment. She consented. This book is our correspondence.

It is based on Miyamoto Musashi’s Book of Five Rings. It should be helpful to anybody in desperate circumstances. The lessons calmed and guided her. War begins in the mind, and an intelligent, calm fighter can defeat an opponent by exploiting the undisciplined fears and desires of his or her opponent.”

Wow!  I was so impressed, I just HAD to get this book. She focuses upon how she masterminded Lynn’s financially successful lawsuit for divorce against me. I was stunned. Not being an attorney or a medical doctor, I wonder how Lynn’s attorney Emily Edelman felt about that during the case? Or how Judge Gold would have felt about that while it was sub judice? Or the State Bar of California?  Or the office of the District Attorney (Statutes about UPL).  Or, come to think of it, my own team of attorneys for not asking the right questions. I bought 14 copies, enough for a jury and backup. As I read it, I saw how this woman had taken over Lynn’s mind and become her Svengali.

Check it out.

I gave it one star only on Amazon, because, as I said there in my comment,

“As the husband she physically threatens throughout this book, I am fascinated by her rendering of a non-existent person. I would have given it 5 stars if it was intended as satire, for here are the makings of a great Saturday Night Live sketch. But since there is no such disclaimer by the author, a non-lawyer religious fundamentalist black belt kickboxer, I have to conclude that she is serious. Hence one star.”

Since it was against my wife’s nature to live according to this Rasputin’s instructions which she readily obeyed, and served lawyer Edelman’s purposes, nature took its course. Karma lives, she didn’t!

My kids, who followed along because they’d benefit from the Living Trust she secretly created, explains why we are alienated. Shame on them. My feelings are bolstered by old Will through the cry of King Lear: How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is to have a thankless child… Away, away!

Now I understand why I was evicted from the 1999 SAG Awards and she called the police on me to make sure I was not allowed to attend the 1999 Independent Spirit Awards to watch her success for Gods & Monsters and Shine, or the 1999 Oscars where she was nominated for Best Supporting Actress – both of which I booked for her, and negotiated! (No agent.)

I read the L.A. Times report again. The article, under Ann O’Neill’s byline, demolished me the defendant, and was actually written by their journalist Louise Roug who daily attended the trial. If the media had known that Lynn’s animosity towards me, and adamant refusal to submit to mediation or interviews was being directed, not by her attorney, but illegally by this woman, the result would have been vastly different. Undoubtedly, the judge would have sanctioned Lynn and Emily Edelman, Esq. for contempt of court, and reviewed again my motion for him to recuse himself. He’d favored her throughout, and allowed her to leave the jurisdiction!

This revelation opens up a whole new avenue for me, and the clock starts running NOW (4 year SOL)

The L.A. Times article, combined with my itemized response to each point, is an important document, especially in the light of this book, which changes everything. Read it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I appeared in a few of Pathé Pictorial’s onscreen newsreels, seen before the feature in the old days (with perhaps a cartoon), or to pass the time while waiting for a train. Now we can watch many of these old clips again.

This is great news! With funds from the National Lottery, they have digitized their inventory.

I’m writing a play which includes my childhood actor days back in the forties (I’ve been accused of being Britain’s Justin Bieber back then!)   There’s going to be a reunion in London, and I hope to be at the Cinema Museum to join them. You can skip what follows if you wish, otherwise you might find it of interest:

Three of us young kids were chosen for this newsreel, because we were “making a name for ourselves“.

It’s fun to see, and then go fast forward to our adulthood, and see how it panned out. First there was me, no secrets here. Then there was Peter Katin, a still living and busy concert pianist.

Finally, Victor Feldman, and if you are a jazz enthusiast, you know who he is, or was. Sadly, he died a few years ago. I ran into him at a club in North Hollywood one evening, asked him if he remembered when we last met, and he said he couldn’t remember anything that far back! He was considered the young Gene Krupa on the British scene, but then went on to other instruments. An all around musician.

Here are some others:

This is the only remnant of the radio Will Hay Programme that I can find. That the BBC didn’t preserve those shows for the record is shocking.
My transition from Will Hay to Just William.
Here were the actors of yesterday, now living at Denville Hall, London, followed by the promising stars of tomorrow.

My play will be attempt at an autobiography as told from the stage, hopefully entertaining. I plan to use some frames as stage projections.

And if you got this far, thanks for indulging me.

John, I see you were born in London in 1932 and attended Watford Grammar School. Given that you started working for the BBC in 1944 you must have planned to be an actor from a very early age. Was that always your ambition? Did you have early training?

Three nos. I had no plan to be an actor, no ambition, and no training. When I went to Kings Langley’s Rudolph Steiner school (locally known as the “do as you like” school), at the age of ten, I was cast in the annual school play, Puck in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, performed outdoors in the garden. But that was it, and I hated doing it, it seemed kind of gay; I was not turned on to acting, and had no thoughts along those lines. 

Your first show on BBC radio was The Will Hay Programme in 1944 where you acted as D’Arcy Minor, the swot of St. Michael’s. How did that come about? And was it fun working with Will Hay?

My family lived in Chipperfield, Herts, in those days, and I was coming home on the bus after school one day in August, when a man came up to me who I recognized, for he lived down the road. His name was Alick Hayes, and he asked me if I was a good reader. I told him yes, and he said could I come over later, meet his wife Zillah, have a cup of tea, and read him something out of the Evening Standard, so after supper I did. He tested me for fluency, to see if I could read without stumbling, and he was pleased that I could. He then explained that he was a BBC producer, and was about to start a new BBC radio comedy series, but the young actor he was going to use had just got sick, and he had an emergency, and maybe I could help out.

The show was The Will Hay Programme (The Diary of a Schoolmaster) and the part was that of a very clever young swot who said very long multi-syllabic words instead of shorter ones whenever he answered the schoolmaster’s questions. Mr Hayes wanted me to play it, just the first show, and he said it would save him from having to find another actor quickly from an acting academy. It was going out live in front of an audience from the Paris Cinema, a basement BBC studio off Piccadilly Circus, in just three days’ time.

I raced home, told my parents, said please let me do it, it sounds like fun, and it pays money. So my mother took me up to London next day, and that is where I met Will Hay and the rest of the cast – one schoolmaster and three students, so-called. Smart was the cheeky one (played by the very professional actor Charles Hawtrey), Beckett the dumb one (Billy Nicholls, on his day off from the RAF), and D’Arcy Minor, the studious swot (me). The joke was that I was the only real schoolboy (eleven years old). Will Hay was repeating the same schoolmaster act he had done in several of his films (Good Morning Boys, 1937, etc). It will be remembered that the comedy came out of the fact that he was a hopeless teacher, and the students took over.

That first day I remember well. Continue Reading Just William Society Magazine interview

June 1st. 2013

I see that my late ex will be having an Off-Broadway theatre named for her at a June 3rd 2013 ceremony in New York. The 45 Bleecker Street Theatre will thereafter be called the Lynn Redgrave Theatre. I am pleased for her. I plan to be there, and to become re-acquainted with my children and old family members and friends.

This has given me occasion to reflect on our life together.

Lynn and I, over the course of a little under 33 years, made a change in the landscape for the life of actors, for the better, I do believe. We never went looking for trouble. It came to us, and instead of burying it, we fought back.

REVIEW

First was a lawsuit against the Gate Theatre in Dublin. We put on a play starring Lynn and Dan O’Herlihy, my first directing job actually. We ran for 3 sold-out weeks (the longest they’d book us), the best box office in their history. Our deal was to split profits, which were excellent. Instead, they took half of our gross receipts. Discovery revealed that the Irish government, the owners, had years before ordered the management to make the theatre available to outside Irish companies for free. We lived locally, hired Irish actors, financed the show, and of course paid all the costs of our production. A 4-wall deal. We lost the case because their manager got me to initial a contract clause over my shoulder while I was directing a scene. The judge held me to it. We left Dublin soon after, leaving an Irish Equity with a smile on its face, for we had broken the Gate’s hold on their previous minimal actor’s salaries. It’s worth mentioning that despite (or because of) using an Irish attorney, brother of a prominent Irish actor, we lost and didn’t get our money back.

Then we headed West, back to my home town of New York, where we were soon greeted with a lawsuit filed against us by U.S. Equity who extorted 5% of my wife’s self-paid salary as dues, from a year’s tour we took across America with our own show, financed by us and directed by me. We had posted Equity bonds at each date, and they refused to return them. Again, we lost. Because of Vanessa’s political views, Lynn was under watch, and the release of her green card was held up. Equity rules defined a green card holder as actually holding it in her hand! The judge said this was a stupid lawsuit, but was forced to rule in their favor.  They returned the bonds less 5%. But, in a form of revenge you might say, we made a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board, who summoned the leaders of all of the performing unions, and found that Equity alone had been breaking the law for years, penalizing foreign stage performers for daring to peddle their art in America. They had constructed a punitive discriminatory dues structure, in order to discourage them. This time we won because they won. Now foreign actors are treated equally, and have a smile on their faces too, because it has led to a relatively free exchange of actors between America and England and elsewhere. Certainly audiences have applauded this development. We however, were deprived of financial satisfaction because we were outside the Statute of Limitations (3 year rule.) Yul Brynner received hundreds of thousands of dollars which nearly broke the union, but he was very nice, he invited me to lunch with him at the Bel Air, and gave me a bunch of daffodils for her, by way of his thanks.

Next came our famous lawsuit against Lew Wasserman and MCA/Universal, when Lynn was fired for wishing to breastfeed our daughter Annabel at work. Our thoroughly compromised WMA agent didn’t help, nor did our attorneys, and UTV’s press department went to work. Our suit was quietly dismissed by a corrupted judge headed for retirement. I wrote about it in the “Housecalls, what really happened” topic on the left. Expensive yeah, and actor mothers and fathers were eternally grateful for causing all Film and TV companies to provide facilities for employees who were new mothers and their babies. That was the only positive to come out of that case. In the event, they were ordered to reimburse our attorneys’ fees. They didn’t. They’d faxed notice of a hearing to our locked office while we were performing Love Letters up in San Francisco, and avoided payment due to our non-appearance, thanks to their famed “I always win” attorney Gale Title. No transcript was made of the proceedings, so Lew kept all of our attorney fees, and we never knew how he managed to make that happen.

Next, Lynn and I were asked to lead the Players, Edwin Booth’s 1888 gift to actors on Gramercy Park, by our close friends Garson Kanin and Ruth Gordon. I’d been a member for many years. The club was in dire straits. No proper books, so we gave them 20 grand to construct a proper set. Then our tough love for them proved to be too much, and we were summarily ejected. They’re still floundering. I see that steps are being taken by insiders for a clean sweep to improve its chances of survival. For my trouble, I’ve been called John Sleeper Clarke.

This gives me pause. The comparisons are striking! Booths = Redgraves! Consider: Separated by about one hundred years, it produces quite startling results. Junius Brutus cf. Sir Michael = Shakespearean actors, patriarchs and family founders, both. John Wilkes cf. Corin and Vanessa = fiery political trouble-makers, both. Asia cf. Lynn = good writers, recorders of their family stories, both. John Clarke cf. John Clark (me), married to those same sisters. We are the link by our same name. We are both lawyerly, both wicked comedians, both into management, and as Asia wrote to her brother Edwin “He lives a free going bachelor life and does what he likes.”  Sorry, no comment from me there, and he’s dead! Enough already.

COMPLAINT

To bring us up to date, I am here to say that the tradition is still alive, even though Lynn isn’t. I still choose to live dangerously, sui juris, out of some kind of personality defect, contrariness, orneriness, or just some kind of survival instinct from bad ad litem experiences – it’s not for me to say. But today I filed a Complaint with the Los Angeles Better Business Bureau, and the Los Angeles Department of Consumer Affairs against The Breakdown Services, Ltd. This is only a start, but hopefully it will lead to a satisfactory finish. Their stranglehold on the casting process is a scandal. Read it here:

I am a British born professional actor age 80, and have been a union member in England, Canada and America since 1944 (SAG/AFTRA, US Equity, ACTRA, Canadian Equity, British Equity). I am and have been a U.S. citizen since 1965. I do not use a “manager” or an “agent” because of past conflict of interest problems with them, and the experience of a major lawsuit against the William Morris Agency. I get my own acting jobs, but am effectively prevented from doing so.

I need to avail myself of full casting information from the Breakdowns, aka “Breakdown Services” (hereinafter “BS”), which is a monopoly service employed by all big and small movie and TV production and theatre companies. Scripts and story lines are received by BS from these companies, and from them, BS creates a breakdown of story plots and characters. This information is supplied EXCLUSIVELY to agents and/or managers electronically for money and profit, which is their business practice.

Actors, the subject of these notices, are shut out from seeing all, I said all, of them!

The owner/founder of BS, Gary Marsh, told his audience at a seminar he gave the evening of March 20, 2013 at the premises where I live at Oakwood, Barham Blvd. Hollywood, to a group of child actors and their mothers that he has criminal lawsuits pending against actors who have bootlegged his information. I have done this in the past. He told me that I could not buy their services at any price, only managers and agents, and between them they set the rules. I asked him if I could receive this information if I became a manager, and he said I could not qualify because I am an actor, and if I “wear 2 hats”, I would still be denied. There were at least 20 witnesses.

If you think that Mr. Marsh is not serious, look what he did to Mr. Brian Burke. He got himself a judgment of $1.3 million, and put Burke behind bars for 20 days for not obeying his court order! That’s an abuse of power, Mr. Marsh, a terrible abuse of actors who are trying to find available  work which you keep secret except for your paying privileged customers, aka agents and managers. You claim that it is the production companies and casting directors who make your rules. That, Mr. Marsh, is BS! The best of BS!

I believe that all actors are protected from this kind of discriminatory anti-competitive practice by government law, such as The Sherman Act, of July 2, 1890, ch. 647, 26 S 209, 15 U.S.C. §§ 1–7. Permit yourself to read it, Mr. Marsh, assuming you respect the laws of the United States.

Breakdown Services operates and reaches across state lines from coast to coast, and abroad. There is no competitive service anywhere. 

As settlement, I DEMAND

That the Breakdown Services provides this information ONLINE, so that ALL ACTORS across the world have access to it, at NO CHARGE. Any cost or expense should be born by the Breakdown Services, and passed on to the production companies. It is their joint problem. Together, they created it.

This complaint will soon appear online for the inspection and I hope support of actors. No, not their managers, and not their agents, and not the production companies. They’ll hate it. Actors don’t wish to be “protected from themselves” (see Gary Marsh’s Q&A link above) and will care, and, I’m pretty sure, SAG/Aftra and Equity will care too. I hope the brave ones will flock to support the request. This is not to denigrate Breakdown Services, for they do a fine job. We just want them to open up to us, the central sine qua non of their business, and stop insulting our intelligence.

Follow along and let me know you support this complaint, so that regulators are assured that we actors and directors WANT to know what jobs are available, 100% of them, not just for our enablers (managers and agents) to know, if you employ them at all, but ALL of us. Actors have voices off camera too, in our free society. Let them be heard loud and clear.

My Twitter handle is John Clark@johnclarknew. Click on it. I need feedback!

I hope it will not be necessary to file a lawsuit against Breakdown Services, because I don’t like lawyers either. And this would need one. I’m also too old to see it through the byways of the U.S. legal system. Here’s another example of what I’m talking about.

