Bad Company: Drugs, Hollywood and the Cotton Club Murder

by Steve Wick

Exposes the shocking true tale of Hollywood greed, drugs, and corruption behind the long-unsolved murder of Roy Radin, who had joined with others to finance the making of a major movie

Genres: True Crime, Nonfiction, Mystery

270 pages, Hardcover

First published June 15, 1990

Reviews

[Jill H. · Rating 1 out of 5]

I knew when I picked up this book, it might be cheesy but that word doesn't even come close. What a disaster.

I don't know where to start, so I'll keep it short. More characters than the population of a small town, holes as big as the Grand Canyon, characters that you hate, and unexplained incidents. The coup de grace was that the book just stopped before anything was resolved. It was as if the last few chapters were accidentally omitted. Obviously the book was written before the "case' was closed and I wasn't even interested enough to Google to find the outcome.

My apologies to the author and those who enjoyed this mish-mash of a book.

[Laurah · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was better organized and much less salacious than other true crime books. Found it at the GoodWill and knew nothing of the case, it was worth the quarter.

[A Cesspool · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fair Warning: This has nothing to do with Hollywood Film & Video Production -- if like me, you might be expecting some insightful anecdotal(s) around the making of the 1984 motion picture The Cotton Club. They might've just as well subtitled:

Drugs, Hollywood and The Two Jakes Murder.

It just happened Robert Evans fancied Roy Radin's Cotton Club treatment (over their other potential projects, including sequels to Chinatown & The Godfather).

Thoroughly researched, neatly edited (albeit mostly);
Not o n e likable character throughout -- Bad Company reads like a Steven Soderbergh’s Greatest Hits -- there isn’t a character portrayed I'd invest my free time with willingly. Quite lit·er·al·ly everyone featured is a Grade A-hole (not even spoiled bastard only-child Dax [nor his loose-lipped nanny] go unscathed ...especially the nanny, imo). Save for Radin’s mother; probably the only one i could harbor any sincere empathy for.

Bad Company is at times fascinating even if the third act invests more in Karen "Lanie" Jacobs Greenberger's epilogue-swindle than her obligatory criminal trial.. The initial first edition [publishing] ought to be discontinued & in moratorium -- out of circulation -- after the 1991 paperback's requisite postscript edition, amends the outcome to Lanie's criminal trial; a supplement that's not even on the 2008 audiobook edition!?!

Unanswered queries:

 » Ed Bolter -- whose business, Eagle Outdoor Advertising, Larry Greenberger had invested $250,000, -- could not collect on an insurance policy on Larry Greenberger's life because of the circumstances of his death + It was Bolter's E.O.A. truck clandestinely parked inside Greenberger's garage (alongside alleged triggerman Terry Squillante's Jeep) when Larry was away, undergoing cosmetic surgery in California.

 » Why wasn't Evans' stooge, Sergeant Glenn Sousa, who retired from LAPD, later went on Evans' payroll (only after Radin's cadaver appeared), ever investigated?

 » Who stripped out the infamous Limousine's interior, replacing all of the seating fabric?

Why wasn't Bob Evans given immunity (since the State had no plans to charge him), thereby forcing his hand; rather than allowing him to skate on the 5th amendment?

 » Exactly what type of cooperating informant is Mark Fogel?? LAPD Homicide Detectives Stoner and Guenther interviewed Fogel four years after Radin’s murder and he can still finger regurgitate the ‘Laney Jacobs as a major coke dealer’ intel and yet still play dumb on the Roy Radin cold case??

 » Did LAPD narc (and Fogel handler) Freddy McKnight oversee the least productive squad in the Narcotics Division? How could Lanie & Fogel’s relationship continue to thrive (e.g. access to vehicles, cherry picking lot employees to mule) with LAPD supposedly right on top of them, from the very the get-go (or even prior) Lanie establishing West Coast residency? Freddy McKnight knew all the major players in Roy Radin’s kidnapping-murder, yet LAPD allowed the case to go cold; albeit until Homicide Detectives Stoner & Guenther caught their first real break after McNight shot his mouth off to the DA?
Quite literally every facet of LAPD, through County Sheriff’s Department, all the way to L.A. District Atty. either prioritized Bob Evans’ best interests or just feigned little in resolving a high value (potentially sensational) criminal case involving narcotics, kidnapping, murder, entertainment industry, simply because the victim was non-residential (East Coast transplant)?

