Hollywood Auditions Candidates

A day after Al Gore announced his decision to skip the 2004 presidential race, Rob Reiner arrived at the studio offices of Castle Rock Entertainment in Beverly Hills to find three messages.

Howard Dean, John F. Kerry and Joseph I. Lieberman were all trying to reach the actor-director to commiserate -- and to plug their own White House bids. By week’s end, Reiner, an active Democrat and ardent Gore supporter, also had spoken with John Edwards and Richard A. Gephardt about their presidential plans.

Still, Reiner is holding out, intrigued by the prospects but undecided about which candidate to support in 2004. “A lot of people out there are trying to find the person to fall in love with,” he said.

There is no end of eager suitors.

Since 1992, when Bill Clinton captivated many in the entertainment industry, Hollywood -- long an important source of Democratic Party money -- has become a vital one. Over the last several elections, political contributions from donors in the movie, TV and music business have more than tripled, to $46 million in 2002.

Ranked by industry, Hollywood is the nation’s fourth-biggest source of cash in federal campaigns, surpassing longtime givers such as the energy and tobacco industries, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan group that tracks campaign giving. More than 70% of the money contributed over the last decade has gone to Democrats, reflecting Hollywood’s leftward tilt and Clinton’s cementing of that relationship.

“They come where they know, as a matter of principle, they have great support,” said entertainment magnate Haim Saban, a major Democratic donor. “They’re not going to go to Mississippi.”

Now that Clinton and Gore have left the scene, the industry’s hearts and checkbooks are largely unspoken for. As a result, Hollywood is in the throes of an ardent courtship, as candidates, moguls and celebrities get acquainted at elaborate dinners, luncheon tryouts and private performances in the mansions and high-rises of Los Angeles’ Westside.

In just the last few weeks, North Carolina Sen. Edwards has stumped at the Pacific Palisades home of Larry David, star and creator of HBO’s “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” Former Vermont Gov. Dean has huddled with actor Warren Beatty. Missouri Rep. Gephardt mingled Thursday night in Beverly Hills at the mansion of ex-studio owner Marvin Davis. Those sessions all have been private, as the participants prefer; some who have attended say the candidates talk about the same issues -- health care, the economy, the environment, defense and foreign policy -- that they discuss with Democratic activists across the country.

“It’s weird. We went away for the holidays and came back and suddenly they were all here,” said Margery Tabankin, a longtime Hollywood activist who runs Barbra Streisand’s personal and political foundation. (Streisand was sighted at the Edwards affair.)

By the end of February, each of the five leading Democratic contenders will have called on Hollywood at least one time this month.

Some, like Gephardt and Massachusetts Sen. Kerry, are building on long-standing relationships. Others, like Dean and Edwards, are relatively fresh faces. There is little evident support for Connecticut Sen. Lieberman, Gore’s running mate in 2000, who has antagonized many with his crusade against media sex and violence, or for the Rev. Al Sharpton, the most recent entry in the field.

Apart from those two, however, “the race ... is up for grabs, in a way it really hasn’t been in Hollywood for years,” said Chad Griffin, a former Clinton aide now active in the entertainment community.

If anything, industry support may have grown even more valuable under new campaign finance laws that limit so-called soft money, the unlimited contributions that political parties -- and Democrats in particular -- collected in five- and six-figure chunks.

Individual donors can now give no more than $4,000 to a candidate each election season, which puts a premium on those political givers -- such as agents, producers and other Hollywood brokers -- who can tap large networks of like-minded peers to fill several dinner tables at $2,000 a plate, or persuade a rock star to give a $1,000-a-ticket concert.

“The personal checks are important,” Tabankin said. “The connections are incredibly important.”

While Clinton and campaign finance have combined to elevate Hollywood’s activism and influence in recent years, the industry’s political involvement goes back decades, practically to the advent of motion pictures.

Al Jolson corralled support for both Warren G. Harding and Calvin Coolidge. MGM founder Louis B. Mayer was the first studio chief to systematically court politicians, wooing Herbert Hoover and eventually dining at the White House.

Moguls Harry and Jack Warner organized a celebrity benefit for Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Frank Sinatra befriended presidents from Roosevelt to Kennedy. Lew Wasserman, reigning from Universal City, may have been the most powerful entertainment executive of all, emerging as Hollywood’s top fund-raiser just as the era of TV-driven, big-money politics was dawning.