 

August 11, 2006

People have often asked me this question.  They say “Look what the Jews did to you”

Indeed. Judge Arnold Gold put me in jail the day before I had to appear in court to start defending myself in my two cases initiated by Lynn and Nicolette (working together or separately, I never knew). He kicked me out of my house to sell it and pay for the fees of opposing counsel (who filed suit against me in the first place) who were 1. my wife’s killer “divorce designer” attorney Emily Shappell Edelman (Jewish) and 2. Nicolette Hannah’s killer divorce attorney (Jewish), James R. Eliaser, whose evil tactics deprived a small boy of his father, and who, I discovered quite by accident, used to be an employee of the judge’s law firm Pachter & Gold.  These two Jews conspired to conceal the fact that they used to work together, knowing full well that Judge Gold should have automatically recused himself under the rules. When I challenged them in court – wait for it – they both chimed in their answers, that they had quite forgotten about it, and then Judge Gold said that it would hardly make any difference, and I, unbelievably, BELIEVED HIM and didn’t enforce the rule.

So, in its good time, I would find that my opponents would have their wishes granted. Gold evicted me from my home, sold it, gave me just a couple of thousand dollars as my community property share, gave my co-op apartment at The Osborne opposite Carnegie Hall away to my wife, granted full custody of my son to his mother thus causing the loss of his Dad to him, and him to me, and caused the exodus of the entire Clark family, less me, to the East Coast, and the fracture of the Redgrave brand.

And so there I was, from my day one of proper pro se, caught up in a hellish circle of interlinked Jewish characters ritually conspiring in a fore-ordained dance which, in the case of my wife Lynn Redgrave, became a dance of death (which I truly believe.) Listen to the charade, and follow along on the revealed theme.

There was Family Court Supervising Judge Aviva Bobb, who I believe is Jewish, who backed Gold up, kept awarding new fees to Eliaser, and then refused to let me buy my guest house so that I could continue to live in Topanga, keep my dogs, and not store my belongings and not live in a trailer. Here is a reminder of my expectations that celebrity pandering could not happen in Hollywood’s hallowed halls of justice.  We read this

on the wall next to the entrance to the filing office.

An Appeal to the Second Circuit got me a negative review from Justice Miriam Vogel, also Jewish.

Judge Gold, meanwhile, escaped the wrath of his brothers on the Judicial Council by “retiring” right after disposing of me and my case, thus avoiding their oversight and possible disciplinary action. Must have been nervous. For my discovery of the foundation of his  personal character, read about this in the sidebar.

An Appeal to the Supreme Court, after I had written to Chief Justice Ronald George (whose office manager had encouraged me to appeal) who I believe is also Jewish, was turned down.

And the media, which wouldn’t stop, appeared to get more fodder from the site of Hebrew University, where one of their professors made me her target for an absurd made-up story setting out to prove her totally inapposite use of me in a legal paper.  Eliaser advocated for her, her name was Hila Keren, and to this day, I have received no response from her. I hope her students hold her to account.

And then of course, there was Lew Wasserman, the top Jew in Hollywood, from the old House Calls breast feeding case.

Well, my answer to this ALL-IMPORTANT QUESTION is that far from being anti-semitic, I am, perhaps surprisingly, PRO-SEMITIC AND HUGELY ENVIOUS OF THEM. Here’s why:

I have always respected the culture of the Jews, and their education, which certainly exceeds mine. I look up to them, and their low numbers among the world’s population has always astonished me.  Always an outsider, I even believe I have the soul of a Jew. I have made a point of making close friends with Jewish people.  (In fact, more than one of my girlfriends was Jewish.)

I WANT TO BECOME JEWISH, so that I could be completely like them, recognizably the same, but without their religious beliefs, a secular Jew.

I believe that there is the APPEARANCE of networking and mutual backscratching taking place.  Of course, business is all about mutual backscratching, nothing wrong with that, but if I am right, I want to be a part of THAT network.

It is absolutely no coincidence that I believe I could then enter the places where Jewish mingling and socializing take place. Clubs, temples, agents’ offices and so forth, where right now I would be unwelcome and refused entry. Perhaps because I am no longer attached to a celebrity.

It was Adolph Zukor, that originator of things Hollywood, founder of Paramount Pictures, who ages ago gave this deathless advice to newcomers to the Hollywood scene: “Talk British but think Yiddish!” That was right up my tree.

To this end, I have entertained the thought of taking a hint from Careen Johnson, a struggling black bricklayer and funeral parlor assistant who, dying to become successful as an actress, changed her name to Whoopee Goldberg.  She was smart, it got her an Emmy, an Oscar, a Tony and a Grammy. And of course she had the great talent to back it up.

Now me, I could change my name to Clarkstein or Clarkberg, but would it help? Not bloody likely! If I became a Jew aspiring to become successful as an actor or a celebrity, I would surely be advised to change it back to Clark.

Don’t think so?  Look at Emmanuel Goldenberg, Muni Weisenfreund, Julius Garfinkle, David Kaminsky, Bernard Schwartz, Jacob Cohen, Joyce Frankenberg, Aaron Chwatt and Ephraim Goldberg.  They changed their monikers to Edward G. Robinson, Paul Muni, John Garfield, Danny Kaye, Tony Curtis, Rodney Dangerfield, Jane Seymour, Red Buttons and Frank Gehry respectively. And then there was Larry King (interesting choice, but what is wrong with “Larry Zeiger Live”?)

No, I’m afraid that that can only be my fantasy.

But getting back to the law, I did make a point of hiring Jewish lawyers, who always keep their original names perhaps as a badge of office, oh, and a Jewish press agent, thinking that would help.

The first to defend me was Melvin S. Goldsman, and Marci Levine, Esqs. of Freid & Goldsman, their names giving them away.

I fired them when I found that my Mel allowed his Jewish adversary to write a time sensitive stipulation to Nicolette that could have led to the cessation of hostilities, didn’t read it because he was out of the office and there’s no money in ceased hostilities, and told his secretary to tell me to sign it, which I did.  Boy, was I green at the beginning.  Perhaps they were old friends. Perhaps they performed regularly for the Beverly Hills Bar Association.

My next was Steve Mindell, Esq. I fired him because he was about as  aggressive as my little son’s kindergarten teacher.  When I asked him to get Lynn to open a joint bank account with me so that she could pay her share of the upkeep of our joint property during the three years of my lone occupation, he simply told me she wouldn’t agree. When I asked him to get our joint stock portfolo released from the freeze put on it at the height of the dotcom bubble so we could cash out, again, he wouldn’t do it. It would have meant getting a court order, and he wouldn’t go to court for it. Nothing appeared to be happening, other than his endless bills.

So then I hired noted hit man Mike Kelly, Esq., a referral from a Topanga millionaire divorcee lady friend. He’s Irish, (the worst kind, I hear someone shout – but that’s a joke). I disliked him from the start, he was of the “nudge nudge wink wink” variety, veiling the suggestion that he really knew I was trying to get away with something, but he’d-do-his-best-to-save-me. I fired him after stretched out three hundred dollar an hour months when he yelled at me for trying to get Nicolette evicted from her little house by not paying the property taxes, causing it to be sold by the taxing authorities. He hadn’t bothered to read the 1-page notice, which had been sent over to him by Eliaser, whom I’m sure had read it. Of course, it wasn’t for me, it belonged to another John Clark, on a rundown foreclosing property in South Central Los Angeles!

My last lawyer did not appear for me, he was a sort of advisor. His name was Cy Schaffer (also a Jew), to whom I paid $50,000.  In court, Judge Gold said he had made an order that I was not to use funds from a tax refund to pay this lawyer, and he should immediately refund it to me. Schaffer elaborately protested in court. Gold hunted for his order, then said he couldn’t find it, and told him he could keep the money. Of course. Naturally. I never did get a bill, or an account of his hours. I don’t forget that he got me to type up a brief for him, in his apartment. Couldn’t figure out the “Word” software.

So now I was out of lawyers because I got sick of their dishonesty and stopped believing in them.  More importantly, I’d lost six hundred thousand dollars to them, and had no more money. That’s how I came to represent myself in court, and had to learn what it is to be a PRO SE.

Having wised up, my first appearance before Judge Gold was over the unread-by-my-attorney property tax inquiry. There was Eliaser, sputtering to the judge that I was trying to get his client evicted. I showed the court a copy of the receipt to prove I had paid the property taxes, and then the 1-page notice showing it didn’t belong to me. Judge Gold just smiled, and thanked me for being smart enough to catch it. I asked for a money sanction against Eliaser for wasting the court’s time. Not granted. Of course. Naturally.

As for my Jewish press agent, a gentleman named Michael Levine, a self-styled media expert, I hired him to give me advice on handling the media now that I was suing Larry Zeiger -sorry, King. I got no advice at all; he refused to visit me at my house, but I did find that my money, about thirteen thousand dollars, went towards starting his new wannabe Drudge Report, aimed at bringing down the likes of Mel Gibson and Michael Jackson and maybe me and others who APPEAR to be breaking his moral code (chuckle chuckle). Networking again, is my opinion. But unlike Red Buttons, I did get a dinner, several actually. It wasn’t until after I had dropped him that I discovered that he used to be married to King’s current wife by whom he had a child. I think he should have told me about that before I paid him a penny.

So thanks, Arnold Gold, but no thanks. However did you get your robe of office? Must be quite a story, which I tell if you click here, and then scroll down a bit to where it says “Genesis”.

If I ever get as drunk as Mel Gibson, I’m told that I tend to act out my Jewish fantasy while singing the freedom chorus of the Hebrew slaves in their banishment.  My God, the middle one looks like HIM!

But when I sober up, I get to thinking more about what “they” did to me.  Here I am, my possessions lost or stolen, alienated by my kids and my family (I face back East to see them), removed from my house and my wealth by quasi-military enforcers, and exiled from Topanga, my Homeland. Then these words come to me.

As long as deep in the heart,
The soul of a Jew yearns,
. . . . . . . . . .
Our hope is not yet lost.

And Barbra comes to my rescue in song.

 

How would this headline have looked back in 1999? Because that is what I was trying to prevent and DID prevent, at great cost to me as it turned out.

 

LYNN REDGRAVE, SON, NANNY JAILED

Illegal Green Card Scam. Feds step in.

Lover Revealed.

   By ALISON BOSHOFF

   29 March, 1999

John Clark today reveals the truth about his 32 year marriage to actress and star Lynn Redgrave in this exclusive interview with the Daily Mail, now that his wife is headed for jail. He says he does this to “clear the air”, but that it gives him no pleasure whatsoever.

He says that about ten years into his marriage, Lynn revealed that she began a secret affair with actor Brandon Maggart, following in the same footsteps as her mother, actress Rachel Kempson, who maintained a secret 40 year affair with noted theatre director Glen Byam Shaw, bi-sexual husband of Upstairs Downstairs actress Angela Baddeley. She told John that Brandon wanted her for himself, that they loved each other, but that, like her mother, she would not dump John because of their small children, in much the same way that Rachel’s husband Sir Michael Redgrave wanted to keep his 50 year marriage going as a gay cover. However, she said she would continue the affair, and in fact arranged for Maggart to join her in the next dressing-room in the failed 1989 ABC-TV series Chicken Soup, where she co-starred with comedian Jackie Mason. Maggart proudly posted these pictures on his vanity website, as trophy proof which are worth a thousand words, he says. They show her at the Farmer’s Market in Santa Monica, then the two of them with Bill Clinton, and finally, in a picture take by their daughter Annabel, revealed her relationship with the Maggot (as John refers to him.)

 

This picture, taken from the website, shows John’s family, (and on the left Maggart’s son also named Brandon, who the court put in charge of the house during the term of his eviction.)

According to John, she became pregnant by him, but aborted the baby during rehearsals for Saint Joan, a Broadway play he directed for her. She told him that he would be “kept on” to continue to organize, manage, and assist in all aspects of her career, at her direction, so as to be able to dispense with agents, publicists, lawyers, money managers, and for protection from the press. And to continue to run the home, chauffeur the kids, and feed her horses. For his part, he says that since it was his only job, he told her “O.K. but all bets are off” as far as his own personal life was concerned. So he became the cuckolded husband.

He went on to present her in her first solo Broadway show Shakespeare For My Father, which he put together from her first scribblings, re-wrote parts of it, financed it alone, produced it alone, and directed it alone. That show was nominated for a Tony. He continued to stay in the background, uncredited, for that’s the way she insisted it be. He later found out that was a bad idea. She erased him from the record.

When the sister of their former English nanny Adeline came to live with them in 1990, the family dynamics changed. Nicolette Hannah was a “failed” Jehovah’s Witness who had been banished from the sect for having an affair with a married man. In her misery, and to help her carry on with her life, he suggested that a baby would be in order, and that he would arrange for its birth and send them both back to England where she could start a new life, and that he’d send her money until she found a husband.

Lynn was aware of this arrangement, and heartily condoned it. In fact, the day his son Jonathan was to be married in Dublin coincided with the day the baby was going to appear. He couldn’t be in both places at the same time and so, at Lynn’s suggestion, he attended the birth at a hospital in Santa Monica, and sent Benjy to Dublin.

His son from his first marriage, Jonathan, was a last minute baby appearing after his separation from Canadian actress Kay Hawtrey years before, in 1963. Furious because of his marriage to Lynn, she, using a Toronto family-law lawyer, denied him access to Jonathan in his growing years, ignoring court orders. John did not press for jail-time for Jonathan’s mother.

When Nicolette’s baby turned out to be a boy, he inevitably replaced the missing years of Jonathan. They named him Zachary John, and the only problem was that he was captivatingly adorable, and the family fell in love with him. Annabel got a brother, Lynn a grandson, and Zach got a father (but didn’t know it), raw irony at its fullest. Nicky, as she was always called, had named John as surviving parent in  her holographic will, in case anything happened to her. He became his guardian angel of a sort, and John says his first duty was to make sure the boy was happy and had a place to play and call his second home. John unwisely introduced Nicky to his and Lynn’s porn publisher friend Al Goldstein, whom they had helped save from prison in a midwest trial over his controversial Screw Magazine, being mailed across state lines. Nicky swooned into his ready arms, and decided she wanted to marry him, a horrifying outcome from Zach’s point of view.  He interceded successfully, and then the next danger came from an entirely unexpected source, Ernesto, his married Mexican plumber. He had hoped for a better quality husband for her, a nice rich jewish Beverly Hills corporate lawyer, perhaps. But it was not to be. (She did marry him, years later.)

While Lynn knew what was going on, they made sure that their children did not, and arranging for mother and child to stay in America meant careful planning, which turned out disastrously.

John is sorry that Lynn and Benjy and Zachary’s mother are in jail. It turned out to be unwise to meet with agents of the Justice Department using the “I am a celebrity” approach in an attempt to make sure they would not check up on Benjy’s arranged marriage, (for which he was well paid by Nicky.) They did check up. Was John involved in this attempted scam? Yes, he says, he was. And he wrote privately to tell them he was, and did not hear back. They left him out of it.

Meanwhile, the culprits have yet to appear in court to answer a few questions, for celebrities cannot be seen to get special treatment. In fact, they should be aware that celebrities are often used, depending on who they are, to set an example for the general public to know that they are not exempt from the harsh punishment of the law.

John says that Lynn was always a woman living “under the influence”. By that he meant that due to her strange upbringing, she was ill-equipped to handle life when she suddenly became a celebrity in competition with her already established and ambitious older sister Vanessa, and the intrusions of her father and his boyfriend’s planned projects into her evolving career. John says that, having lived the celebrity life before he met her, he was just the person to be her partner, and help her feel safe, secure, and well promoted upon their move to the United States where he was a citizen. And that if she were to leave him she will fall under another influence, probably through the advances of the always roaming sexual predators, and find that her days are numbered.

