Harvey Levin, managing editor of celebrity news Internet site TMZ.com and executive producer of its offshoot TV show, has been called a modern-day Walter Winchell, the gossip columnist of bygone days who could break a career with the turn of a devastating phrase.
For Levin, that power comes not with the clever phrase but with the quick distribution of an embarrassing video. And he pursues those images with the same intensity he was known for in his days as a Los Angeles legal reporter on local television.
In the most famous example, Levin got his hands on a video clip of former “Seinfeld” regular Michael Richards spouting a racist rant on stage at the Laugh Factory in November 2006, and he posted it on TMZ.com. The clip was quickly broadcast around the world, and Richards’ reputation was immediately damaged.
The scoop helped Levin put TMZ on the map, and Richards has barely been heard from since.
It also angered Jamie Masada, owner of the comedy venue on the Sunset Strip, who claims the video wasn’t public domain.
“It was stolen goods,” Masada said. “There are signs everywhere saying that taping is not allowed without prior consent by management.”
Not one to shrink from a fight, Levin said TMZ’s distribution of the tape, which was shot by an audience member on a cell phone, was fair use. The incident was a news event that took place in a public forum, he claims.
“We went down to the club and walked all around it and there were no signs that we saw,” Levin said.
Hollywood publicist Michael Levine, who has known Levin for decades, said the incident shows the damn-the-torpedoes approach that makes the former lawyer and television journalist a success in the modern world of celebrity coverage.
“Harvey has the burning, maniacal rage that it takes to be successful in this industry,” said Levine, who has represented Dave Chappelle, Sandra Bernhard and George Carlin, among others.
Where did that burning rage come from? There wasn’t much evidence in his formative years, although he’s always demonstrated his own brand of boldness.
Born in 1950 in Los Angeles, Levin studied political science at the University of California, Santa Barbara during the Vietnam War era. He was an activist in Robert Kennedy’s presidential campaign and later lobbied the Los Angeles City Council for gun control.
He made a brief attempt at a master’s degree at the University of Wisconsin, but soon found himself returning to California, where he planned to work in state government. But on the flight back, he had a six-hour layover in Chicago. Trying to make best use of the time, Levin phoned the dean of the University of Chicago law school and asked if he could apply. He was admitted into the school that afternoon.
It was a life-changing layover.
Starting in TV
He was accepted by the California State Bar in 1975 and joined the Los Angeles law firm of Richards Watson Dreyfuss & Gershon. He quickly left to become a television reporter, covering legal affairs for KNBC (Channel 4) in Los Angeles.
That’s where he honed his willingness to take risks and challenge the legal establishment.
Levin made his name at KNBC with a series of stories about a law firm that padded its bills for acting as court-appointed counsel to indigent criminal defendants.
He won the State Bar’s Golden Medallion Award for a story he did on the jury system. He also did noteworthy reports on civil rights violations by the Beverly Hills Police Department and right-to-die issues.
“Harvey was a tenacious competitor,” said David Goldstein, a TV reporter who competed with Levin during coverage of the O.J. Simpson case.
“I remember when we were done for the day and everyone was exhausted, Harvey packed up his camera crew and went down to Brentwood and was doing man-on-the-street interviews late into the night, just trying to come up with a scoop,” Goldstein said. “The guy never sleeps.”
But he made a serious misstep while covering the Simpson trial.
While working as an on-air legal analyst for KCBS (Channel 2) in Los Angeles, Levin aired a videotape of what he said was prosecutor Marcia Clark searching Simpson’s home prior to obtaining a search warrant. But Clark did have a warrant, and Levin was forced to make an on-air apology. He left the station shortly afterward.
Levin said that he left because he wanted to graduate from being a reporter to producing.
“There was simply nothing left for me to do in TV news that I hadn’t already done.” Levin said. “An opportunity came along to executive produce the ‘People’s Court,’ where I had been a legal consultant, so I jumped at it.”
His work at “People’s Court” included conducting man-on-the-street interviews in New York’s Times Square.
Then came “Celebrity Justice,” a tabloid show he executive produced that focused on the legal woes of the famous. The show was cancelled after three years due to poor ratings that Levin blames on bad time slots.
Then Jim Bankoff, executive vice president of programming and products at America Online, offered Levin the position as managing editor of what became TMZ.com.
(TMZ stands for “thirty mile zone,” a 360 degree area radiating outward from the corner of Beverly and La Cienega boulevards. It’s the area where stars tend to live and play.)
“When Jim came to me and told me about this online celebrity network idea he had, I couldn’t have been less interested,” Levin said. “I wanted to produce television.”
But the more Levin thought about the idea, he said, the more he began to embrace it.
“I thought that if you could run an Internet site like a news organization, you can beat television,” Levin said. “And over time I learned how to produce for the Internet. It’s not just throwing video up, it’s producing stories.”
TMZ branding
Its very first day online in December 2005, TMZ.com made a splash, posting video of Paris Hilton and her Greek shipping heir boyfriend, Stavros Niarchos, in a hit-and-run car crash and subsequent run-in with police. Levin released the video, emblazoned with the TMZ logo, to news agencies the world over.
“It instantly branded our site and we got so many hits that it crashed our servers,” Levin said.
TMZ offers a stark contrast to the way celebrities are covered by shows such as Entertainment Tonight, which are dependent on publicists granting access to the stars.
“We don’t need to have Tom Cruise in the studio to talk about his next picture,” said Levin, who works on the third floor unmarked and unremarkable of an office building on Sunset Boulevard. “We don’t care about that type of coverage. So, publicists don’t have any power over us.”
Publicist Stan Rosenfield acknowledged that Levin caught the industry off-guard, but he said he respects him.
“He doesn’t take cheap shots,” Rosenfield said. “He’ll always let you know what’s coming. You may not like it, but he’s fair.”
Some aren’t so generous.
Three defense attorneys, who declined to be identified in this story because of fear of retaliation, said that Levin and TMZ routinely get police reports before prosecutors do and that prosecutors and judges also leak information to Levin in an effort to sway public opinion. For example, TMZ got the scoop on the Mel Gibson arrest in Malibu in which he unleashed an anti-Semitic tirade.
“He’s been around so long and covered the legal system so much that he knows everyone,” one defense attorney said. “So, it’s no surprise that the cops and prosecutors come to him first.”
Another criticism: Since TMZ.com and its television show have turned up the heat on celebrity coverage, hoards of photographers jockeying for the best shot have sometimes created scenes of havoc on the streets.
Local law enforcement has made several arrests of freelance paparazzi photographers who block sidewalks and those who chase down celebrities in their cars.
Levin said that he and the show’s producers, AOL Time Warner and Telepictures, are doing all that they can to control their own photographers through contractual agreements that lay out the ground rules for conduct, but that freelance paparazzi are becoming more aggressive.
“I am very, very concerned that somebody’s going to get seriously injured,” Levin said. “It’s just a matter of time, really.”