As vital as campaign donations are, however, that is only a part of Hollywood’s allure. The other commodity is that magical buzz that suggests, as Democratic strategist David Doak put it, that backing a particular politician “is the cool place to be.”

In the early stages of the primaries, as the presidential candidates struggle to emerge from the muddle, there are few better ways to draw precious attention than the charisma conferred by a celebrity endorsement.

“On any given weekend in Iowa or New Hampshire there’s a pack of Democratic candidates parading around, all fighting for press coverage,” said Griffin, who advises several Hollywood personalities, including Reiner. “The one who has Martin Sheen standing next to him is the one most likely to get the TV cameras.”

Sheen is one of the few celebrities to commit to a presidential candidate at this point. The “West Wing” star recently threw his support to Dean when the ex-governor stopped by the Washington set of the NBC program. The two men have yet to campaign together, however.

Many more are still shopping. Reiner, for instance, has invited each of the presidential hopefuls to join him for a series of private auditions.

The first, with Dean, took place last month over lunch at Spago in Beverly Hills.

Reiner was joined by some high-powered friends, including Michael King of King World Productions, producer Norman Lear, writer-producer Steven Bing and Saban. The latter two last year gave the biggest contributions in Democratic Party history, a combined $12 million.

Though Reiner was favorably impressed by Dean -- “He’s someone who stands up for what he believes” -- he was also noncommittal. “There’s good and bad about all the candidates,” he said. “It would be nice if people out here could come to some consensus ... but I don’t know if that can happen.”

Many are hedging by helping more than one candidate. “Pulp Fiction” producer Lawrence Bender, a prominent activist among young Hollywood figures, has given fund-raisers for both Kerry and Edwards.

Norm Pattiz, founder of Westwood One radio, plans to spread the wealth by writing checks “for several candidates, so they can make their cases,” said Donna Bojarsky, his political advisor.

Still others are standing back for now, angry and frustrated over the 2002 midterm elections, and convinced that Democrats lost seats in the House and Senate because the party was too timid in challenging President Bush’s tax cuts and his stance toward Iraq.

“After the last election I felt beaten to a pulp, really disheartened, less frustrated by the American public than I was by the Democratic Party,” said director Jon Turteltaub, a Kerry backer. “It was amorphous and wimpy.”

Beatty, who is neutral, suggests Democrats have been too skittish after the shock of Sept. 11. “It’s been difficult,” Beatty said, “but in my opinion those domestic issues are still there and should have been articulated more energetically and specifically and more boldly.”

Some still long for the outsized presence of Clinton, who connected with Hollywood Democrats in a way few candidates have. “We got used to somebody who seemed to inspire people,” said producer Mike Medavoy, who is often credited with introducing the future president to Hollywood back when Clinton was Arkansas governor.

The Hollywood-Washington relationship has always been somewhat awkward. Politicians crave the glamour -- not to mention the dollars -- but are wary of too close an embrace. Hollywood, in turn, wants to be taken seriously but doesn’t always see a whole lot of sexiness in, say, the budget reconciliation process. As a result, the courtship takes time.

In the current race, though few are ready to commit, there seems to be a rough consensus in Hollywood about one candidate: Lieberman is unpopular, not just for scolding Hollywood, but also for views that place him well to the right of most Democrats.

Paramount Chairman Sherry Lansing was a Gore delegate to the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles and was visibly moved when Lieberman became the first Jewish vice presidential candidate in 2000. But since then, she said, “I have been extremely disappointed in a lot of the decisions he’s made, especially in regards to the motion picture industry.”

Added Bruce Cohen, Oscar-winning producer of “American Beauty” and a Gephardt supporter: “With all the serious problems in the world today,” Lieberman is “going to go after content in the entertainment industry? It seems crazy.”

An aide to Lieberman downplayed the hostility. “Friends disagree from time to time,” said the spokesman, Jano Cabrera. “Ultimately, however, we believe that those in the industry will find that there are many more issues, such as the environment and the economy, on which they and Sen. Lieberman share common ground.”

The senator has a Los Angeles fund-raiser scheduled later this month.