However, now that John sees his life with Lynn has come to an end, he breathes a sigh of relief, and wishes her and their kids well, and looks forward to getting back to his first love, which is acting and directing and film making, and to be a part of Zachary’s Topanga Canyon life as he grows up. He says he has no regrets at all, and perhaps his only failure, as a Redgrave, was not being a homosexual.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Google my name John Clark, and I just found that the Daily Mail was at it again. They’ve “updated” that article from 1999 when it was all happening and it was all about damage control caused by Nicolette’s lawyer James Eliaser, Esq., and attached it to the comments I made to a couple of reporters from the gossip agency Splash at my door on the occasion of Lynn’s death a couple of years ago. The Splash folks turned around and sold our conversation to the Daily Mail as though it was they who had interviewed me. Now, due to Google’s improved software, anyone googling my name comes up with that article, with the headline

The love child who broke Lynn Redgrave’s heart: In the week the actress died, her ex-husband tells of his shame and regret

By Alison Boshoff

UPDATED: 19:42 EST, 7 May 2010

I had already reported their dishonest tactics to the Press Commission in London (see that subject dealt with on the left).

There are two new biographies of the Redgrave family about to appear. One is the Donald Spoto biography titled The Redgraves: A Family Epic, and the other is The House of Redgrave, The Secret Lives of a Theatrical Dynasty by Tim Adler. I fully expect to be slaughtered again, with the same Daily Mail courtesy, a blood sport indeed. I shall buy them, read them, and report on them. As for me, an interview I gave to the Just William Society will be appearing shortly in their magazine, which will start me off on my book, yet to be finished.

In the meantime, in the sure knowledge that these authors will have got it wrong as far as my life with Lynn is concerned, let them read and ponder the facts, as filed under oath in my COMPLAINT against Larry King and CNN in District Court in Los Angeles on September 23, 2004. Here they will find out the whole story. That’s how I’ve been spending my time. Some retirement! But I think it is useful to educate the public on the workings and failings of our judicial system in these United States of America.

Anyway, it is for these reasons that I cannot let these false impressions of me sit there any longer, for there are still Lynn fans out there who refuse to accept me. It’s the same with professionals and the media, and it interferes with my rights, civil and professional, and my ability to make a living. I figure that after 12 years, the statute of limitations will have run its course. Both ladies hoodwinked me and hoodwinked you, with the help of a court of law, an evil judge, and evil attorneys by the name of Emily Edelman, and James Eliaser, all in it together for the money.

I think that readers can see from this that I have no “Shame and Regret” whatsoever. But please be advised that I was never interviewed by Alison Boshoff. If the Daily Mail cares to print this now, they have my permission, freely given.

To Lynn’s fans who are furious at me for bringing this up saying “let the dead R.I.P”, I have this in reply. I firmly believe in L.I.P. (Live in Peace). Anyway, how do we know that the dead are resting in peace? We don’t. I know that Lynn certainly didn’t die in peace, for she was essentially a good person (or I wouldn’t have agreed to marry her) and knew exactly what she was secretly doing to me, motivated by her lover, his 2 sons, a highly paid trickster of a lawyer, and a judge with a shady past. Her death resulted from something called Karma.

I needed to attend her funeral for many private and personal reasons. My son, feeling loyal and bound by her orders, forcibly stopped me at the church in Kent, Connecticut, and I nearly met my own death in a nearby hospital. I wish I could report that my kids are back with me now. Not so. I haven’t heard from them since. Meanwhile, the First Congregational Church and the Actors Fund adored her. In return for their adoration, she bequeathed $10,000 to each in her will. She later got a memorial fundraiser for the Fund, so good for them. They need the money.

In 1999 The Daily Telegraph wanted to pay me a million dollars, which would be split with their writer, for a joint book, and I turned them down, because Lynn’s life would have been destroyed, and I would have looked like a short term husband on the make. I am not, and have never needed to be, that kind of a person. I told them that when the time came, I would be writing my own book, alone, and I’ve kept their correspondence as proof. (n.b. It will not be called “Enter the Plumber”). And, BTW, I’ve never accepted a penny for an interview.

That time has come. Stay tuned. From now on I’m ready, maybe to self-publish if I have to. I need to be paid!

 

I have frequently been asked by friends and others in this largely free-wheeling buyer-beware jungle of our industry called Showbiz with its circling network of lawyers and contracts and producers and unions and agents and managers and publicists and landlords and traffic courts … to help them.

They say it’s all very well, but you don’t tell us how to conduct a lawsuit or even understand what’s going on. You find yourself in court as a sue-ee or a sue-er, and I need to know what do I do now?

As you know, I am not a lawyer. I did take out my Notary license, but by law I cannot give legal advice. However, I can, and have, told you what happened to me, what to beware of, and what I learned the hard way. I could give you a nudge to point you towards a trustworthy lawyer, but I haven’t found one yet. I’d much rather find out how to arm myself (no, not with a gun), and how to do it in a professional manner. I did sign up for an online course to become a lawyer a few years ago, but gave up after listening to a few lectures. Not for me, and I don’t sell out!

I scoured the internet for self-help guides, and was not impressed. No sense of what really goes on in a court room (a parallel world, and believe me, they’re all intimidating, as are lawyers’ offices.) They give false impressions and empty comfort.

Then I found Dr. Frederick Graves online, an experienced retired Florida lawyer, like me with a mission. I bought his program and studied it. I didn’t then have any particular personal use for it, except to kick myself for being green and stupid. Now I do need it, so I recently bought his latest updated version and checked it out. I have examined it in detail, and I can say that it very effectively teaches you how to FILE AND RUN A LAWSUIT FROM START TO FINISH, or if you prefer, HOW TO MAKE SURE THAT YOUR LAWYER IS DOING HIS JOB IN YOUR BEST INTERESTS and HOW TO MAKE SURE THE JUDGE IS BEHAVING HIM OR HERSELF. Dr. Graves is very specific, and he gives away the secrets as well as the tools.

Law students and even licensed lawyers would do well to get acquainted with it, because it essentially deals with all of the common legal tricks used in battle, and takes the view to not trust lawyers or judges either. Don’t kid yourself, courtroom legal tactics are games of war, and the punishments meted out can exceed the worst of wounds by a judge who seems to take sides, and can leaves scars on the soul! And you’ll be the only advocate swearing to tell the truth!

I don’t suggest you can become a brilliant trial lawyer overnight. Just stick with Law & Order and Family Guy for that. But if you’re in any way contemplating litigation or you’re in the middle of it, you need to get the intimidation off your back, and learn how to fight by insisting that the rules be followed by the judge and the lawyer(s) you’re using or fighting. (Just an aside here, screen writers could use the practical knowledge too.)

Bear in mind that the courts are encouraging you to do it for yourself. Yes they are! They don’t provide court-appointed lawyers unless you’re indigent and in Criminal court. This is more for Civil court users, although any alleged criminals out there are welcome too. And the courts would be grateful to see pro pers and pro ses with know-how exercised respectfully. Judges are not umpires, and they don’t offer legal advice from the bench. They make rulings based upon what they see and hear, according to the law. You’ll be on your own.

So it is with enthusiasm that I urge you to copy and paste this link into the address bar of your browser. Be sure that this is all that appears in the address bar for it to work properly (on a Mac, the drop-down menu may say “go to site” ). When you’ve studied it, bookmark it so you can go back to it and check it out thoroughly. You won’t see legalese, and the language and instructions are pretty straight-forward.

www.HowToWinInCourt.com?refercode=CJ0021

You’ll quickly get ideas and leads on how to proceed, with free workflow charts, forms, and so on. If you decide to buy the program, all I ask is you mention my name or this site. Dr. Frederick Graves is my friend, he knows that I want to help you, and if I bring people to his website, I get a small commission, and that helps to keep this site running, and advertisement-free.

You’ll see that the cost is reasonable, less than a country lawyer’s one billable hour. And your time? Maybe a weekend of concentrated study.

If you do use it, get back to me with a story of your experience. I’m at john@johnclarkprose.com, and maybe I’ll tell it here. Maybe you’ll get a screenplay out of it. Here’s MY true story!

BTW, important, please know that there are no guarantees of success in your case, I accept no responsibility, and I can’t answer any legal questions. It’s completely up to you. A notary I am, a lawyer I am not.

I saw that this film, the first solo movie directing effort of Dustin Hoffman, was to be screened at the DGA’s excellent movie house in Hollywood, and that Dustin would be interviewed by Michael Apted (our last DGA president) for a Q & A after the screening.

If controversy was sought, they couldn’t have found a better place, or subject. Apted had been involved in directing Dustin in the movie Agatha, and as some of us remember, that movie was filled with litigious controversy, and my sister-in-law Vanessa costarred. . . but more about that later. What fun! I knew I had to be there.

I think that the L.A. Times review written with intelligence by the dependable Betsy Sharkey says it best, and I agree with her view, sometime xenophobe that she can be, so link on it here. Incidentally, I enjoyed seeing several of my old British actor friends of long ago working again.

This film is based upon the retired opera performers’ home in Milan, which was built by Verde over a hundred years ago. Casa di Riposo per Musicisti has been displaced to a village near the Thames countryside, and staged at Hedsor House, going now by the name of Beecham House. Most attractive it is, with lush English gardens and busy Victorian interiors.

There’s no such real opera performers’ home in England, sad to say, but we do have a real actors’ home, Denville Hall it’s called, which is where my mother-in-law Rachel Kempson spent some demented time. Here’s a brief documentary video from the priceless Path� collection of ancient newsreels. (I’m being sneaky here as you’ll see if you watch it).

Dustin gets to direct with a sure hand, especially in his management of actors and crowds, and I hope he feels encouraged to continue with that occupation. It requires the willingness to learn a new skill-set, but there’s a great satisfaction in it, extending easily from the urge to act.

In the aftermath of the Newtown horrors, we may get to see the ascendancy of films like this; no violence, no guns, little exterior “action”, but much to think about in the recesses of the mind. I do believe that we seniors will be firmly planted in movie theatre seats once again, and face it, we have more time and spending money than the kids. But no way the big 4 (Universal, WB, Paramount, Disney) will favor the trend, and we’ll have to continue to depend upon the likes of Bob Weinstein, Sony, and Fox. Now that Ismael has gone from us, is Merchant Ivory still cooking, I wonder.

 

URGENT UPDATE

December 14, 2012:
With the terrifying news out of Newtown Connecticut this morning, it is now more clear than ever that psychological profiling of any student demonstrating possibly dangerous behavior be ordered, and to hell with their personal right to privacy. When lives and guns are involved, emergency methods must be taken. It seems that these perpetrators are seeking closure of some kind. When that involves mass killing and the taking of their own lives, society is at risk, remains unprotected, and learns nothing.

It’s time the American Psychiatric Association got its act together. Let the ruling body immediately review the latest DSM-5, and “clean it up” to the extent of including a requirement that any individual inflicted with the pain of Parental Alienation (PAS or whatever)  HAS A FORM OF MENTAL SICKNESS. Until this is done, students wracked with overwhelming conflicts lurking in their inmost family relationships will continue to seek relief. It is worth noting that the first victim of this latest outrage by a twenty-year old male student was his sleeping gun-loving mother, and then on to the elementary school to take down teachers and babies. This happened in the peaceful Connecticut countryside community of Newtown. 28 people have died, including himself, and still counting!

[Piers Morgan on CNN publicized his opinions on gun violence, and incredibly, the NRA is asking for his eviction from the shores of the USA! This column appeared in MailOnline on December 30, the end of the year. He says it better than I could have done]

December 13, 2012:
I see in an article in the current Time Magazine (Dec. 17), a report on the new guidelines for Mental Illness. It summarizes the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), used by doctors for their purposes and insurance companies, on which to base their decisions. The new features of the DSM-5 have just been approved, and will be published in May 2013. They’re just “cleaning it up” until then.

The article tells us that in the world of mental health, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders is more or less the bible. Doctors use the DSM’s definitions to diagnose depression, stuttering, fetishism, schizophrenia and more than 300 other conditions. Insurance companies use it to justify reimbursements; without a DSM code, mental-health patients usually don’t get a dime. And the manual carries enormous cultural heft: when it stopped listing homosexuality as a mental disorder–after a 1974 psychiatrists’ debate in which being gay was deemed sane by a vote of 5,854 to 3,810–gay rights received a crucial boost.

Among the many conditions listed, those with affects caused by Hoarding, Bereavement, Binge Eating etc. are allowed; Aspergers and Autistics is a maybe, and Parental Alienation Syndrome is definitely not in.

Much has been written and much has been discredited in the efforts of Richard Gardner, who came up with it back in the early 1980s. But I’ve had personal reasons to revisit and rethink the case of Parental Alienation, and whether it rises to the level of a syndrome. There is a storm of controversy attached to it.

But first, what is a syndrome? Wikipedia comes up with this definition:

In medicine and psychology, a syndrome is the association of several clinically recognizable features, signs (observed by someone other than the patient), symptoms (reported by the patient), phenomena or characteristics that often occur together, so that the presence of one or more features alerts the healthcare provider to the possible presence of the others.

Let’s assume that you are a divorced or separated parent, and that your kid is firmly alienated towards you, one of the parents, and there is no underlying reason! By underlying reason, I mean that you, the alienated parent has no history of abuse, violence, or drunken behavior, and instead your behavior has always been loving and steadfast and caring, and, even better, you have always provided financial support for the kid without protest. And in fact, used to have an excellent relationship.

I believe that the condition has become hard-wired into the child’s mental processes, and is therefore a form of clinical sickness capable of being rectified.

Well, the DSMs say that, nevertheless, it is not an insurable condition. It may require medical intervention, or it may require counseling, but it’s only if you go along with their opinion and it’s your choice. As far as the courts are concerned, it doesn’t exist as a syndrome, or an identifiable medical condition, and will probably refer to the DSM protocol.

It is my view that, lacking any other probable cause, a syndrome IS operating. Professional intervention is not only advisable, but, bearing in mind the kid’s future workplace career and college education, should be required by any licensing authority, and even ordered to be tackled by the medical profession, the schools, and the courts. The official view seems to be that the individual’s and family’s right to privacy comes first, and the public’s right to be safe and protected comes second.

Whether the other parent, the one conditioning the child towards alienation, should be punished is a different issue, already in hand. That parent may well go to prison if the other one pushes for it, for the courts frown on that behavior. But if that happened, even such an order most probably will not release the child from his or her frozen mental state, might even make it worse (“So you put my Dad/Mom in prison? I HATE you”), and therapy will still be needed. Please, do everyone, and your child, a favor.

Saturday, November 3rd. 2012

I don’t bother with moviegoing much any more. My time is taken up with real life things, and I don’t need to escape into worlds of action, horror, fantasy, and in-your-face scatology, and I fear that the same might be said for the general population, as the new economic/political scene gets under way.

However, partly to celebrate my 80th birthday, and partly to see something I could relate to (I have a pilot license and owned 2 planes), and as a SAG member for the past 50 years, I decided to accept Paramount’s invitation for actors to see a special screening of this movie yesterday at the Writers Guild Theater, and interact with the makers at a Q & A afterwards.

Continue Reading FLIGHT

I’m 80 today! With a great effort my mother held on and avoided Hallowe’en with its suggestion of a magical witches brew getting into her new baby’s bloodstream, and released me to this world on ALL SAINTS DAY 1932, with the result you all know.

Continue Reading MILESTONES! 80 Years ago today . . .

Hey folks, this is quite exciting! Terry Taylor, the editor of a magazine which is put out twice a year for the Just William Society in the U.K., had been in touch with me a few weeks ago to ask if we could put together the story of my life. Daunting!

Not quite the whole story but a lot of it, starting with my being “discovered” as they used to say, on a bus in Chipperfield, and my beginnings as a child actor in wartime London with comedian Will Hay on BBC radio.

