CHAPTER 12
Whether it was hearing the Lone Ranger cry “Hi-Yo, Silver! Away!” or the sound of air rushing by as Superman flew through the skies, the early history of television is intimately entwined with superheroes and comic books. While comics could take readers inside the minds of the characters in ways that film couldn’t, something about actually seeing the live-action superhero on the screen gave fans a different kind of thrill.
The popularity of televised superheroes often pushed the comic book trade into boom and bust cycles that usually had little to do with the quality of the comics or who produced them. The volatility would drive most people batty. Both the Superman and Batman television shows caused surges in comic book sales in the 1950s and late 1960s. Looking at the television landscape and recalling those two phenomenally popular programs, Marvel executives, including Cadence president Jim Galton, wondered why their company couldn’t replicate these successes in the 1970s, particularly given that it had replaced longtime rival DC as the industry leader in sales.
The fight for sales supremacy between the comic book giants had taken decades to win. Galton and other leaders wanted to capitalize on the victory by establishing a stronger foothold on the West Coast. They also wanted to use the television momentum to show film studios that superheroes could carry feature films. These endeavors would be more lucrative for Cadence and counterbalance the cyclical nature of the print division.
The timing for Lee neared perfection. Searching for new ways to attract audiences, he did what so many Americans had done before him: looked across the country to the golden shores of California.
By the end of the 1970s, he had been in comic book publishing for forty years. Now in his late fifties, he hoped to reinvigorate his career, just as he had a decade before when he faced throngs of college readers on campuses across the nation. Galton, who had a great relationship with his publisher, schemed with Lee to propose that the company buy a Hollywood production studio. When the television networks started showing interest in Marvel’s superheroes in animation and live-action, Lee was sent west to plot their course.
Although Lee’s superheroes revolutionized popular culture and were read by fanatics worldwide, he left for Los Angeles in an odd position. He was already a big name, a celebrity in his own right, which made it difficult (if not impossible) for him to learn the business from the ground up. Lee had the mighty Marvel content behind him, which would open many doors, but it simultaneously raised expectations on the part of his bosses that the path to success would be straightforward. Lee also was used to calling the shots, as he had with Marvel since his teen years. Hollywood simply did not work that way. Lee had to convince skeptical television executives that Marvel’s heroes would translate to live-action programming and that adult viewers would tune in.
Yet the winds of change were already set in motion. In addition to Marvel’s ascension to the top of the comic book world and Lee’s pervasive influence on popular culture as a result, science fiction and fantasy films and television shows had become incredibly popular. On the small screen, The Six Million Dollar Man (1974–1978) proved that audiences would respond to a superhero-like lead character. Steve Austin (played by Lee Majors) developed into a pop culture phenomenon, spawning comic books (featuring artwork by Lee’s friends Howard Chaykin and Neal Adams), albums, and action figures. The spinoff The Bionic Woman (1976–1978) expanded the cyborg adventures, this time featuring the lead female Jaime Sommers (actress Lindsay Wagner). Her popularity also meant a merchandise line, ranging from an action figure to a board game to a lunchbox, which became a must-have item for elementary school kids.
The late 1960s had also helped pave the way for superhero and science fiction narratives among mainstream audiences. In 1968, for example, the films 2001: A Space Odyssey and Planet of the Apes thrilled audiences and generated strong box-office returns. These films reinforced the new style of storytelling that audiences demanded, as well as set the stage for science fiction and fantasy aimed at adults. Later, a film like Logan’s Run (1976) demonstrated how fantasy content could be enhanced by innovative technology and special effects. In 1977, George Lucas’s Star Wars showed film and television executives, as well as people around the world, the vitality of science fiction and fantasy. Didn’t Luke Skywalker, after all, seem like a futuristic version of Spider-Man, an outsider who must deal with possessing extraordinary powers? A year later, the mighty Superman would fly into theaters, also blowing audiences’ minds. Movies like these proved that innovative filmmaking technology could power fantastic plots and characters. Special effects were finally catching up with the imaginations of writers and artists, opening doors for science fiction and fantasy projects on screens both large and small. The time was ripe for comic book characters to make the transition.
Lee spent time crisscrossing the nation, attempting to keep his fingers on the pulse of the comic book division, but increasingly focusing on getting Marvel further established in television and film. He viewed Los Angeles as “Nirvana,” a celestial utopia that would enable him to launch a new career path in his late-fifties without having to discard all that he had done to that point.1 The trepidation of leaving New York City, basically his home for his entire life, got swept away in a sea of excitement about the work he would be doing and the sheer magnificence of the West Coast: the warm breezes blowing off the Pacific Ocean and the hidden enclaves surrounded by thick woods and hillsides.
