King World Chairman in Hot Water Again : Entertainment: A Las Vegas incident that resulted in battery charges is not Roger King’s first brush with the law.

Roger King, a high-rolling gambler familiar in the casinos of Atlantic City and Las Vegas, was in trouble again.

Last Oct. 25, two guests at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas accused the beefy chairman of King World Productions--the immensely profitable company that distributes “Jeopardy,” “Wheel of Fortune” and “The Oprah Winfrey Show”--of attacking them, unprovoked, in the hotel’s health club.

According to the police report of the incident, Roger King emerged from the club’s TV room screaming ethnic epithets at the accusers, retailer Robert Rothstein of Woodland Hills and his father-in-law, Moses Levy of Bellevue, Wash. King shouted “I’m gonna kill you,” the report says.

King appeared drunk and his speech was slurred, witnesses told Las Vegas police. As the two men tried to walk away, King allegedly pushed Rothstein against a wall and hit him “repeatedly in the chest.” He also swung at Levy, who blocked the blow. According to the report, the scene was witnessed by three Caesars employees, who tackled King and took him away.

King--who has not commented publicly on the allegations--was charged with battery. His arraignment is Wednesday. If found guilty, he could spend six months in jail and be fined $1,000. Meanwhile, Levy and Rothstein have hired Las Vegas attorney Alan Buttell, who anticipates that a civil suit will be filed shortly.

While it may be strange for the chairman of a major corporation to get into brawls at a casino, it nonetheless is not unheard of for King, who heads one of the most successful--arguably the most successful--television program companies in Hollywood.

Over the last five years, King has been involved in two other public outbursts of violence. In one case, he pleaded no contest to criminal charges. In the other, he was ordered to pay damages of $66,000 in a civil lawsuit.

If King World were any other company, King might be pilloried by Wall Street, the press, his board of directors or outraged clients.

But this is not any other company. “Wheel,” “Jeopardy” and “Oprah” are the top three shows in first-run syndication. That’s like having Nolan Ryan, Tom Seaver and Sandy Koufax all in the starting rotation. So most who deal with the company don’t ask questions about King’s behavior.

King World’s success “alleviates various foibles,” said Christopher P. Dixon, an analyst at PaineWebber in New York.

Yet with the latest allegations, some in Hollywood and on Wall Street are taking pause--wondering if King, universally acknowledged as one of the most astute programmers in television, is out of control.

They fear that his removal from King World--either voluntarily or because he ends up in jail--could be a devastating blow to the company’s continued success.

“The sales aspect of what he does is critical to their success,” said James Levitas, president of Levitas & Co., a New York money management firm.

Levitas was all set to go “both feet into” King World stock when the company issued a press release on Christmas Eve stating that King had been arrested in Las Vegas two months earlier. If found guilty, Levitas said, King might give up his management position at King World--and that could cripple the company.

Allyson Kossow, a King World spokeswoman, called King a “brilliant creative executive and one of the best and most talented people in the business.”

But she disputed speculation that King World’s continued success rested solely on Roger King. “No executive is indispensable,” she said. Starting with brother Michael King, the firm’s chief executive, the company has a stable and proven successful management team in place, she said.

The King World rocket began to soar in 1983, when the then little-known program distributor made a deal with Merv Griffin to distribute “Wheel of Fortune” and “Jeopardy,” which had been playing for several years on daytime network television.

King World spruced up the shows and began syndicating them to TV stations for play in their so-called prime access time period--the hour between local news and prime-time when viewing levels are high.

“Wheel” took off almost immediately, and “Jeopardy” followed shortly after. King World went public in December, 1984, and overnight made the Kings multimillionaires.

But what has some investors and industry executives increasingly concerned is that Roger King’s Las Vegas “altercation”--as the company called the incident in its press release--is one of a series of events going back many years.

In 1987, King was charged with auto theft, strong-arm robbery and cocaine possession after he fought with a cab driver who picked him up from a Ft. Lauderdale nightclub and stole the driver’s cab. King, who pleaded no contest to the theft and cocaine charges--the strong-arm charge was dismissed--was sentenced to two years probation and ordered to contribute $2,000 to a drug-treatment center.

Only a few months after the Ft. Lauderdale incident--and the day before he was to report to a Minneapolis hospital for substance-abuse treatment--King bear-hugged Atlantic City baccarat dealer Jeffrey Silverman after winning a $22,500 bet.

Silverman sued the executive, and in the resulting court case testified that King lifted him “by the throat” and held him off the floor for nearly 20 seconds until one of King’s friends said, “Let him go.”

A New Jersey Superior Court judge last year upheld a lower court’s decision to award Silverman $66,000 in compensatory damages in the incident, while denying punitive damages. The trial judge had determined there was no “malice” on the part of King.

James M. Rupp, president of WCCO-TV in Minneapolis and a director of King World, said Roger King realizes the seriousness of his drinking problem and is undergoing medical treatment.

“Roger would be the first to admit he would have a chemical problem,” Rupp said. “It hopefully has been addressed. He’s determined to get rid of this terrible disease.”

Some investors appear to take the incidents in stride, having grown accustomed to them over the years.

“Most people who are in the stock now know that Roger King is a mess but are willing to let him go because he is such a phenomenal salesman,” said Lisbeth Barron, an entertainment analyst at S.G. Warburg in New York.

King World’s stock has been trading around $25 per share recently, significantly below its high of $34 last spring, despite the overall stock market’s record levels. The stock closed Thursday at $25.50, up 12.5 cents in New York Stock Exchange trading.

Analysts say a number of factors are depressing the shares, including the introduction next fall of a new Bill Cosby-hosted version of “You Bet Your Life” that is being pitched by a competitor.

On the negative side too is the seeming inevitability that TV stations on the West Coast will be advancing prime-time ahead one hour, thereby shrinking the number of stations on which King World can place its shows.

Royal Flush

King World Productions has reported steady revenue and earnings increases every year since going public in 1984. King World’s hit shows--”Wheel of Fortune,” “Jeopardy” and “The Oprah Winfrey Show”--accounted for 80% of the company’s $476 million revenue in fiscal 1991, up from 73% in 1990. From there, contributors to the company’s cash flow fall off quickly: “Inside Edition” accounted for 6% of King World’s 1991 revenue, and a Buffalo, N.Y., television station provided 4%.

Net earnings for fiscal years ended Aug. 31: 1991 $90.5 million, 1981 $800 thousand