We performed the act for the King, Queen, and Princesses 4 days before the war ended. What followed was my being cast as “Just William”, and the downward spiral of my life as an actor to the present day. That’s 69 years! Here’s what he had to say:

Continue Reading Tooting My Horn as JUST WILLIAM

With the just announced death of Fidel Castro, and the confused and confusing responses of world leaders, let’s ignore the politics and the law, and take a moment to consider the humanity. Oh, the humanity! (Where did I hear that before?). This is a true story, worth the telling, crying out for a screenplay and a star like Meryl Streep. I wrote it up on Wikipedia. Who needs fiction?

Mary McCarthy was the daughter of a St. John’s, Newfoundland, supplier of fishing supplies. Showing some musical talent, he sent his daughter Mary to Boston for lessons, and it is there she met a wealthy Spaniard named Pedro Gomez Cueto, who met her father and asked for her hand in marriage. Her father said come back in a year. He did, and so they were married, and he took her to live with him in Havana, Cuba, where he manufactured boots for the army.

He built his wife a white mansion in 1936 called Villa Mary, which became their home. It was filled with Napoleon III furniture and chandeliers, and a Steinway grand piano, becoming a gathering place for visiting artists and singers, such as Frank Sinatra (who had a house behind hers) and Nat King Cole. In those days, under the rule of President Fulgencio Batista, the island was known as “a millionaires’ paradise”. They became part of local society, and helped to found the Havana Philharmonic Orchestra and an orphanage for boys. Then in 1951 her husband died, and her life changed drastically under Fidel Castro’s revolution of 1959.

The US imposed a trade embargo against Cuba in 1962, causing her U.S. bank account of about 4 million dollars to be frozen. Unable to touch her money, things became worse when Castro confiscated her island holdings, and granted her a monthly pension of 200 pesos (about $15). While free to return to her native Canada, or the United States, she vowed never to leave the island, for Cuba was her home. And so this native Canadian continued to live there in poverty, a relic from days gone by. This is a documentary made a few years ago.

Her neighbors had left the island long before, and their mansions were converted into embassy residences. Peacocks continued to strut under the palm trees in her large garden. The abandoned mansion still retains the elegance and graceful atmosphere that Mary so carefully maintained for more than seven decades.  Screen Shot 2016-11-26 at 5.05.09 PM

In 2002 she broke her hip and used a wheelchair, but continued to wear a satin dress, silk blouse, chiffon scarf and lipstick to greet her visitors.

With the need for more money due to her medical problems, some measure of relief came in 2007 through a Canadian diplomat. Washington allowed her to draw from her inheritance $96 a month. “I don’t even want to buy candy,” she declared in her distinctive Newfoundland Irish accent.

Reminders of her long life were on the walls where framed telegrams hung from Queen Elizabeth II and Pope John Paul II, congratulating her on her 100th birthday, and photographs on the table showed her with the conductor Sir Thomas Beecham and the guitarist Andrés Segovia.

Asked whether she approved of Fidel Castro and his revolution, she did concede that poverty and illiteracy ended with his rule.

She died on Friday, April 3, 2009, just 24 days short of her 109th birthday, and was buried next to her husband in a white marble crypt in The Necropolis Cristóbal Colón, in Havana.

This film was shot in IMAX and released September 9, 2016.  It stars Tom Hanks as Captain Sullenberger, was filmed by Clint Eastwood, written by Todd Komarnicki, and edited by Blu Murray.  The event, now famous as “The Miracle on the Hudson”  took place on January 15, 2009, at around 3:30pm. The plane, an Airbus A320 of USAirways, hit a flock of Canada Geese, lost power, and after gliding was landed in the Hudson River’s freezing water off 50th Street Manhattan, with 155 passengers and crew, all of whom were saved.  Here is what it meant to me:

My interest in flying began with building model airplanes as a kid, and ended with my ownership of 2 planes which I flew until I was forced to sell them due to the ministrations of a lawyer, the judge, and my own experience of PTSD and loss of pilot license to fly.

While my aeronautical interest was thus curbed, it continues to this day online.  I like to follow the career of my son Benjy (Delta Captain, flying internationally)  who I’m glad to say I rescued from a waiter’s career at California Pizza Kitchen within a stone’s throw of LAX. I taught him to fly my plane, and sent him on his way to a flying school in Georgia, where he gained all his grades.

This film allowed me to come to grips with the sheer complication of flying, the attendant responsibility of the ship’s captain, and a better understanding and consequent admiration for the skills Ben has acquired.

I met with him recently at a local restaurant – here’s a picture – but a falling out ensued.  (He cancelled my parental courtesy free pass on Delta flights, because I wanted to visit my daughter Pema in Norfolk, and meet my grand-kids for the first time.IMG_3040 At my current age of 84, it becomes kind of important.)  He currently flies out of JFK to Africa, where he now lives.

Back to the film.

It’s full of the intricate detail of the world of flying under the watchful eye of the FAA , of enormous interest to me, but possibly above the curiosity of your average film-goer.

As a member of the Directors Guild of America, I get to see all the new releases which compete for my attention and so get to vote, culminating in the DGA Awards dinner which will be held in Hollywood February 4, 2017, and which I always attend. I shall most certainly cast my vote for this picture in different categories. But maybe I have too much of a special interest.

Newt Gingrich, a Republican, was 50th. speaker of the United States House of Representatives from 1995 to 1999. He posted this piece online this morning

I grew up in an era when the New York Times was the greatest newspaper in the world. Throughout my political career, there were plenty of moments when I thought the paper’s coverage had an unfair slant. But I knew it remained America’s most revered newspaper, and that generally its reporters held themselves to the highest standards. Screen Shot 2016-11-16 at 7.40.30 AM

Thus I watched with some regret as all of that went out the window this election cycle. It was sad to see a 165-year-old paper destroy its credibility over one election season. But the Times’s complete abandonment of its old standards was obvious to anyone who read its coverage. The paper wrote stories that were unrelentingly hostile to Trump and his supporters.

It allowed reporters to include their personal opinions and political analysis in news coverage. It allowed political reporters to spew their animosity to Trump on social media. (I am old enough to remember when reporters maintained the conceit that they did not have political opinions.)

It published stories about Trump in which it distorted the accounts of interviewees, according to the subjects’ own testimony. It published front page stories and editorials with headlines that accused Trump of “lying”–but never so characterized any of Hillary Clinton’s well-documented lies.

And now the same publisher and the same editor that oversaw this partisan assault are promising to “rededicate” themselves to reporting “honestly”. Perhaps even the paper’s liberal readership has tired of reporting that increasingly resembles the state-controlled propaganda of totalitarian regimes.

Before readers take the paper at its word, they should ask its leadership some of the following questions:

  1. Does the Times have any reporters, editors, or columnists who will say they voted for Trump, and has it hired any new ones?
  2. Has it hired any reporters who are even Republicans?
  3. Has it changed its policies that allowed journalists to express their opinions about the events and people they covered in their news stories?
  4. Will it ask the Pulitzer Prize board to withdraw, and its reporters to return, any prizes that might be awarded for news stories that contained reporters’ personal opinions?
  5. Have its editors retracted misleading news headlines that expressed opinions or pure speculation–such as the paper’s coverage of Trump’s tax returns?
  6. Has it fired reporters who admitted to writing politically motivated “news” stories and encouraged interview subjects to talk to them so they could stop Trump?
  7. Has it retracted its shameful election-eve front-page story “reporting” on Trump’s innermost thoughts and feelings, virtually every sentence of which is filled with reporters’ opinions and speculations–featuring claims like “he is struggling to suppress his bottomless need for attention”?

If the answer to all of these questions is “no”–why would anyone believe that the paper is now “rededicated” to honesty? And why would anyone trust the New York Times to report on American politics?

Well said, Newt. And now for my opinion. The rot started when newspapers no longer “said” anything, it was when writers were revealed by name. Newspapers used to have a voice as a collective, but no more. Now, only consumer brands have voices (usually of their chairman or CEO), and the press should think the same way. However, it is a 2-way street. Authoritarian states do what we’d like and speak with one voice, but we don’t want that either. The only daylight is that democracy has a way of evening it all out. It corrects itself eventually. Or maybe it cancels itself. Nobody hears anything, because nobody’s listening. The myriad voices become a babble.

Mr. Trump met with Obama in the White House this morning, and to my mind is becoming far too obsequious. He proclaimed it was “an honor” to meet him and that Barack was “a good man”. What? Has Trump lost his cojones? Or is he, like a chameleon, changing his spots. Sorry, that’s a leopard. Well, he’d better be more like a leopard.Screen Shot 2016-11-10 at 1.02.47 PM

We elected him on his stated platform. He’d better not lose sight of it.

It has been quite a joy to watch the backtracking of celebrities who pledged their all to Hillary Clinton. Speaking of whom.

I’ve said all along that she was Bill, in her clothing, or maybe he was her in his clothing. Or maybe they are cross-dressers, who knows, but theirs was clearly an end run around the 22nd Amendment, which refers to term limits of 4 years only, passed March 21, 1947.

Bill and Hillary are and remain a married couple, which means that legally they are treated in many ways as a single entity, enjoying certain privileges, such as that they cannot be forced to give evidence against each other. Another game to the system.

Some celebrities say that if Trump was elected, they’d move up to Canada. Trouble is, Canada doesn’t want them. Will they build a wall to keep them out?

Life is becoming truly bizarre.

 

This complaint was filed in District Court, Los Angeles,  on September 23, 2004. As it contains useful details of my personal story, I post it here again today. Remember, posting dates are for reasons of hierarchical separation, and not necessarily the dates things actually happened. Hopefully, insights will be gained as to how the media works, as well as how lawyers work.

A reminder. I am a Notary Public in the State of California, Commission #2123250. My commission expires September 10, 2019. I have been subjected to background screening with the Department of Justice this week, and have passed with no problems. I have never resorted to bankruptcy protection from predator lawyers. I fight them this way. And so I pursue my purpose of helping people to help themselves with a clear conscience. I am not Alfred Dreyfus.

 

****************************************************************************************

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
CENTRAL DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA
WESTERN DIVISION
Case no. 2:04-cv-03632 WMB-FMO
JOHN CLARK
Plaintiff,
vs.
LAWRENCE HARVEY ZEIGER aka LARRY KING; CABLE NEWS NETWORK, LP, LLLP.; TURNER BROADCASTING SYSTEM, INC.;
Does 1 thru 10 INCLUSIVE
Defendants.
TRIAL BY JURY DEMANDED
(SECOND AMENDED)
VERIFIED COMPLAINT FOR DEFAMATION
ASSAULT, LIBEL AND SLANDER