The move from print to television seemed natural in a world increasingly dominated by images and movement. Lee called the Marvel style “a very cinematic approach” that married dialogue and art.2 A flurry of activity in Los Angeles and deals with several networks and production companies gave Marvel a lift. However, some of the resulting television shows did not live up to Lee’s standards. Others didn’t quite catch on with viewers. Hollywood studio executives and the teams of writers, directors, and producers underestimated the importance of Lee’s style and voice in making Marvel superheroes iconic. Honestly, they felt that they could get it right themselves, since they were the experts, or could at least duplicate what they understood as pithy banter and human pathos. For movie and television leaders, Marvel characters were “properties” to be turned into content that would sell. The soul of the superheroes and what turned fans into rapid consumers of Marvel content often died in the translation.
On the surface, many of Lee’s characters seemed a natural fit for live-action television. However, it was one of the least likely—the green-skinned, raging behemoth Hulk—that made it to the screen. Former Mr. Universe Lou Ferrigno, a six-foot, five-inch, 285-pound mass of rippling muscles, played the lead character. Veteran television actor Bill Bixby played mild-mannered physician and scientist David Banner (series writers changed his first name from Lee’s original “Bruce”). Critics speculated about the show’s popularity, usually deducing that it was a mix of women gawking at Ferrigno and the overall tenor that played to adult sensibilities, rather than a youth audience. Producer Ken Johnson explained the tone to a reporter, saying, “We’ve tried to make it an adult show that kids are allowed to watch.” The writers purposely played down the “camp” elements, Johnson said. We “try to keep it as straight and honest as possible.”3 For his part, Lee enjoyed the adaptation, noting the quality of the acting and story changes the television team made so that the superhero would appeal to an older audience.
Some commentators speculated that many adult viewers took pleasure in seeing a character let loose when angered and go into a rage. Lee identified with the cathartic impulse, saying, “We’d all like to ‘Hulk out’ sometimes. Nobody pushed the Hulk around, and people can identify with that.”4 The show was a surprise hit in the United States, but even bigger in the United Kingdom, where it reached number one. Perhaps in the 1970s the British had a stronger desire to “Hulk out” than Americans. Ultimately, it would be the most successful live-action Marvel property for decades to come.
CBS also brought Spider-Man, Doctor Strange (changed to “Dr. Strange”), and Captain America to the small screen. The Amazing Spider-Man starred Nicholas Hammond as Peter Parker, running sporadically on CBS for two seasons. Dr. Strange, featuring Peter Hooten, debuted as a television film/pilot in September 1978, while Captain America also came out as a TV film, starring Reb Brown as the title hero.
Of the three productions, Spider-Man had the greatest success in terms of viewers. Demonstrating how pervasive Spidey was in popular culture, the pilot earned a 30-share Nielsen rating, the network’s highest rating for 1978. CBS execs worried, though, that the movie did not do well in the important eighteen-to-forty-nine-year-old demographic. They hedged their bet on the superhero and only picked up a five-episode run to gauge if it might garner more viewers from that group (running in April and May 1978). The series debut also did well in the ratings, winning the week for CBS and placing in the top ten overall. Although it eventually placed in the top twenty for the season, network officials perceived it as a show aimed at younger audiences.
Fans tuned into the live-action Spider-Man, but Lee hated it, criticizing the series because it “looked silly . . . juvenile, comic-booky.” He had run-ins with producer Daniel R. Goodman, claiming that the series should be aimed at adults. “Spider-Man was a TV series for a while, and it was terrible. Just dreadful. It had no personality. No humor. None of the ingredients it should have had.”5 In a bind, CBS ordered seven episodes for the next season, and then aired them in mishmash fashion, usually against ratings juggernauts on the competing networks. New producer Lionel Siegel took over and made changes, downplaying Spidey’s superpowers and adding a female love interest. Despite solid ratings, CBS officials axed the show after the second season. They feared the network was being typecast for having so many superhero programs.
Lee disliked the Spider-Man series, calling it “terrible” because it didn’t have the “Marvel pacing” that had made the comic book a best seller for decades. The aspects of the superhero’s life as Peter Parker and Spider-Man just weren’t captured in the CBS show, and then the network more or less gave up on it. But when it came to the Captain America movie, Lee could barely contain himself, declaring it an “abomination.”6 Each of the television shows that made it to air deviated widely from the overriding concept that Lee and his cocreators had established when they constructed the Marvel Universe.
