LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- Aaron Spelling, a onetime movie bit
player who created a massive number of hit series, from the vintage
"Charlie's Angels" and "Dynasty" to "Beverly Hills 90210" and "Melrose
Place," died Friday, his publicist said. He was 83.
Spelling died at his home in Los Angeles after suffering a stroke on
June 18, according to publicist Kevin Sasaki.
Spelling's other hit series included "Love Boat," "Fantasy Island,"
"Burke's Law," "The Mod Squad," "Starsky and Hutch," "T.J. Hooker,"
"Matt Houston," "Hart to Hart" and "Hotel." He kept his hand in
21st-century TV with series including "7th Heaven" and "Summerland."
(Watch Spelling's journey from Angels to 7th Heaven via 90210 -- 3:26)
He also produced more than 140 television movies. Among the most
notable: "Death Sentence" (1974), Nick Nolte's first starring role; "The
Boy in the Plastic Bubble" (1976), John Travolta's first dramatic role;
and "The Best Little Girl in the World" (1981), which starred Jennifer
Jason Leigh.
During the 1970s and 1980s, Spelling provided series and movies
exclusively for ABC and is credited for the network's rise to major
status. Jokesters referred to it as "The Aaron Broadcasting Company."
Success was not without its thorns. TV critics denounced Spelling for
fostering fluff and nighttime soap operas. He called his shows "mind
candy"; critics referred to them as "mindless candy."
"The knocks by the critics bother you," he admitted in a 1986 interview
with The Associated Press.
"But you have a choice of proving yourself to 300 critics or 30 million
fans. You have to make a choice. I think you're also categorized by the
critics. If you do something good they almost don't want to like it."
He liked to cite some of his more creditable achievements, like "Family"
(1976-80), a drama about a middle-class family, and "The Best Little
Girl in the World."
Among his prestige films for TV: "Day One" (1988), about an atomic blast
in middle America; "And the Band Played On" (1992), based on Randy
Shilts' book about the AIDS crisis.
Spelling had arrived in Hollywood virtually penniless in the early
1950s. By the 1980s, Forbes magazine estimated his wealth at $300
million. He enjoyed his status, working in a Hollywood office larger
than those of golden-era moguls ("I'm slightly claustrophpobic," he
explained.) He gifted his second wife, Candy, with a 40-carat diamond ring.
The Spellings' most publicized extravagance was their 56,500-square-foot
French chateau in Holmby Hills.
The couple bought the former Bing Crosby estate for $10 million. It was
leveled to the ground, along with two other houses. Construction cost
was estimated at $12 million.
The two-story house reached a height of 51 feet. Among the features: an
entire floor for closets, a one-lane bowling alley, plus the usual
elements for the Hollywood rich -- pool, tennis court, gym, screening
room. Built on rollers, it easily survived the 1994 Northridge earthquake.
The mansion dwarfed nearby estates, and the neighbors were furious. One
woman won an injunction during construction, calling the place
"Look-at-me-I'm-rich architecture."
Spelling grew up in a small frame house on Browder Street in Dallas "on
the wrong side of the tracks," he wrote in his 1996 autobiography. He
was the fourth son of immigrant Jews, his father from Poland, mother
from Russia. The father's name, Spurling, was simplified to Spelling by
an Ellis Island official.
Spelling enlisted in the Army Air Corps after graduating from high
school in 1942.
"I grew up thinking 'Jew boy' was one word," the producer wrote in his
memoir, "Aaron Spelling: A Prime-Time Life." He was considered strange
by his Dallas schoolmates because his parents spoke Yiddish. He was
subjected to anti-Semitic taunts and beatings on his way home from school.
At 8, the boy suffered what he termed a nervous breakdown, and he spent
a year in bed. He later considered that period the birth of his creative
urge. He fell in love with great storytellers, especially O. Henry. Of
his early TV series he said, "They are all O. Henry short stories."
"I still have nightmares about being in a $6,000 house in Dallas,
Texas," he remarked in a 1996 AP interview. "Wall-to-wall people, one
bathroom. I was the one to go to the local bakery a block away on
Saturday to get the day-old stuff."
After combat and organizing entertainment in Europe during the war,
Spelling returned to Texas and enrolled at Southern Methodist
University, where he wrote and directed plays. He continued working in
local theatrics after graduating.
Finding no work in New York, Spelling moved to Los Angeles, where he
staged plays and acted in more than 40 TV shows and 12 movies. His
skinny frame suited him for the role of a ragged beggar in the MGM
musical "Kismet." He worked for three weeks, repeating his one line:
"Alms for the love of Allah."
The "Kismet" experience resulted in two decisions: he abandoned acting
for the typewriter; he married a young actress he had been courting,
Carolyn Jones. She became well-known, especially as Morticia in "The
Addams Family" series. They divorced after 13 years, and she died of
cancer in 1983.
Spelling's friendship with such actor-producers as Dick Powell, Jack
Webb and Alan Ladd led to his rapid rise as a prolific writer and later
producer of TV series. In 1960, Powell, head of Four Star Productions,
hired him to produce shows for Powell himself, his wife June Allyson and
Lloyd Bridges. "Burke's Law," with Gene Barry as a millionaire
detective, became the first hit series Spelling created.
After Powell's death, Spelling teamed with Danny Thomas in a production
company, scoring a huge success with "The Mod Squad," about a trio of
youthful undercover cops. In 1969, Spelling began an exclusive contract
with ABC, helping the network to rise from a low third place to the top
of the network ratings. Former ABC programming chief Leonard Goldberg
joined him as partner in 1972.
After ABC cancelled "Dynasty" in 1989 and his contract with the network
had ended, Spelling found himself without a show on the air for the
first time since 1960.
"I was so depressed, I would have quit, but I like TV too much,"
Spelling wrote in his memoir. Besides, his company had started issuing
stock in 1986, and he had an obligation to his investors. After a year's
respite, he returned with "Beverly Hills 90210," which helped launch the
fledgling Fox Network into the bigtime. "Melrose Place" gave Fox another
hit.
Throughout his career, Spelling maintained the same image: the skinny
frame, slightly hawkish face. He usually posed with a pipe in his mouth,
a custom he adopted early after seeing stars with pipes in fan magazine
photos.
Spelling and his second wife, Candy, had two children, Tori (for
Victoria), who became a star on the two Fox serials ("Now I'm known as
Tori Spelling's father," he said in mock lament), and Randy, who
appeared in the short-lived "Malibu Shores."
Spelling set a record of producing more than 3,000 TV shows. Besides the
TV movies, he produced 10 theatrical films including "California Split,"
"Mr. Mom." "'night, Mother," "Loose Cannons" and "Soapdish."
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