Judge: Hon. William Matthew Byrne Jr.
COMES NOW Plaintiff, John Clark, appearing pro se, and respectfully states his (second amended) Complaint for Defamation against Defendants, Lawrence Harvey Zeiger, which was his birth name and is believed to be his legal name, now better known under the name believed to be possibly his alter ego Larry King (“Larry”); Cable News Network, LP, LLLP. (“CNN”), Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. (“TBS”); and does 1 thru 10.
This Complaint is asserted by Declaration, and is verified as to its truth.
THE PARTIES, JURISDICTION, VENUE, & SERVICE
1. I, John Clark, Plaintiff, was the spouse and manager of celebrity actress Lynn Redgrave (“Lynn”) for 32 years, and the father of our three children. I have resided in Los Angeles County since 1981, and currently reside in Hollywood, California. Lynn abandoned the marriage and the home in February 1999 and secured a divorce from me in December 2000. I am 71 years old, and have been a United States citizen since 1965. I am now remarried, and live only on my pension. I consider myself to be a “private person” and not a “celebrity,” as are my children, within the meaning of that phrase as it applies to the laws of libel.
2. Defendant Lawrence Harvey Zeiger aka Larry King, hereinafter referred to as Larry King (“Larry”), is believed to live and reside in Washington, D.C. He is the host inter alia of a television interview show, LARRY KING LIVE, the vehicle which carried the offensive material. He is regularly traveling away from his hometown, believed to be Washington, D.C. and broadcasts from various places around the world.
3. Defendant CABLE NEWS NETWORK, LP, LLLP. (“CNN”) has its main office, according to its website, at 1 CNN Center, 100 International Blvd., Atlanta, GA 30348. It is a “Limited Partnership, Limited Liability Limited Partnership.”
4. Defendant TURNER BROADCASTING SYSTEM, INC. “TBS” has its main office, according to its website, at 1 CNN Center, 100 International Blvd., Atlanta, GA 30348. TBS is a division, I believe, of the Time-Warner Corporation, or owned by them.
5. Defendants “Does 1 thru 10” consist of the producers and miscellaneous support for the program LARRY KING LIVE. Their names and identities are not known at this time, but it is possible that my ex-wife may be a Doe, and that Time Warner may be a Doe, and they are not being pursued at this time.
6. The program “LARRY KING LIVE” is seen almost every evening, and I believe broadcast all over the world, and is often repeated. Furthermore, transcripts of the offensive material are published and remain available on the website of CNN. The program is carried by the facilities of CNN, which is owned and operated under the direction of TBS and possibly Time Warner, and possibly broadcast in foreign countries under license.
7. These parties are subject to the jurisdiction of this Court with proper venue. This is a Federal Question. [Fed. Ch. 28: 1331]. I live in the Central District, Western Division, of California.
8. Service of process is being perfected upon CNN and TBS by service upon their registered agent, CT Corporation, at their registered office, at 1201 Peachtree Street NE, Atlanta, GA 30361
9. Service of process is being attempted personally upon Larry King, who is slippery, for his attorney Mark Adam Barondess has told me that he would not accept service of process. Substitute service may have to be attempted.
CAUSES OF ACTION
10. This case is being brought for Defamation, Assault, Libel, Slander, and Interference of Judicial Processes, tortious acts performed upon me, stemming from the effects and results of a broadcast carried to millions of viewers in North America and I believe worldwide, with the cooperation of, under the direction of, and through the facilities of, CNN and TBS and possibly Time Warner on the LARRY KING LIVE television show, on the evening of May 22, 2003. No relationship existed between me and defendants, and there was no contract involved.
11. The acts of defendants alleged in this complaint are in the nature of a tort, and whether this was an intentional tort or a negligent tort will be decided by a jury when the facts are presented.
12. Defendants may claim 1st Amendment Rights of free speech and fair comment, freedom of the press and so forth. But this freedom is restricted as it applies to what has become known as an “all-news” channel. FCC regulations are required to allow REPLY time to individuals who have been personally attacked on the air under the fairness doctrine.
13. Title 47, Chapter 5, §558 (Criminal and Civil Liability), a provision of the United States Code, recognizes that Defendants, as cable programmers or cable operators, are subject to the provisions of and pursuant to “Federal, State, or local law of libel, slander, obscenity, incitement, invasions of privacy, false or misleading advertising, or other similar laws.” Plaintiff will show in court proceedings that defendants were in fact in violation of all or some of these laws.
14. I was denied Due Process and Equal Protection of the Law guaranteed by Article XIV, Section 1 of the United States Constitution, by the State of California. Defendants should have been aware of my battle with the State of California, and my past, current and future battles. By their offensive broadcast, they became an influence upon its outcome, thus interfering with my rights guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment.
15. Also violated were protections afforded me as a senior citizen under Title 42. The Public Health and Welfare Chapter 35. PROGRAMS FOR OLDER AMERICANS Subchapter I. DECLARATION OF OBJECTIVES AND DEFINITIONS § 3001, as well as local and state laws protecting me as a senior citizen.
16. The United States Constitution was created, as it says in its opening words, to “establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility . . . . and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity . . .” [Article 1, U.S. Constitution]. Defendants, in my case, have helped California Family Court to insure that I and my children get none.
DISCUSSION OF CASE
As Plaintiff, it is my hope that Defendants will be punished for their alleged offenses, and that they will take due care before someone else falls into their trap. And if by the efforts of their powerful lawyers I am unable to make my case, then at least, by this Complaint, I have no choice but to state the truth now so as to get the true story out, revealing that which Defendants should have discovered with minimal research, or did, and ignored or suppressed it. Shakespeare put it well, “…he that filches from me my good name….makes me poor indeed.”
Herein are the true story, and background, to the issues which will be presented for consideration by a jury, the sine qua non of this case. The jury will hear, view and review the evidence and decide whether these facts should have been known to Larry King and his producers at CNN and TBS.
They will learn what took place in the events of my life leading up to my being thrown out of our debt-free beloved home for 21 years, and escorted off the premises by armed police on September 13, 2001, onto the street, while I was still on the telephone inquiring as to the lives of three of my children who I knew were situated in New York City at the time of the 9/11 terrorist attacks and remained silent to me.
This event happened as a result of bizarre rulings sought and obtained by my wife from now retired Family Court Judge Arnold H. Gold, which caused me to investigate the judge from public record sources. Judge Gold’s breakdown of his own marriage, and the reasons behind his fighting for a divorce from his own wife for about five years back in the sixties shocks the conscience, and is revealed later in this document. Terrorism comes in many forms.
The circumstances of the breakup instigated by my wife with the aid of a Hollywood “Divorce Designer” attorney and leading up to this event are well documented in the continuing public records of the Los Angeles Family Court, four different Courts of Appeal, and the California Supreme Court.
THE BROADCAST
I heard through a friend on the morning of May 22, 2003 that it was advertised that my ex-wife would be interviewed for an hour by Larry King that very evening.
Fearful of what she might say, and assuming from its title that the broadcast would be live, I walked down to CNN’s studios at 6430 Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood, a few blocks from my nearby home and presented myself to the staff there for the purpose of being included in the show which I had been on before, and particularly so that I could have some input and control over what my extremely hostile ex-wife might say or not say in the interview.
I had reason to worry at that time of her Larry King Live interview, and I have even more reason to worry at this time. I have just discovered that she and my photographer daughter have a book advertised on Amazon.com, not yet available, and ready to promote, that deals with her breast cancer.
In past years, I had met Larry on more than one occasion when I brought my wife to those same studios for purposes of promoting her, her career and to talk of our future projects, and I expected to be welcomed.
I was especially worried that things would be said that would have an adverse effect on the outcome of several Civil Court cases which were at that time before the California Court of Appeal, Second District, in Los Angeles, and also two Family Court cases still active even now before the Los Angeles Superior Court.
In the divorce case, case no. BD296320 filed by Lynn in March 1999, I still have to go back to show the court that I should be reimbursed for the costs of many thousands of dollars borne by me since she abandoned the family back in February 1999; and in a paternity case filed by my child’s mother, BF013155, I still have to go back to find out where the mother and her attorney are hiding my son, and to get visitation for him.
I had made oral argument before the Court of Appeal’s Division 1 in the Dissolution proceeding on April 22, 2003, just one month prior to the broadcast, and was awaiting a decision. I received news of the justices affirming the decision of the lower court on April 29, and on June 9, I filed for review by the California Supreme Court.
On the same day of the broadcast, an opinion came down from Division 3 in a separate Quiet Title action brought by the attorneys for me and Lynn working together, which was affirmed in our favor.
As for the two derivative cases that were currently before the California Court of Appeal, I have had to plead for dismissal of their review because of this defamatory broadcast.
Here in Footnote 1. I give the text of my Motion for Dismissal dated August 30, 2004, which was immediately granted for the reasons given and in the manner stated, [footnote 1]
fn 1
CALIFORNIA COURT OF APPEAL Case No. B 165744; “JOHN CLARK, Plaintiff/Appellant vs. MELISSA OLIVER, EMILY EDELMAN, JAMES ELIASER, MICHAEL KATLEMAN, ALLYN KATLEMAN, COLDWELL BANKER REAL ESTATE CORPORATION, COLDWELL BANKER REAL ESTATE HOLDINGS, INC, COLDWELL BANKER RESIDENTIAL BROKERAGE COMPANY, COLDWELL BANKER RESIDENTIAL REAL ESTATE, INC., STONERIDGE ESCROW CORPORATION and DOES 1-30 inclusive,
Respondents/Defendants.
APPELLANT’S MOTION TO DISMISS,
I, John Clark declare
1. I am the Appellant. I am 71 years old. I am not an attorney.
2. I brought this Complaint against Defendants in Santa Monica Superior Court in April 2002.
3. The Complaint was for
A.BREACH OF FIDUCIARY DUTY
B.NEGLIGENCE
C.CONSPIRACY
4. On September 6, 2002, I brought and declared in open court an Affidavit of Peremptory Challenge before Judge Paul G. Flynn under the code provisions of the CCP [§170.6(5)] which I also filed with the court.
5. I believe this was done properly, but it did not prevent Judge Flynn from making certain rulings and sanctions adverse to me, when I believe he no longer had the standing and power to do so, and out of my presence.
6. However, certain events have happened since that time which I believe has polluted this case, so that even if I were successful in my appeal and this court were to remand it back to the lower court, I believe I could not get a fair or meaningful trial.
7. In May of 2003, my ex-wife celebrity actress Lynn Redgrave (after a marriage lasting 32 years), post divorce, gave an interview to Larry King where, throughout his one hour “Larry King Live” show on CNN (“All The News You Can Trust”), my name and likeness, and that of my small child Zachary and his mother Nicolette, was plastered on the screen in a banner by Larry King and his producers, filled with innuendo and denigration of my character and reputation, and aired before millions throughout the world, while my court cases are still alive.
8. This interference of continuing judicial processes and its effect upon me and my ability to make a living in film and theatre in my professional capacity as a long
time member of the Directors Guild of America, The Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers, the Screen Actors Guild, the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists and Actors Equity has caused me to file a lawsuit against Mr. King and CNN in Federal District Court for liability for Defamation and related issues [case
04-03632].
been illegal activity by Respondents and other persons and organizations, particularly those involved in real estate deals, yet to be proved but unable to be proved in the California State Civil Court system, leading to the loss of more than two million dollars of my family’s and especially my children’s and grand-children’s savings and family estate, and I believe there may have been violations of US Code Title 18, Part 1, ch. 96, § 1961-68 (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations act). Judge Flynn in my civil case before the Santa Monica court would not allow me to pursue defendants and conduct discovery and depositions in order to investigate what happened to bring about these horrendous losses to my family’s investments, and also the theft of several hundred thousand dollars worth of my family’s possessions.
10. That was 2001/2. This is 2004/5. My family and American society has changed. Now we both need to know.
11. Therefore, I respectfully request that this honorable court dismiss my appeal in this case, and that it be on record that this was done at my (at appellant’s) request.
I declare under penalty of perjury under the laws of the State of California that the foregoing is true and correct and was executed this 30th day of August, 2004, at Los Angeles, California. (Signed) John Clark, Appellant [end of fn 1]

On arrival early in the afternoon on May 22, 2003 at the CNN studios, I was told to use the telephone on the ground floor to state my business, which I did. I then took the elevator to their floor, where I was told by security to wait outside. Eventually a Mr. Hunter Waters (“Waters”), an employee of TBS, appeared. He stated that it would be impossible for me to appear on the show, because it had been pre-taped on the East Coast believed to be in Washington, D.C. about three weeks previously.
I asked for, and received, Water’s e-mail address, and thereupon walked home and immediately composed and sent the following e-mail to Waters, which I quote verbatim:
“Thursday, May 22, 2003
Dear Hunter,
I shall be watching tonight with a great deal of interest. Regardless of what I see, I can’t help wondering why you did not attampt [sic] to contact me. My input would have made for a better and more balanced show.
Are you aware that all of her career development through the last 32 years culminating in her Golden Globe award and Academy recognition was designed by me? Are you aware of her own 26 year affair with Brandon Maggart since 1977, by whom she got pregnant? Her affair with Brian Dennehy? I may have to ask for equal time. Anyway, I expect you will be hearing from me again. I live just down the road in the Hollywood Hills, on San Marco Drive. You can check me out on IMDb, from Lynn Redgrave’s site.
The attachment lets you know that once upon a time, my visibility was greater than hers. [There followed several picture attachments]
“A long long time ago. And here’s a shot of my last sight of Lynn, giving orders to try to get me arrested when I went back to our Topanga Canyon home to retrieve my possessions after she got me evicted 2 days after 9/11. There she is back with Brandon Maggart and his goon sons and the real estate agents. And one of his sons knocked me to the ground. The police are on their way, but refused to help me after talking with her. There’s a lot you can learn about me, this is just a hint, you missed the big story! But I’ll know just how much, later tonight. And I expect you’ll hear from me again.
John Clark.”

[There were 6 files attached to this e-mail, being digital photographs of Redgrave together with agents of Coldwell Banker who in court recommended Plaintiff’s eviction, her boyfriend Brandon Maggart and his 2 sons, Spencer Brandon Maggart and Garrett Maggart.
Brandon Maggart’s face is covered by a video camera successfully preventing Plaintiff’s recognition of him, but Plaintiff had never met and was unaware of the identities of the 2 younger sons, who Redgrave, having secured possession of the house, had put in charge of Plaintiff’s house and home.
His job was to keep Plaintiff away, and prevent him from collecting his belongings. One of the pictures depicts the moment before Plaintiff was assaulted by Spencer.
Plaintiff called the police, and 2 officers arrived. They did not file a police report after they spoke with Redgrave. At the station-house, officers refused to accept an assault charge.
Another attachment was a video news clip from the web-based archives of Pathé Pictorial in the United Kingdom, a file that showed Plaintiff at that time was a big child star in London entertaining U.S. and British troops in the closing stages of World War II. On May 4, 1945, he was asked to perform for the King and Queen and the two princesses, at a private function of celebration immediately preceding VE Day]
That evening, May 22 2003, I sat and watched and taped the broadcast, which purported to be a discussion of Lynn’s treatment of her breast cancer. I had and still have no problem with this theme, for it is a matter of great public concern.
The broadcast, however, became something else. Defendants, including Larry King and the producers of Larry King Live, had created an elaborately planned and scripted show which sought to reveal that Redgrave somehow is surviving her illness, the implication being that this is because of, or in spite of, the stress caused by the behavior of her husband which drove her to psychiatrists and so on. It is a well-known fact that stress can contribute to the onset of the disease.
The truth however is much different, and is a truth that I, not just a husband and manager, but also a father, have always sought to keep private, not just because of my children’s safety and privacy, but also because it involved our family’s, including Lynn’s and our son’s, green card scam, which is a federal offense. I have since discovered that the Immigration and Naturalization Service is not proceeding against phony marriages after the passage of two years of time, and will not now prosecute.
The Larry King Live interview, about one hour in length with commercials, had the following elements:
After each commercial, at least three times, the network’s logo appears “CNN – NEWS YOU CAN TRUST” before starting the next part of the interview.
Remaining on the bottom of the screen at all times, there is a descriptive caption, the wording slightly changed for each segment.
The program proceeded as follows:
Throughout the one hour interview, the captions at the bottom of the screen changed between the following versions, which is not revealed in the written transcript (to this day still available on CNN and Larry King’s website). They all read “LYNN REDGRAVE TELLS ALL.” and then
Caption #1 “ON HER SHOCKING DIVORCE, HER FAMILY AND CAREER.”
Caption #2 “IN 1998 HER HUSBAND ADMITTED FATHERING LOVE CHILD.”
Caption #3. “LYNN REDGRAVE TELLS ALL, HER HUSBAND FATHERED A BOY W/HIS THEN ASSISTANT IN 1991”.

At this point the camera zooms in on a National Enquirer headline and various pictures of Plaintiff, Redgrave and Nicolette, the boy’s mother.
The boy Zachary is also identifiable (he was then about seven years old.)
The caption changes to “HER HUSBAND’S OTHER WOMAN LATER WED AND DIVORCED THEIR SON.”
And caption #6 read “DIVORCED HUSBAND IN 2000 AFTER 33 YEARS OF MARRIAGE.”
Larry King ends his interview looking into Lynn’s eyes with the heartfelt words “You are a survivor.”
After the broadcast, I sent the following email to CNN headquarters on their website, again quoted verbatim:
“I am Lynn Redgrave’s ex husband of 32 years. I am also a director and actor, and you can check me out on IMDb [International Movie Data base IMDb.com], and I’m older than Larry King.
I have already spoken to Hunter about this. Your taping of the Lynn Redgrave interview on May 22, commenting on our divorce with slanderous comment on me without having the courtesy, indeed the ethical and legal requirement, to get input and corroboration first from me is despicable.
I have always respected and have even been interviewed (with Lynn) by Larry, and I know him to be fair minded.
I can understand his avoiding controversy in a puff piece, I can understand he would not ask Lynn about her 25 year affair with actor Brandon Maggart by whom she got pregnant (later aborted), nor ask Lynn how much she paid her Jehovah’s Witness assistant to marry our son so that she could get a green card and the little boy could stay in this country (yes, this is all in the court record which has been going on now for four years) nor ask about her love affair with Brian Dennehy (which he admits to) [he corroborated this to the London Sunday Mirror, and they published that tidbit] but at the least, he could have asked simple, positive questions, like:
Do you have any kind words to say about your husband?
Do you feel you owe him something for the career you enjoy today?
Didn’t he help you put together, produce and direct your Tony nominated play “Shakespeare For My Father”?
As well as “Saint Joan” for Broadway?
Do you look toward healing of your family relationships, or have you decided to continue to ostracize him from his own family I understand he’s yet to meet his six grandchildren?
Why did you evict him from his home?
Are you punishing him?
It’s all very well for her to play the “No fair, I have cancer” victims’ game, but her shameless behavior today puts Joan Crawford in the shade. And your sensationalistic behaviour makes the National Enquirer (they never go to press without corroboration of their stories) look like the Washington Post.”

