Motown Records Wins Rights to Gaye’s Life Story

For a tense, often confusing 50 minutes Thursday, the life story of the late soul singer-composer Marvin Gaye was on the block with a Los Angeles Superior Court judge as auctioneer.

How much was the exercise worth?

An extra $36,000.

Judge Billy G. Mills gaveled off the film and television rights to “the highest and best bidder”--Motown Records.

The music company was considered the best choice by executors Marvin Gaye III and Joseph C. Karol and their attorneys, Jeffrey L. Glassman and Lee B. Ackerman, although its bid was not the highest.

Gaye, 44, was fatally shot in April, 1984, by his father after a fight. Marvin Gay Sr., 70, is now on probation after pleading guilty to manslaughter.

For $46,000, Motown won the rights to an 18-month option, $5,000 to extend the option six months, $50,000 (minus a possible $2,500 payment to Gaye’s mother) to exercise the rights and 2.5% of profits on any completed picture.

Premier to Aid Estate

The company also agreed to stage a premiere of the film benefitting Gaye’s beleaguered estate or to pay $15,000. It also agreed to pay half of all the above fees if a sequel or remake is ever done.

The agreement differed in only two ways from Motown’s original offer, which triggered the unusual court auction. The company initially planned to pay $36,000 less: $20,000 for the first 18-month option and $40,000 maximum to exercise it.

Mills ordered the court auction for all interested bidders after three of Gaye’s major creditors, whose claims against the estate total $3.7 million, objected that Gaye’s story was worth far more.

Only one other would-be production company challenged Motown, and its $41,000 offer for a 12-month option plus $60,000 to make a film and 5% profits failed to impress the executors.

The higher offer was made sequentially by Robert V. Gaulin, representing Richard Pollack, who owns Labels for Less clothing stores in New York and various real estate properties, and Pollack’s partner, actor John Philip, who appeared in the movie “The Bostonians” and has produced stage plays.

Gaulin insisted, however, that the “ballgame is not over” without elaborating on whether he would appeal Mills’ approval of the sale.

His offer, Gaulin pointed out, in addition to doubling the profits from any marketed film, would have given the estate $101,000 within 12 months, while the Motown arrangement will provide only a maximum of $51,000 in two years.

Glassman said the executors favored Motown because it already has a viable production company and owns the rights to Gaye’s music. Any other producer, he said, would have no assurance of obtaining those music rights and could not make a movie without them.

Assistant U.S. Atty. Charles H. Magnuson watched the auction carefully. The $9.2 million in claims against Gaye’s $1-million estate include $4,245,614.69 in unpaid federal taxes from 1974 through 1980, and Uncle Sam gets first priority.