It almost appears as if this cast of creeps instinctively colluded at keeping the lone character we might have any empathy for, Roy’s mother, Renee, from meaningful closure, by waiting to prosecute her son’s murders shortly after her passing, imo.

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

The author makes a case for Radin’s rising star re-establishment out West and had he — not succumbed to vampire-pirate Bob Evans’ scorched earth-collaboration — followed through with Paramount's initial offer, Radin almost certainly would’ve landed a development deal there. And yet, Roy Radin was a degenerate numbskull who almost certainly would've succumbed to premature demise; regardless of Lanie Greenberger -- again, and again and again Roy Radin disregarded the advice of both peers and colleagues who only proffered best intentions & self-preservation.

Double-barrels blast of chicanery: Indecent Exposure: A True Story of Hollywood and Wall Street
...if interested in a double feature of early-80's Hollywood racketeering & treachery.
Robert Evans' post-Paramount existence almost perfectly pantomimes shamefaced-studio head David "Begelscan" Begelman; specifically, Evans final days as production chief on the studio lot (and thereafter). Whereas Begelman sabotaged his own legacy via native graft, Evans does likewise, only subverting the same outcome by virtue of charming lechery and duplicity.

[Candy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Juicy, crazy, decadent, pop culture must read.

[Susan · Rating 3 out of 5]

It paints a great picture of Hollywood excess, but the story itself feels incomplete, both in terms of what it intentionally and unintentionally seems to leave out.

[Christina · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have several connections to this book, which I only discovered after reading. The hitman, Bill, was in a writing class I was teaching at a prison! A reporter friend of mine is good friends with the author, and a former BF of mine had optioned the film rights to the book! Very weird. Anyway, the book is a great read, extremely well researched, about a narcissistic woman who tries to get away with murder and very nearly does. If you're into crime or true crime, this book is for you. For the record, I asked Bill about the book. He hasn't read it but maintains everything written about this high profile case is wrong. He says he did the wrong thing for the right reasons. Every now and then, he gets producers interested in doing a movie/TV show on the case, but he's not interested. He's now 7o years old.

[Koren · Rating 4 out of 5]

I may have heard of this crime way back in the early 80's but I didn't really remember it. I'm sure it was all over the news when it happened as there are some well-known Hollywood characters mentioned, most notably Demond Wilson who played the son in Sanford and Son. This was a really well-written True Crime book that was not repetitive at all and the trial was very condensed, basically just taking up the last 20 or 30 pages. This was not just about a couple of murders but taught this rural hick from the sticks a few things about the cocaine trade.

[Vincent Picks · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great story and deeply researched, although lacking substantially in scenes leading to Cotton Club’s actual production and release. Disappointing, as Evans and Coppola’s 70s/80s evolving dynamic is what attracted me to the book in the first place.

Among the most stirring moments, Radin’s abduction, Red Buttons’ eulogy of Radin, and a coroners’ detailed analysis of a bullet wound to a head (not Radin’s).

I’d trust Jonathan Lawson with my life.

[Carol Waters · Rating 2 out of 5]

Save some time: the ending just disappeared, the 80's are over, and drug dealing is dangerous. Very little insight into anyone's character. There could have been a sentence about WHY the transvestite was killed....

Another wasted few hours on my drive to clean off the bookshelves. I have got to learn to just drop these clunkers in a box.

Stars are for research and for effort.

[Brian J · Rating 3 out of 5]

What do a high-level Miami coke distributor, a coke-addicted Vaudeville act promoter, and a wash-up big time Hollywood producer have in common? In 1983, they all teamed up to create what eventually became Francis Ford Coppola’s the Cotton Club, which left at least one person murdered, kilos of coke snorted, and lots of dirty dealings in its wake.

Great sordid Hollywood story, full of good tea.

[Eugene · Rating 3 out of 5]

Moral of the story....cocaine is really nasty, kids and this book is all about really bad things people seriously involved with it have done. It's also quite a page-turner.

[Joan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wow, you really never know what is going on in Hollywood.
How far someone will go to get a movie made is unbelievable.
Wild ride.