These messages were ignored. I believe they refused what was clearly my demand for correction by defendants, an opportunity for me or them to correct the record. I hoped for a subsequent interview, as is covered by Cal. Civ. Code §48a(2).
I believe that Defendants’ response will be based on the premise that they were telling and reporting on the truth, since that is the basis for a defense in libel.
If I am deemed to be a private person, I believe that Defendants will have the burden of proving that what they said was true, and whether the insinuations casting aspersions on my character and reputation were true.
In court I will show that the truth was always available in the public record, and that I will have to put that truth before the jury to prove that defendants are lying, and how I have been damaged.
As broadcasters on the public airwaves, and as a cable operator, under the law and FCC regulations, they have a duty to report the truth, or at least not to dispense lies and suggestive material to the detriment of a person’s reputation.
I believe that this is actual or de facto malice. I was held up to scorn, ridicule and contempt. My reputation was harmed with the result that persons in my community have been deterred from associating or dealing with me.
Defendants CNN and TBS have a legal department and a department of Standards & Practices set up to make sure they comply with the law.
One can assume that this time they thought they could get away with it, and that I would not take it upon myself to spend the remaining years of my life setting the record straight. To continue with the true story:
At a pre-trial Hearing the day before trial was due to start, Judge Gold said I was slow producing discovery, although my wife’s attorney agreed with the court that by then she had all she had asked for.
But Judge Gold set out to punish me anyway, and suggested I should spend the night in prison, unless I craved mercy in some way. I said I felt as Kafka might have felt. “I’ve done nothing wrong, you wouldn’t do that, and besides it’s my 68th birthday today!”.
I was led out of the courtroom in handcuffs immediately. My parting shot was “Well your Honor, we survived the Battle of Britain.”
It was the night before I was due to start my trial representing myself, “pro se”.
It was also the night Lynn raided my private office in the house, with its sign saying “Keep Out, War Room” which contained my trial preparation because she knew I would not be there. This account is not only in the court records, but was published as a headline in the Pasadena Star News a few days later.
I am a life member of New York’s famed Players Club of Anglo/American theatre in Gramercy Park where I helped to change the club’s policy of no female members, and arranged for my wife to become the first female President of the club. I am not now welcome at the club, partly because we saw irregularities over the handling of their priceless historical library and long dead actors’ Foundations under their control and tried to clean it up, resulting in the fact that the New York District Attorney has been watching them for a few years, and the club is now thriving (Lynn was ousted).
I am a member of the Pacific Pioneer Broadcasters club, and we hold a lunch each month at the Sportsman’s Lodge in Studio City. People turn away from me.
I am a longtime member of the Directors Guild of America. I am not deemed acceptable to serve on a committee.
I am a member of Hollywood’s Magic Castle. I am ignored by all except the help when I go there.
Lynn and Annabel have a book coming out next month, telling of her experiences having her breast removed with pictures taken by my daughter Annabel. It is titled “JOURNAL. A MOTHER AND DAUGHTER’S RECOVERY FROM BREAST CANCER.” by Lynn Redgrave and Annabel Clark.
We are told by Amazon.com that the book is not yet available, but will be coming out next month, in October. I believe that the New York Times owns the copyright in the pictures, which were published in their Sunday Magazine a while back, because picture credits stated “Copyright NY Times.”
It is now obvious to me that I have been set up as a promotional lure for the book marketing people to obtain talk show exposure.
I can see it now, Lynn and my daughter sitting with Katie Couric on the “Today Show”. They will need to say nothing about me at all, not even engage in that part, and Larry King and CNN’s work will be referenced by the interviewer.
I can imagine their sitting with Dan Rather on CBS 60 Minutes, or with any of the folks on “Entertainment Tonight”, who deliberately trashed me when the news of our breakup first came out, and set the tone.
Such is the power of celebrity in Hollywood.
But here I remind Defendants that they will be liable for every single utterance made by another broadcaster as a result of their defamatory treatment of me.
It is now more than five years since Lynn abandoned the marriage. I have been offered but turned away money for stories by all television and print media.
This true story is free. Public record.
MY (PLAINTIFF’S) BACKGROUND
I have been a professional actor since 1944, and married Lynn in 1967. We have three children, now all grown. I always considered our family to be a pillar of strength and stability, and unusual in the sense that we became well-known in the Hollywood community as activists for women’s rights, stemming from Lynn’s taking on Lew Wasserman’s Universal Studios in 1981 when she was fired from her successful series House Calls on CBS.
The issue then was whether a new mother and actress should be allowed to bring her baby to the lot to be able to breast-feed the baby between 6a.m. and going home late in the evening.
We started with Gloria Allred and wound up with the corrupt and later bankrupted New York Finley Kumble law firm, and the less said about them the better. It never got heard. But as a result, the studios now have child care centers where actresses can bring their babies to work.
We were married in Sidney Lumet’s living-room on April 2, 1967 after a whirlwind courtship. Pictures were taken for Life Magazine by Michael Crawford, and there was a Time Magazine cover picture of the two famous sisters.
I tried to continue my acting career, but unsuccessfully, and in 1972 I gave it up in support of Lynn, and so she became my career, at her bidding and wishes.
At that time, my first marriage had unexpectedly produced a son literally on our last day together, and was for years troubling because she refused to allow visitation with Jonathan.
They lived up in Canada, and Lynn was hugely supportive and appeared with me in family court up in Toronto on many occasions. I was forever grateful to Lynn for this.
After an eight year sojourn back in my old hometown of London and then Dublin, we moved to New York, where I wanted to turn her into an acting icon for America, to be perceived as a separate person from her sister Vanessa and her loathed left-leaning politics, and to be more available for Jonathan.
Because of my varied background in show-business and in the real world, it was easy for me to become her full time director, writer, drama teacher, coach, photographer, publicist, manager, negotiator and contract maker and paralegal. We had learned to distrust lawyers and agents too.
I was also very happily the family’s driver, pilot with two family planes, caretaker and maintenance man for our properties, horse feeder and general do-it-yourself head cook and bottle washer, while she was out and away making pictures and television series. And by all accepted standards I was good at it, and a great husband and father, and manager too, (although I have since learned that I should have spent more personal time in raising my kids).
I had a hand in every single one of her projects since 1968 to after her abandonment of me in 1999. Our son is now a pilot for Delta, one of our daughters is now a professional photographer shooting pictures for the New York Times, and our proud lesbian daughter Kelly is a teacher in London.
Prior to meeting my then wife in 1966, I had been a New York-based actor, a photographer and with some success a stock market technical analyst and investor, which became my hobby. I learned all about the technical approach to investing with the aid of charts.
We kept, and now she has, my co-op apartment in the historic “Osborne,” across from Carnegie Hall in New York, but because of long-term television series contracts and movie offers in Los Angeles, in 1981 I decided we should move our base to the West Coast, and so I found and created our 5-acre permanent home alongside the State Park in Topanga Canyon, fenced it around for privacy and security, bought two trained guard dogs, and rebuilt and designed it with the help of our old friend Trevor Williams, an award winning movie production designer.
At great cost, I built a custom designed swimming pool with waterfalls, and a Jack Kramer fake grass tennis court (I once played tennis at Wimbledon as a junior), a writing studio for my wife to write, a corral for my show-jumper wife and daughter’s horses, a tack room, garage space for four cars and parking for 40 cars (yes, we held great parties and social gatherings), an Extenderhoe Case backhoe, 2 twelve foot C-band satellite dishes, a website “redgrave.com” before anyone else was doing it, arranging for a web-designer to create her history on it, and a rehearsal studio where I and my wife could plan and create our future projects, and I could help her write her books.
Together we wrote “Shakespeare For My Father”, and her Weight-Watchers book, dedicated to me, “This Is Living”.
Her success was mine too, and because we had a stable marriage, I had made no effort to be on any of the copyrights.
I was happy to be the engine behind her work, and it was a combination that led to many awards and a lot of creative work.
This office space with 18 file cabinets of all of our history, her contracts, huge press clippings, and work, dating from 1963, kept all of the business away from the residence. It also housed my photographic equipment, for future use as a video and film studio.
I began to build a darkroom in the garden for our youngest daughter. I had installed an antique 12 x 6 foot English Burroughs & Watts slate billiard table, a present from my wife for she knew I had once been a boy’s billiards champion back home in England.
I bought a Chickering grand piano which I loved to play on, and helped to teach my children on this piano.
I had stored my photo equipment which included my three working Nikons, their multiple lenses, nine other professional still and video cameras and darkroom and recording equipment from my past part-time profession, for the time when my youngest daughter could use them responsibly – and now she can – except that all of my equipment was stolen from the house when my ex-wife took it over courtesy of Family Court Judge Arnold H. Gold.
I bought a Twin Comanche airplane so my son could get his multi-engine license and develop his passion for flying, and incidentally get out of the drug culture he showed signs of getting involved with as a student. I sent him away to the University of Colorado, and he straightened up.
And I kept company with my little son Zachary every single day of the year until he disappeared into the hands of our notorious Topanga Mexican plumber Ernesto who was married, as a result of the court action of Judge Gold, at the impressionable age of eight.
The so-called “scandal” retailed by the media with the blessing of my wife, was that Nicolette was falsely described as my mistress, that I impregnated her with a “love-child”, that my son married her and thought that the child was his while I kept her on as my secret mistress, or as a “piece of meat” as Nicolette informed the press.
The true story was as follows, again available in court records, but essential to recount here.
In 1990, I was on a business trip to London to secure rights to a television property controlled by the BBC starring Lynn, and which had won her the BBC award as the best TV actress of the year 1989 (“Death of a Son”). I wanted it to be seen in the USA, and bought the property to remake and edit it into a theatrical film with new music, which I did. I thought Lynn’s performance was Oscar material.
We had regularly kept in touch with our old Beverly Hills nanny, now Mrs. Adeline Procter in Palmers Green, who had helped with our children when we first moved to L.A. She was and still is an avid Jehovah’s Witness.
I called her from my hotel as I always did when in London, but this time she was in tears, her mother had just the day before dropped dead in the street from an embolism, and she couldn’t meet me. But she said her sister Nicolette Hannah worked as a consular assistant around the corner from my hotel at the Finnish Embassy, and she would drop by for a cup of tea and give me the details.
This she did, and what I found was a very distraught lady, with an extra reason to be. I learned that the Elders of the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ cult program had “disfellowshipped” her for reasons I won’t go into here, and under their strict rules this meant that she was ignored and isolated by her family and friends. Her only friend and life support had been her mother.
Our London daughter Kelly befriended her, and a few weeks later brought her to New York where Lynn and I were appearing on Broadway in “Love Letters” for a couple of weeks.
There, she lost her British passport when out with Kelly having lunch at Macy’s, her purse was stolen. Waiting for a replacement, she flew home to L.A. with us, because Lynn was contracted to do a play in La Jolla, near San Diego.
Nicky and I were left alone at the house, with Annabel still at school and Nicky soon to return to her home.
As a result of her huge depression and spiritual crisis and deep sense of guilt, I suggested to her that she should bear a child because a new life of her own would give her a reason for living.
I recalled Lynn and my appearance in a game show “Tattletales” telecast the week of January 18, 1982, with Bert Convy, Dick and Dolly Martin, and Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gormé.
In that show, we were asked whether I would provide sperm to a friend of my wife if asked, and would my wife object? I said given the right circumstances, certainly I would. I guessed right, Lynn when asked said she wouldn’t object too much, but there could be problems down the road. So she guessed right too. I still have that tape.
Yes, Nicky and I decided it was a sperm bank or me, and that was not a difficult choice. Together we decided that I should be the father, and I truly believe this saved her life.
The idea was that she should return to London when the baby was born, and there meet and marry some nice man, up to which time I would support the child. He need never know who his father was, and thus was born a romantic story.
I was with her at the birth in St. John’s Hospital in Santa Monica, the very same day I had to decline attending Jonathan’s wedding in Dublin, and the expectation was that she would go back to England when the baby was a few months old and her visitor’s visa expired.
The plan went awry when – we should have known – we all fell in love with the little boy, whom we had named Zachary John Hannah.
I do not think for one moment that people did not know I was the father, because we look alike, I had a Danish mother, meaning unusual looks for California. Just that it was never mentioned, and the boy called me Dad anyway.
He became part of our family, as did Nicky, and we all hoped she would find and marry a nice rich Jewish lawyer in Beverly Hills and also thereby get her green card and stick around, and meanwhile, Lynn and I set up a trust fund for him, and Nicky put my name in a written agreement that should anything happen to her, I would take custody, and Annabel was over the moon knowing that she had a little brother.
We paid for the child’s education and Nicky was paid a salary, she paid her taxes, and she helped the family run smoothly as my and Lynn’s assistant.
I invested her money, her inheritance from her mother, and made $36,000 profit for her in the stock market.
She lived nearby in a tiny cottage that we had bought for the use of our children as they got older, and from there she had her own life and boyfriends.
But when the boy was two years old, a nice Jewish lawyer it was not.
Instead I found that she had taken up with a friend of ours, Al Goldstein, publisher of New York’s Screw Magazine, and she told me she wanted to marry him and live in Florida.
I was aghast. But he wanted her, he told me, as his West Coast woman, to live in his Hollywood apartment with little Zachary.
He told me, and I have the evidence, that if I stood in his way, he would call the Enquirer and Lynn’s reputation would be ruined. So for a while Nicky got to go to the Mansion and drive his Porsche.
And that’s what can happen to the best laid plans. Thankfully I was able to convince Nicky that she should immediately stop seeing Goldstein because of his threats and what it would do to Lynn’s career, and so she did.
As it was obvious that a Green Card was the key to all of these problems, a plan was hatched by Lynn, Benjy, Nicolette, Annabel and me.
Our son Benjy married her, and he got motivated by the money she paid him which he needed to get out of his waiter career at California Pizza Kitchen and into his professional pilot licenses and a new career,(he is still a pilot for Delta – good luck!).
I have the video of their Vegas marriage, Lynn there, and me, and little Zachary, with the bride and groom, all smiles.
Some time after the marriage, Ben obtained an expedited U.S. citizenship so that he could get the green card for Nicolette.
As I show later, it is in the public record that Lynn went down with Ben to the INS, she signed autographs for the staff, and the green card was secured without further question. Hollywood privilege.
After the green card came in, they got a mail-order Dominican Republic divorce two years later, which may in fact threaten the validity of both of their new marriages, my son to a lawyer and Nicky to our plumber.
Nicolette had restarted the affair she began years before with Ernesto when I paid him to re-pipe the cottage where she lived, and court papers much much later show that she and the plumber forged a plot to take away from us our little cottage, a property worth about $300,000. They now claim to be married, and have disappeared with Zachary.
Now, finally, it’s time to reveal Lynn’s true story, the story which I took care to tell by filings available in court records among other sources.
While we had a long and successful partnership in marriage, the intimate side of it had faded many years before. Beginning back in 1977, Lynn began an affair with actor Brandon Maggart while they were both on the road with Jerry Lewis in “Hellzapoppin’”, and has maintained it ever since. I was appearing in a small part on Broadway in “Comedians” at that time, directed by Mike Nichols.
Shortly after, I was busy producing and directing Shaw’s Saint Joan, her dream part, to star Lynn on Broadway, and during rehearsal, Lynn had an abortion of a fetus that I had good reason to believe, because of the time factor, had not been put there by me.
I was not too bothered about the moral side of it, but I did ask her to consider what this would do to our impending production, to cancel or not to cancel. It was her decision to have the abortion.
It was our nanny at that time, Ada, an English girl now married and living in Brooklyn and available to give evidence, who observed Brandon Maggart visiting my wife’s bedroom after the show and staying all night.
She did not tell me of this until later when she left our employ. And in 1998, Lynn revealed to me that Maggart had wanted to take her away from me because they were in love, and how she decided against it for the sake of our small children.
But by now I was beyond caring, except I thought that we could go forward on a better footing, now that the children had left home, and Zachary’s parentage was now in the open.
In 1989, Lynn brought Brandon to Hollywood for him to play her brother in a sitcom for ABC with a 5-year contract (“Chicken Soup” opposite Jackie Mason) and I did not care then either. And so she maintained the relationship.
We had a quiet but open marriage, perhaps the secret to a long Hollywood marriage.
She, in her quest for truth in her acting roles, had a habit, I believe, to be intimate with some of her willing co-stars.
For example, one of them, star Brian Dennehy with whom she has worked on three occasions, has cheerfully admitted to their affair to the press “a long time ago.” I subpoenaed him to come to court.
Judge Gold continued the hearing until Dennehy left town. Hollywood privilege. Public record.
Lynn is from a strange and talented family, perhaps those qualities go together.
Her mother actress Rachel Kempson had a secret lover for 50 years (we started to write a play about this, “The Mandrake Root”, but then she left before it was finished), her father Sir Michael picked up boys off the street, and her sister Vanessa’s husband Tony Richardson died of Aids. Hollywood behavior? Public record.
The innuendos of Larry King and the National Enquirer and other tabloids are entirely incorrect, but the press appears to have much more fun preserving Lynn’s icon status while maintaining the fiction that their son married their assistant and thought that my child was his.
That is a shocking and disgusting thought, but because there was a federal offense involved, I never could correct it to the press. But I did take care to reveal the truth during the trial, and my letter confessing to the INS is on the record.
I was evicted on September 13, 2001. I was given an hour to collect my things, hook up my old Scout to my trailer, charge the battery and leave, and I lived in that trailer for the next six months.
Lynn secured a restraining order against me so that I have been unable to communicate with her, and abandoned all of the contents of our home to me, even though much of it belongs to her and the Redgrave family, and our children.
I now see that was good divorce designer tactics. (Hollywood’s Family Court attorneys are now called “specialists”. Good word).
The court, giving me a few days but no money, ordered me to retrieve all of the contents of the house the office, the farm equipment, and all of my cars and the backhoe.
I went to get a car, at least, so I could have wheels, but in trying to do that, I was prevented from doing so by Lynn who I thought was away filming in London, and Brandon Maggart and his two sons, and agent Jon Saver of Coldwell Banker who had taken over possession of my home, and then the police who I called.
Photographs of this event are available as exhibits for the court trial. Lynn effectively took possession of everything at the house, and I found out much later she had destroyed many documents, including much of the history of my childhood career, including autographs personally signed to me as a child actor, by Glen Miller, Tommy Handley, Arthur Askey, Tommy Trinder, Will Hay and other luminaries of Britain’s past entertainment world with whom I had worked alongside for the BBC in the forties.
Lynn sealed everything in seven foot crates, and everything was hauled away to be stored in facilities under her name.