Shuttling back and forth between the coasts, Lee shuddered at the way Hollywood fiddled with the superheroes as if they were afterthoughts to plug into the network lineups. Many creative types on the West Coast carried the same elitist ideas that Lee had encountered most of his career—thinking that superheroes were kid stuff and that adults wouldn’t respond unless there were heavy doses of romantic intrigue added to the story lines. The countless issues sold over the last two decades and the billions of times Marvel comic books had been read and passed around by a generation and a half of readers could not convince Hollywood that superheroes would succeed as adult fare. While the studio heads and creative teams wanted to meet the famous creator of the Marvel Universe, securing contracts with the studios was another matter altogether.
Lee’s carnival-barker banter in his Soapbox columns and college lectures helped promote Marvel, but this over-the-top approach didn’t translate well in Los Angeles. Lee made it a habit of announcing deals and hyping his production work, which drove anticipation, but backfired when a project became mired in preproduction or later fizzled completely.
Lee had to answer to many people, including his bosses back at Cadence, as well as work to establish himself as an independent entity apart from his famous characters. All the while, he had to separate the genuine meetings from the ones that took place simply because a director or producer who had grown up reading Marvel books wanted to meet a childhood hero.
Marvel’s West Coast operation needed to demonstrate progress, so Lee and his team started piecing together deals. They worked with NBC to bring the Silver Surfer graphic novel he did with Kirby to television. Then ABC made noise about developing a Spider-Woman show. Soon, another twelve characters, including Thor, Daredevil, and Doctor Strange, were optioned to Universal.
But as the announcements about new projects piled up, they also served as a kind of ball and chain, because many deals—like so many in Hollywood—simply dissolved. Lee’s frustrations with the Hollywood process mounted. Deal after deal fell through, which left him deflated: “We’ve been working with other production companies, and I have to go along with what they want to do. It’s just taking forever to come up with a story that everyone agrees on.”7
Lee’s perpetual challenge during his early years in Hollywood circled back to the same encounter over and over again. He could not close the kind of deal that would make him and Marvel major players on the Hollywood scene. Almost cyclically, it seemed, Lee would draw media attention and then list a plethora of potential projects, but few ever saw the light of day. Even worse, some that did bombed horribly because the script had problems, the production company did not understand the character’s appeal, or the technology did not exist to make the hero seem heroic or powerful enough. “There is no way of ever predicting which the networks will buy and which they won’t,” Lee lamented.8
The never-ending series of meetings also severely disrupted Lee’s time to actually write. “Out here, you get an idea for a movie and years later, you’re still trying to get it on the screen,” Lee explained. “Here, it is much more big business. There are contracts and negotiations and turnarounds. I find that a little frustrating, because I like to move fast and write fast.”9 Movie studios and publishing companies approached him about writing scripts and novels, he recalls, but he couldn’t find the “few months off” that this kind of work required. Life in L.A. seemed a kind of vicious cycle of meetings, talks, deals, and waiting around. Lee spent more time talking about creativity than producing anything creative.
Despite his general frustration with the Hollywood process, the idea of physically moving to Hollywood appealed to Lee. Ironically, DC’s film success helped him and Joanie get to Los Angeles on a full-time basis. In 1978, the Warner Bros. Superman film starring Christopher Reeve as the Man of Steel thrilled audiences and influential film critic Roger Ebert gave the movie a strong review. Viewers responded—the film earned $300 million in its initial release. The hit movie, combined with the popularity of The Incredible Hulk on television, seemed to make the time ripe for more superhero programming. Lee convinced his bosses at Marvel to allow him to set up an office on the West Coast.
In a May 1979 letter to his friend, eminent French New Wave filmmaker Alain Resnais, Lee wrote about his “love” for Los Angeles and his hope that he might “be able to infiltrate into the TV and movie business.” He also mentioned a potential deal with Lee Kramer, a producer and the manager/boyfriend of popular singer and actress Olivia Newton-John, to make a big budget Silver Surfer movie.10
Lee spent most of the year working in Los Angeles, while dreaming about moving there permanently. “The fact was that I had fallen in love with L.A. during my many trips,” he explained.11 But he hadn’t fully convinced Joanie that it was the right move. Later, she warmed to the idea, chiefly after the Lee’s apartment in New York was robbed and all of her jewelry and other valuables were stolen. Lee called it, “the most depressing and distressing thing imaginable.” They both viewed Hollywood as a new start. Lee did try to put on a brave face for his friend, joking in the letter that Alain and his wife, Flo, should “Lock up your jewelry!”12
By July 1979, Lee’s work to get to L.A. picked up steam. Attempting to adapt the Marvel Method to movies, he dictated the plot for a film about a witch who only kills bad guys, called The Night of the Witch, into a tape machine. Independent filmmaker Lloyd Kaufman (who would later score with the hit cult film The Toxic Avenger) transcribed the tapes and then worked the material into a full script. Kaufman had met Lee while a Marvel-obsessed student at Yale University. The young man later cofounded Troma Entertainment, a low-budget studio that mixed comedy, screwball antics, and horror into reasonably successful, midnight movies. The two continued to collaborate for years. The Night of the Witch got picked up for a meager $500, but never went into development.13 Later, they put together another Lee idea, pitching it directly to Resnais. Titled The Man Who Talked to God, the director did not option the treatment.
