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For Reeves, the fall from star to has-beenwas more than she could handle; in the late 60s, she had a series of ner-vous breakdowns and, reportedly, was put in a strait-jacket for a time.Motown, essentially, had evolved into a two-headed creature theSupremes and everyone else.But even as HDH were digging deeperinto their creative well for a last few rounds of immortal genius, thedarker view of life that they had begun to mine and brand into theSupremes sonic dreamscape an ingenious and even necessary com-mercial segue, to be sure was in itself an ominous signpost, and onetied to their progressive enmity for Gordy.At the same time, there were strains building between Gordy andMickey Stevenson and Harvey Fuqua.Which is why, even if Gordydidn t sense it, there was a crisis on the way at Motown, with theSupremes and by extension, the entire Motown realm squarely inthe cross-hairs.The hiring of Shelly Berger would shift the center of Motown s axis.Berger, at 27, was a short, brash, and hyperbolic former actor who hadtalked his way into managing acts either not-yet-famous like insult 0306815867_ribowsky:6.125 x 9.25 4/22/09 11:06 AM Page 251AN ITCHING IN THE HEART 251comic Don Rickles or erstwhile-famous like the Kingsmen and Dickand Dee Dee.Good fortune smiled on him early in 1966 when hewalked into a big L.A.talent agent s office one day just as the agent wason the phone with Ralph Seltzer, Motown s chief accountant andlawyer and overseer of its bare-boned L.A.operation.Berger recalls, He was saying, No, I m not interested, then, spot-ting me, continued, but you know who would be great for the job?Shelly Berger. I said, Yeah, I would. When he hung up, I said, Oh, bythe way, what job am I perfect for? It was, it turned out, with Motown, trying to line up work for thecompany s performers on TV shows and in movies still not the easiestof tasks in the real world outside of the Supremes, which was no doubtwhy the big agent declined.Berger, up for any challenge, didn t.WhenSeltzer took the advice and called him with the offer, he quit Ricklesand the has-been rockers and began talking up Motown acts all overHollywood.He didn t meet Berry Gordy until he came to Detroit todrop in, uninvited, at the July 4th Motown picnic.Gordy was shockedto see the elfin white stranger arrive in the back seat of Gordy s ex-wifeThelma s car, having waylaid her on the way by claiming he ran Mo-town s West Coast office. When Berger introduced himself, Gordykept his distance, wondering why Seltzer had hired this loon.SHELLY BERGER: At the beginning, Mr.Gordy and I thoughteach other were crazy.I thought his memo that the Supremescould only record No.1 records was the most insane thing I dever heard of.When we sat down, he asked me, Can you getour acts on TV? I said, Not only will I do that, but we re go-ing to produce our own TV specials and movies. At whichpoint he excused himself, called Ralph Seltzer, and told him tofire me.I was informed that his exact words were Either he son drugs or he s an idiot. Because it was so far-fetched.But it was something I trulybelieved.I knew what Motown was capable of.It had giantpotential.It just didn t have anyone who could work full-timeon it.Mr.Gordy tried to do it himself, but he had a record com-pany to run.Left to his devices alone, it never would have gottendone.For many reasons.Look, there s no need to sugar-coatit.There was resistance to black acts.We live in a racist coun-try, back then much more so.We were up against SammyDavis, Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, all the standard black 0306815867_ribowsky:6.125 x 9.25 4/22/09 11:06 AM Page 252252 THE SUPREMESperformers who got all the work there was for black acts.Wewere the rock and roll kids.Mr.Gordy realized all that; and that he had nothing to losewith me.And I think we both learned to believe that each of uswas at least partly sane.Gordy became convinced Berger was onto something when, withinweeks, he d gotten Dick Clark to do an entire Where the Action Is show from the Roostertail Club featuring no one but Motown acts.The Motown operation in L.A.was a cramped room in a small of-fice building at 6290 Sunset Boulevard. Actually, says Berger, theWest Coast office was basically Brenda Holloway, the only act of con-sequence to record out of L.A.The staff there consisted mainly of pro-ducers Hal Davis and Marc Gordon and songwriter Frank Wilson,their work confined to cutting Holloway records and Motown albumfiller.Now, it became a hub of outgoing and incoming calls, withBerger, a phone in each ear, carrying on several conversations at oncewith TV producers.Leaning on Ed Sullivan s head man Bob Precht, hewas able to secure a deal for the Supremes to appear on the Sullivanshow four times a year; in time, every other big-name Motown actwould make it onto Sullivan s stage, too.Berger s old friendship with Jules Podell also paid dividends; theoriginal Copa contract with the Supremes was torn up, replaced by onethat broke the glass ceiling of Podell s pay scale. I gave Jules an addi-tional year on the Supremes, Berger explains, and an added year onthe Temptations, and I broke the top, which was $10,000.I believe wegot $17,500 for the Supremes last engagement there.Nobody, noteven Sinatra, had ever gotten near that, even near $15,000.It happenedbecause I was one of the few people Jules Podell would talk to.Hedidn t do me any favors, he just listened to me.He didn t ever really lis-ten to Mr.Gordy.He didn t really even know who Berry Gordy was.Jules spoke to me, Lee Solomon at William Morris, and Buddy Howellat GAC.So that was the bonus that Motown got when they hired me. With barely a breath in between negotiations, Berger enlisted theindependent TV production team of George Schlatter and Ed Friendly(who would bring Laugh-In to the small screen in 1968) to package aSupremes-Temptations special and present it to the networks, and be-gan dickering with ABC s Saturday night stalwart The Hollywood Palacefor the Supremes not just to perform on the show, as they had already,but to host the glitter-filled show several times a year. 0306815867_ribowsky:6.125 x 9.25 4/22/09 11:06 AM Page 253AN ITCHING IN THE HEART 253By 1967, L.A.would be more than a nominal piece of lint in theMotown back drawer
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