She put our three Rottweilers, Portia, Hermia and Puck, to be boarded at a filthy pet-care facility in Burbank. I was able to rescue them, and they are now in the care of our next-door Topanga neighbor.
I still pay for their food, and she, to her lasting credit, loves them, and they have a familiar home, and I have visitation with them regularly.
I did not retrieve all of my belongings until April 2004, and I now find that some documents are missing, as well as most of the record of my past career.
I also observed huge truckloads of material hauled away from the premises by local Topanga contractors, feeding at the trough.
I have three independent inventories of what was left and I now have, which reveal what has been lost or stolen or sold off, more than $250,000 worth. Evidence filed with the court.
I also found that our frozen stock market holdings had fallen precipitously in value (example: Migratec (MIGR), worth $1 million at its height in 1999 is now worth nothing), and that our debt-free real estate was sold under the court’s signature at the start of an unprecedented rise in real estate values by order of Judge Gold. I had no recourse.
Her and Nicky’s lawyers got paid out of escrow in the form of sanctions against me, awarded to them by Judge Gold.
My home and prime 5-acre estate was sold for an unbelievable $1,700,000. I received an unbelievable check for $2,616.03.
My house is now owned by Michael and Allyn Katleman, a fellow director member of the DGA and his wife, who staked their claim with Melissa Oliver before my eviction, and my studio/office is now owned by a real estate agent friend of Oliver (who, remember, represented both buyer and seller).
And I suppose that Lynn remained confident that with her Golden Globe statue, her SAG award, and Academy Award nomination which I helped her obtain through energetic marketing, she was now firmly in the hands of powerful agents and attorneys who would help her become a really big star, with ample cash flow to take care of her future needs, children to adore her for moral support, and a staff of the usual handlers on retainers, manager/agent/publicist/accountant and of course attorney.
She certainly didn’t need me for that any longer, and I have no problem with that. Her present un-insurable condition is ironic.
However, there exist Community Property laws in the State of California. I should not be broke.
The damage done to my reputation and ability to earn a living in the small world of Hollywood and New York entertainment has been perhaps irreparably damaged, and incalculable in terms of lost creativity.
I maintain my active membership with the Directors Guild of America, the Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers, Actors Equity, Screen Actors Guild, and AFTRA. But nobody comes knocking.
I defended myself in the courts, because my lawyers took more than $600,000 cash from me before trial started, and bankruptcy loomed.
And CNN, “THE MOST TRUSTED NAME IN NEWS” claims to tell the truth of what really happened, and spreads it around the world.
DEFENDANT LARRY KING’S BACKGROUND
And who is Larry King, and why should anyone believe what he has to say?
We are about the same age. I have been a professional in the entertainment business longer than he has. Research gleaned from several sources on the web reveals that he regularly interviews senators, former presidents, current presidents, Kings, Queens, heads of state, and enjoys enormous respect in the news business. He needs no introduction here. Everybody I know sees him as the top interviewer in the business. Everybody seeks to be his friend and to get on his show, wrongly titled, as I found out, “Larry King Live.” He sets the trend in interview technique.
We are told by his publicists that he has been inducted into five of the nation’s leading broadcasting halls of fame and is the recipient of the prestigious Allen H. Neuharth Award for “Excellence in Journalism.”
In celebration of his 40th anniversary in the broadcasting industry, Hollywood honored King in 1997 with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for his life’s work.
Larry’s reported salary for the year 2000 was 7 million dollars. His fees for speaking engagements are said to be $50,000 apiece. Public record.
He is married for the fifth time, to actress Shawn Southwick, and is the father of Andy, Larry Jr., Chaia, Chance and Cannon.
He is fortunate, he must see them often.
Contrast this with my life, the father of Jonathan, Benjy, Kelly, Annabel and Zachary, and the grandfather of six. I was allowed to meet them but once. I do not know where they all live, and they support their mother exclusively, moving East to be with her.
Of course everybody listens to Larry King. They believe what he has to say, and they believe he asks all the questions there are to be asked.
As he said at the start of the program, “For the first time, the shocking details of the scandalous divorce that set off a tabloid frenzy. She opens up about everything. She’s been through it all. A no-holds-barred hour with Lynn Redgrave. Exclusive.”
Thank you, Mr. King.
And now, let’s reveal your under-belly, published by E-Online on the web. Call this sauce for the gander:
Birth Name: Lawrence Harvey Ziegler; Birthdate: November 19, 1933. Birthplace: Brooklyn, NY; Occupation: TV/radio host; Significant Other(s): Wife: Frada Miller; married after high school graduation 1953, marriage annulled; Wife: Alene Akins, former Playboy bunny, married 1961 divorced 1963 remarried 1967, divorced 1971; mother of Chaia and Andy; Wife: Mickey Sutphin, married 1964, divorced 1968, mother of Kelly; Wife: Sharon Lepore, production assistant, former math teacher, married 1976, divorced 1983; Angie Dickinson, actress, together 1983-88; Wife: Julia Alexander, married 1989, separated 1990, divorced 1992; King later sued her for slander, case settled in 1994 with order to seal court records; Next, Rama Fox, minister, announced engagement 1992, separated 1995. King and Fox later entered into litigation over financial matters. Next, Deanna Lund, former actress, announced engagement 1995, no longer together. Current wife: Shawn Southwick, singer, model, TV host, met in early 1997, married September 5, 1997, former wife of public-relations executive Michael Levine. Has son (born 1981) from first marriage.
PENDING JUDICIAL MATTERS
My ex-wife sought to influence the justice system in Los Angeles, and has succeeded very well with the assistance of defendants. I have only my pension to live on now, because I got re-married and lost my wife’s lifetime support of $3,000 per month which the court ordered I should be paid, befitting my customary standard of living(!).
I believe there was and still is a RICO game going on, and I intend to prove it.
And what are the Lawsuits which are part of the public record?
Lawsuits, begun against me by Lynn and Nicolette, all in the Los Angeles courts, are as follows:
Nicolette Hannah Clark v. John Clark (Paternity issues) BF 013155 (filed January 1999)
Lynn Redgrave Clark v. John Clark BD 296320 (Dissolution of Marriage, filed March 1999)
Defendant John Clark’s WRIT to DISQUALIFY Judge Arnold H. Gold in Division 1, COA (denied); John Clark and Lynn Redgrave Clark v. Nicolette Hannah SC 063529 (Quiet Title to house in which she lived with her now husband Ernesto Hernandez) denied as to Nicolette by Judge Reid (surprise, but Redgrave was on my side and the judge wasn’t Arnold Gold, and I used a lawyer).
Kellybee Enterprises, Inc. v Illyria Enterprises, Inc. SC 063527 over fraudulent transfer of funds by Redgrave to her new corporation [Not prosecuted, and rulings were made by Judge Gold without attorney representation of a corporation which is mandated by law].
John Clark v. Spencer Brandon Maggart, et al SC 070226 [Judge Flynn as of 8/8/02, to be heard in Civil Court with John Clark v. Melissa Oliver, Coldwell Banker Companies BC 273790 (Judge Chalfant].
Disso Appeal of Dissolution decision to evict me from my home to release funds to pay Redgrave’s attorney fees and other expenses from escrow B151350 [DIV. 1] Consolidated with BOND appeal (bond was set at well over a million dollars, beyond defendant’s ability to raise) case B152947. Affirmed.
Appeal re. Decision to sell guest house below market to release more funds to escrow (within the dissolution case) B159545; APPEAL B151269 [DIV. 3.] of paternity decision of Judge Gold, to pay attorney fees out of escrow; Nicolette Hannah Clark Hernandez APPEAL of Quiet Title Case B157749 in DIV. 3 (denied as to Nicolette); Nicolette’s Writ to deny Judge Reid’s findings in LASC B163150 (denied).
On June 10, 2004, my appeal re. eviction from my home was upcoming, and the theft of much of my belongings, to be presented to the 4th. and 7th Divisions. The suits had been dismissed by Judge Flynn. I have now withdrawn them, as shown in footnote 1.
For the future I am bringing complaints before the appropriate authorities regarding Judge Arnold H. Gold, and his application for a judgeship. He retired immediately after hearing my cases, and inquiries are being made as to what happened to the funds he awarded to several attorneys, one of whom, Nicolette’s attorney James Eliaser, worked with him in Judge Gold’s law firm Pachter, Gold and Schaffer (this being concealed by Judge Gold during pre-trial motions) amounting to several hundred thousand dollars as sanctions against me, to be taken out of the escrow upon sale of my debt-free home after my eviction, under the court’s signature, and with no recourse by me and supported by Family Court rules.
After Judge Gold made his rulings, he then retired from the public bench; his current wife runs a charity. The Commission on Judicial Performance tells me that it has no oversight on retired, or re-assigned retired judges. I have been informed that the District Attorney’s policy is not to get involved with domestic issues in divorces and family court, and they have shown no interest. Where does the buck stop?
“We the people” place our trust in a system which supports clean judges. We are reasonably confident they are free from corruption, as they are appointed by our governors and stay with the approval of, and under the watchful eye of, our Chief Justice, Ronald George. It’s a serious and solemn business.
A request to review Judge Gold’s application to the governor to become a judge has been refused by the authorities, deemed “confidential”. Applying my due diligence, I have learned from public records that he was awarded a judgeship by Governor Deukmejian on 9/13/88, despite the record in his own nearly 5 year long dissolution proceedings (in LASC case number D718500) where he was found by Family Court at that time to be guilty of domestic physical violence, maintaining a mistress, and mismanagement of his wife’s personal funds. He also took custody of their 3 children, and lived in the house owned by his wife, and stopped paying her support, and she just “gave up” as she is quoted, at the time of her agreeing to settle after nearly five years of litigation. He has sat on the bench for years, he has sat on the Court of Appeal, he has written arcane legal books, he is hugely respected by the legal community, and the legal community came to his farewell banquet in droves in 2002 after his “retirement”, from probate and family court.
It is my belief that he acts out his own personal feelings in his rulings towards victims from the bench. He has been deeply involved in the now celebrated case of courageous pro se litigator (“vexatious litigant” they made her) Idelle Clarke, whose daughter was removed from her custody and placed with her ex-husband whom authorities in Children’s Court had found to be sexually molesting her. She’s been fighting for ten years, all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court (case no. BD108528). Denied, of course. And a similar fate happened to Janette Katz in Katz v. Katz (case no. BD231366), again Gold’s case.
Judge Gold’s background information is available at the Los Angeles Hall of Public Records, if it hasn’t been removed.
After his retirement, Chief Justice Ronald George directed him to stay in charge of my case, despite my letter to him in protest. I have the letter giving full details and the response from his office. “The appeals court will take care of it”, I was told. They sure did. The L.A. Court of Appeal Division 1 in case B151350, despite my submission from the public record, refused to take notice of Judge Gold’s past and unfitness for family court proceedings in my documents filed with them, and refused to set aside his judgments. I was, in fact, reprimanded, and reminded that Lynn had taken a restraining order against me, so I must be a bad person. The Appeals Court, where, it is said, they “shoot the wounded”. My submission for review from the California Supreme Court was then denied.
I am still working towards having the result set aside.
Judge Gold had acceded to Lynn’s demand that I be jailed for 24 hours on the day before I was to begin the trial proceedings, so at the opening of the trial, just before it began, I read a motion for “disqualification for cause”. CCP 170.3 et seq. This effectively stopped the proceedings. There was delay of several weeks while this motion was considered by Judge Horne, a supervisory judge in Orange County who was in the position of securing votes from all of his judges in order to stay in his position. I didn’t know it at the time, and he wrote that there was no breach of judicial power.
I conducted my own defense at the eventual trial before, yes, Judge Gold. I put Lynn in the witness box. It was there and then that I first heard, under my questioning, that she and persons unknown had entered my office and gone through my paperwork and computer that night, Watergate style, knowing I was in jail, despite my notice “WAR ROOM” on the door of my office to stay out. I immediately moved for a mistrial. Denied by Judge Gold.
Then in the middle of trial, which was held on dates calendared by the court at her request, she surprised me and the court. She abruptly left for England, beyond the arm of the court to recall her for my rebuttals of her lies, and so the trial became a charade. When Judge Gold made his punitive rulings against me, he then retired. He is now a “rent-a-judge”, available, as I overheard him say, for celebrities who would pay more than he was paid by the State judicial system, and advertised to consumers by the ARC (Alternative Resolution Centers, a Limited Liability Company).
My pleadings, made properly in court according to courtroom procedures and the California Code of Civil Procedure and the California Rules of Court and the Local Rules and judges’ personal rules, were many over a period of the last 6 years. A partial flavor of what I have been put through in the several and ongoing cases is listed consecutively in the following defensive pleadings. Many of these pleadings had to be prepared twice, one for each case. Here some of them are, as footnote2.
fn 2
– RESPONDENT’S RESPONSE TO PETITIONER’S MOTION FOR BIFURCATION OF THE MARITAL STATUS AND JUDGMENT THEREON. REQUEST THAT THEIR MOTION BE DENIED.
– PETITION FOR PEREMPTORY WRIT OF MANDATE/PROHIBITION FROM ORDER DENYING DISQUALIFICATION OF JUDGE ARNOLD GOLD; MEMORANDUM OF POINTS AND AUTHORITIES IN SUPPORT THEREOF; EXHIBITS
– REQUEST TO CONTINUE TRIAL DATE BASED UPON PENDING DISQUALIFICATION OF JUDGE GOLD FOR CAUSE IN RELATED CASE NO. BD 296 320 (IN RE. MARRIAGE OF CLARK) BECAUSE OF THIS PENDING MATTER
– REQUEST OF THIS COURT TO TAKE JUDICIAL NOTICE UNDER EVIDENCE CODE OF LETTER SENT TO IMMIGRATION AND NATURALIZATION SERVICE ALLEGING FRAUD
– REQUEST FOR STATEMENT OF DECISION ON CONTROVERTED ISSUES
– REQUEST FOR TRIAL COURT TO STAY ENTRY OF JUDGMENT PENDING RESOLUTION OF MATTERS IN CURRENT TRIAL OF RELATED CASE NUMBER BF 013 155 SO AS TO COORDINATE THE RESULTS
– RESPONDENT’S OBJECTION TO PROPER JUDGMENT IN RESPECT OF KELLYBEE ENTERPRISES, INC. WHICH WAS NOT REPRESENTED
– REQUEST FOR TRIAL COURT STAY OF IMPLEMENTATION OF JUDGMENT
– RESPONDENT’S OBJECTION TO JUDGMENT AND/OR ENTRY OF SAME
– MOTION TO DISQUALIFY JUDGE GOLD AND TO ASSIGN ACTION TO ANOTHER JUDGE (CCP SECTION 170.6)
– RESPONDENT’S REQUEST FOR RULING
– OBJECTIONS TO [PROPOSED] STATEMENT OF DECISION; POINTS AND AUTHORITIES;
– NOTICE OF MOTION AND MOTION FOR A NEW TRIAL; MEMORANDUM OF POINTS AND AUTHORITIES
– SUPPLEMENT TO NOTICE OF MOTION AND MOTION FOR A NEW TRIAL; MEMORANDUM OF POINTS AND AUTHORITIES; ADDITION OF CITATION OF RULE 14.4(F) EX PARTE COMMUNICATION (FOR ATTACHMENT)
– EX PARTE APPLICATION FOR ORDER SETTING AMOUNT OF BOND ON COLINA DRIVE PROPERTY;
– DECLARATION OF JOHN CLARK IN SUPPORT THEREOF
– OBJECTION TO LISTING OF MARITAL HOME FOR SALE PENDING CURRENT SETTLEMENT NEGOTIATIONS; DECLARATION OF JOHN CLARK
– EX PARTE APPLICATION FOR 30 DAY STAY OF ORDER TO LIST AND SELL MARITAL RESIDENCE PENDING RESOLUTION OF CURRENT SETTLEMENT NEGOTIATIONS AND LEGAL PROCEDURES
– SUPPLEMENTAL GROUNDS IN SUPPORT OF MOTION FOR NEW TRIAL; POINTS AND AUTHORITIES
– RESPONSE TO PETITIONER’S REQUEST FOR ORDER SHORTENING TIME;
– RESPONSIVE DECLARATION IN OPPOSITION TO PETITIONER’S MOTION TO EVICT RESPONDENT FROM HOME; NOTICE AND APPLICATION FOR COURT TO ENFORCE SETTLEMENT OFFER MADE BY PETITIONER ON JULY 5, 2001;POINTS AND AUTHORITIES;
– EX PARTE APPLICATION SEEKING THIS COURT’S PERMISSION TO ALLOW RESPONDENT TO TAKE UP (cont’d) RESIDENCE AT 21122 ENTRADA ROAD, TOPANGA, PENDING POSSIBLE EVICTION FROM HIS HOME TODAY; OR, IN THE ALTERNATIVE, ORDERING 21122 ENTRADA ROAD TO BE SOLD TO SATISFY ATTORNEYS’ CLAIMS FOR APPROXIMATELY $350,000 IN FEES AND SANCTIONS WHICH WERE APPROVED AND ENTERED BY THIS COURT;
– EX PARTE APPLICATION FOR THIS COURT TO SET AMOUNT OF WASTAGE BOND IN ACCORDANCE WITH CCP 917.4 FOR MANDATORY INJUNCTIVE ORDER MADE 8/24/01 BY THIS HONORABLE COURT (IF APPROPRIATE) SO THAT RESPONDENT WILL NOT BE EVICTED PURSUANT TO MARKETING OF HOUSE
– RESPONDENT’S OBJECTION TO PETITIONER LYNN REDGRAVE’S EX PARTE APPLICATION TO FORCE SALE OF FAMILY HOME AT REDUCED PRICE;REQUEST FOR OSC STATUS;REQUEST FOR RIGHT OF FIRST REFUSAL
– EX PARTE APPLICATION FOR COURT APPROVAL TO MOVE MY POSSESSIONS FROM THE MAIN HOUSE TO THE GUEST HOUSE, AND TO PURCHASE THE GUEST HOUSE
– RESPONSIVE DECLARATION TO PETITIONER’S EX PARTE FILED DECEMBER 19, 2001
– RESPONSE TO NOTICE OF RELATED CASES
– RESPONSIVE DECLARATION TO DECLARATIONS OF LYNN REDGRAVE AND HER ATTORNEY EMILY SHAPPELL EDELMAN
– RESPONSIVE DECLARATION TO PETITIONER’S EX PARTE APPLICATION FOR THE SALE OF RENTAL PROPERTY AT 21122 ENTRADA ROAD, TOPANGA
– RESPONSIVE DECLARATION TO PETITIONER’S EX PARTE APPLICATION FOR LISTING OF JOINTLY OWNED GUEST HOUSE FOR SALE APPOINTING COLDWELL BANKER AS AGENTS
– MEMORANDUM OF POINTS AND AUTHORITIES IN OPPOSITION TO DEFENDANT’S AND CROSS-COMPLAINANT’S MOTION FOR NEW TRIAL
– POINTS AND AUTHORITIES IN SUPPORT OF MOTION FOR ORDER FOR PAYMENT OF EXPENSES AS SANCTIONS
– NOTICE OF MOTION AND MOTION FOR ORDER FOR PAYMENT OF EXPENSES AS SANCTIONS; POINTS AND AUTHORITIES IN SUPPORT THEREOF AND DECLARATION OF JOHN CLARK IN SUPPORT OF MOTION FOR ORDER FOR PAYMENT OF EXPENSES AS SANCTIONS
– DECLARATION OF JOHN CLARK IN OPPOSITION TO ORDER TO SHOW CAUSE OF PETITIONER
– DECLARATION OF INCOME AND EXPENSES OF RESPONDENT JOHN CLARK
– FIRST AMENDED COMPLAINT FOR: 1. CONVERSION 2. BREACH OF CONTRACT 3. NEGLIGENCE 4. INTENTIONAL INFLICTION OF EMOTIONAL DISTRESS 5. ABUSE OF PROCESS 6. ASSAULT 7. BATTERY 8. ACCOUNTING
– APPELLANT’S SECOND REQUEST FOR EXTENSION OF TIME; ORDER THEREON
– POINTS AND AUTHORITIES IN SUPPORT OF MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION OF RULING FOLLOWING
– APPELLANT’S FIRST REQUEST FOR EXTENSION OF TIME; MOTION TO AUGMENT RECORD; ORDER THEREON
– NOTICE OF MOTION AND MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION OF RULING RE. SALE OF COMMUNITY ASSETS AT REDUCED VALUE; POINTS AND AUTHORITIES; DECLARATION OF JOHN CLARK
– DECLARATION OF JOHN CLARK IN OPPOSITION TO MOTION TO DISMISS BASED ON FRAUD ON THE COURT, FRAUDULENT AND INCONSISTENT ALLEGATIONS
– NOTICE OF RESPONDENT’S ADDRESS AND TELEPHONE AND FAX NUMBER
– NOTICE TO COURT THAT THE MAY 24, 2002 FILING FOR RECONSIDERATION OF ITS RULING MADE MAY 13, 2002 WAS NOT FILED LATE; POINTS AND AUTHORITIES; DECLARATION OF JOHN CLARK; DECLARATION OF MIYUKI TSUNODA
– PLAINTIFF’S CORRECTION TO DECLARATION FILED APRIL 26, 2002, ONLY WITH ADDITION OF OMITTED VERIFICATION
– PLAINTIFF’S RESPONSE TO DEFENDANTS NICOLETTE AND ERNESTO HERNANDEZ’ OPPOSITION TO PLAINTIFF’S MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION; POINTS AND AUTHORITIES; DECLARATION OF JOHN CLARK
– APPELLANT’S RESPONSE TO DECLARATION OF JAMES R. ELIASER DATED MAY 30, 2002 OBJECTING TO APPELLANT’S FIRST REQUEST FOR EXTENSION OF TIME TO FILE OPENING BRIEF
– NOTICE OF INCORRECT NOTICE OF THE COURT GIVEN BY DEFENDANT KATLEMAN’S ATTORNEY ABRAHAM M. RUDY
– APPELLANT’S NOTIFICATION OF NEW ADDRESS; APPELLANT’S CORRECTION: THIS IS APPELLANT’S SECOND APPLICATION FOR EXTENSION
– APPELLANT’S NOTIFICATION OF NEW ADDRESS
– ARGUMENT ON MOTION TO RECONSIDER FILED MAY 24, 2002; MEMORANDUM OF POINTS AND AUTHORITIES; DECLARATION OF JOHN CLARK
– NOTICE OF MOTION AND MOTION TO ALLOW TESTIMONY FROM BUILDING AND SAFETY RE. NON-PERMITTED CHANGES AT 21342 COLINA DRIVE TOPANGA; MEMORANDUM OF POINTS AND AUTHORITIES; DECLARATION OF JOHN CLARK;
– COURT’S APPROVAL OF RESPONDENT’S UNDERTAKING
– EX PARTE APPLICATION FOR COURT TO INVALIDATE UNTIMELY CLOSE OF ESCROW ON RESPONDENT’S REAL PROPERTY; REQUEST FOR SANCTIONS; POINTS AND AUTHORITIES; DECLARATION OF JOHN CLARK
– CASE INFORMATION STATEMENT (CIVIL APPEALS) COURT OF APPEAL, SECOND APPELLATE
DISTRICT
– APPELLANT’S ADDENDUM OF EXHIBITS TO CLARIFY CASE INFORMATION STATEMENT FILED YESTERDAY JULY 8, 2002
– APPELLANT’S APPLICATION FOR FURTHER EXTENSION OF TIME TO FILE OAB
– ADDENDUM TO APPELLANT’S APPLICATION FOR FURTHER EXTENSION OF TIME TO FILE OAB
and LETTER DATED JULY 10, 2002, (EXHIBIT 1)
– APPELLANT’S EX PARTE MOTION FOR COURT’S INTERVENTION TO STAY PROCEEDINGS IN OTHER CASES AND GRANT FURTHER EXTENSION OF TIME FOR APPELLANT’S FILING OF OAB DUE 7/15/02
– EX PARTE APPLICATION FOR CONTINUANCE OF THIS MATTER IN THE INTERESTS OF JUSTICE; DECLARATION OF JOHN CLARK
– RESPONDENT JOHN CLARK’S NOTIFICATION OF NEW ADDRESS
– AFFIDAVIT, PEREMPTORY CHALLENGE, CCP 170.6
– RESPONDENT’S BRIEF IN SUPPORT OF EXPUNGEMENT OF LIS PENDENS; DECLARATION OF JOHN CLARK
SUPPORT OF RELEASE OF FUNDS FROM SALE OF REAL PROPERTY
– APPLICATION FOR EXTENSION OF TIME
– NOTICE OF APPEAL
– APPLICATION FOR EXTENSION OF TIME
– NOTICE OF ELECTION TO PREPARE APPENDIX
– NOTICE DESIGNATING PAPERS TO BE INCLUDED IN CLERK’S TRANSCRIPT
– NOTICE OF ELECTION TO PREPARE APPENDIX
– NOTICE DESIGNATING PAPERS TO BE INCLUDED IN CLERK’S TRANSCRIPT
– EX PARTE NOTICE FOR 30 DAY CONTINUANCE
– RESPONSE TO PLAINTIFF’S ORDER TO SHOW CAUSE
– RESPONDENT’S INCOME AND EXPENSE DECLARATION
– NOTICE TO THE COURT OF RESPONDENT’S INABILITY TO FILE BRIEFS DUE TODAY BECAUSE OF THE LOS ANGELES FIRE AND RESULTANT UNAVAILABILITY OF LEGAL AND OTHER SUPPORT; DECLARATION OF JOHN CLARK
– DEFENDANT JOHN CLARK REQUESTS PERMISSION TO FILE DOCUMENTS IN COURT TODAY
NOVEMBER 7, 2003
– SUPPORTING DOCUMENTS TO COMBINED IDENTICAL RESPONSE AND RESPONSIVE DECLARATION IN BOTH RELATED CASES OF DEFENDANT JOHN CLARK
[end of footnote 2]

And I’m not through yet.
The dates are not important, but they started in December of the year 2000 when, pursuing California’s proud liberal penchant for allowing sound heterosexual marriages to be broken up by a dissenting spouse without effort to repair the problems, I was fired by my wife and off-loaded with ease and approval by the courts on December 20, 2000. Public record.
All of these submissions, requests, pleadings, motions and responses are easily available to be read by anybody, especially the research facilities of the “Larry King Live” production staff, and the inquiries undoubtedly made by the Standards and Practices departments of CNN and TBS who regularly check with their legal departments.
Perhaps, given the chance, I could have persuaded them to stay away from the entire subject of our divorce, and stuck with the serious side of women’s breast cancer.
VERIFICATION
I declare under penalty of perjury according to the laws of the State of California and the United States, that the foregoing is true and correct except to those facts which I believe to be true to the best of my information and belief, and would so swear to in court.
Executed at Los Angeles, California. Dated: September 23th, 2004
______________________________________
John Clark, Plaintiff, pro se
CONCLUSION
1. Lynn Redgrave, using Defendant Larry King’s status and credibility, set out to influence the course of Public Opinion and American Justice in Hollywood’s courts at the time that the justices were making their deliberations. Larry King fell for it. CNN fell for it. TBS fell for it. They should be punished. I should be made whole.
2. I needed to get on the air with a rebuttal to the insinuations and harm done to me by Larry King and Lynn Redgrave. I am now the object of scorn in my home town. My ability to make a living seems to be nil.
3. This clearly is a case of de facto slander and libel upon my reputation, accompanied by actual slander and libel on the false information broadcast which was a lie, that should have been uncovered with minimal research which I believe the station and the broadcast facility had a duty to undertake. I believe that the Limited Liability partnership of Cable News Network and the TBS Corporation had a duty to take proper care through their Standards and Practices and legal departments.
4. I believe I am a private person, and I believe that my experiences are a matter of Public Concern, and CNN has a greater duty to report on my experiences in the Los Angeles Family Court system than to suppress the information in order to help promote Lynn Redgrave’s book and career at the expense of her ex-husband and supporter for 33 years.
5. If I am found to be a “public person” and therefore with a higher standard of proof, I believe that I can show through discovery that this invasion of my and my children’s privacy was done with actual malice, that is with knowledge that it was false, or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not, in order to provide entertainment and ratings to a hungry public and demanding sponsors.
6. I believe this has had a direct and adverse effect upon my ability to restart my acting, producing and directing career, as well as an adverse influence upon future trial court proceedings, and my constitutional right to due process and the pursuit of happiness in my golden years.
7. As for my glorious son Zachary John Clark – who knows – her lawyer has illegally hidden him somewhere. The broadcast tends to approve his being kept away from me.
TRIAL BY JURY DEMANDED
I, John Clark, demand that this case be presented to, and decided by, a jury.
Wherefore, I, John Clark, demand:
(A) Trial by jury.
(B) That judgment be entered against defendants, Lawrence Harvey Zeiger aka Larry King, Cable News Network LP, LLLP, and Turner Broadcasting News, Inc., severally and jointly, for actual damages in an amount not less than Ten Million Dollars, with punitive damages assessed by the court.
(C) That all costs of my action be assessed against Defendants.
TRIAL BY JURY DEMANDED
Dated this the 23nd day of September, 2004
______________________________
JOHN CLARK, PLAINTIFF

Since I started this site, I find there have been some excellent websites to find helpful information.

Here’s a new one I just received.

Click on CourtSystem.org, which will link you to places for up-to-date information you may need, no matter where you live.

I’ll be happy to list others, and will hope for a contribution so that my site can continue to flourish.