Despite his legendary status as the cocreator of iconic superheroes, Lee was really just a fledgling scriptwriter and he didn’t really have the time to write full scripts himself, which put him at the mercy of other writers who would craft a full treatment from his ideas. In the early 1970s, he had teamed with Resnais to option a couple of scripts, but in the intervening years he couldn’t find the time.
It made sense for Lee to work with other writers to piece together his ideas. The process fit his frenetic style. What often emerged, though, remained a level removed and did not really capture Lee’s Marvel voice or style. It seemed as if he became too committed to the Marvel Method without finding a writer the equivalent of a Kirby or Ditko to fulfill his vision.
When Lee finally convinced his Cadence bosses that he needed to be in California full time, he opened a little shop in the San Fernando Valley. Announced in mid-1980, Lee set up Marvel Productions in a little flat building at 4610 Van Nuys Boulevard in Sherman Oaks, which Lee described as a “mini-Pentagon built around a lush garden atrium.”14 In true Lee spirit, he established an aggressive pace and worked hard, attempting to live up to the “Excelsior” sign hanging on the office door. A lifelong New Yorker, Lee relished the sunshine of L.A. People thought he was crazy because he would go out into the atrium and work in the sunlight. What a difference from cold, gray New York City and Marvel’s Madison Avenue office.
A handful of executives who had experience in television and film joined Lee in the new venture, thus balancing his relative newcomer status. David H. DePatie, a longtime animation veteran who had worked on several Dr. Seuss specials and won an Oscar for a Pink Panther short, served as president of Marvel Productions. DePatie brought along Lee Gunther as vice president of production. When the company announced the studio’s formation, it noted that the group already had begun a number of animated and live-action projects, including commercials for Oscar Mayer and Owens-Corning.15
Lee yearned to land a blockbuster film deal, but his initial mission centered on expanding the Marvel universe and following up with other potential opportunities, like the commercials and new licensing agreements. Under Cadence’s new management structure, Lee added the formal title of “vice president, creative affairs” to his publisher role. The rather nebulous title fit Lee’s vague duties on the West Coast.
Galton discussed how each piece strengthened the whole, explaining that the studio would “contribute to the success of our licensees, our wholesalers, our advertisers.” He recognized that the “future for Marvel has never looked better,” particularly given “all the benefits to be reaped from the formation.”16 Lee’s marching orders included pursuing numerous projects, while also continuing to champion Marvel in person and via the press.
In 1979, Time magazine speculated that Lee deserved most of the kudos for turning television into “one big electronic comic book,” declaring he was “chiefly responsible” for the trend. The reporter speculated that CBS had so many comic book shows on the air that the company name might be changed to “Comic Book Supplier.”17 The hype for the shows outlived the quality, however, and all the live-action programs outside of the Bixby/Ferrigno Hulk gave Lee headaches.
Marvel Productions had actually been established to focus on animation, particularly with DePatie at the helm. The company believed that animated Saturday morning cartoons were a better fit for Marvel at the time. Lee’s negotiations with the networks focused on “ability, the capability, the know-how and the dependability,” he explained, while DePatie’s credentials helped overcome the networks’ reticence.18
Within a couple years, Marvel Productions teamed with other producers, such as Fred Silverman, to get shows created, particularly on subjects outside the Marvel Universe. The partnership resulted in Meatballs and Spaghetti, which ran in the CBS Saturday morning programming block. The series featured the escapades of a married singing duo who wander around the country in a mobile home. CBS also picked up Dungeons and Dragons, a Marvel production based on the popular dice role-playing game.19
In the early 1980s, Lee expanded his participation in the Spider-Man and Hulk animated series by serving as script consultant and narrator. Fans loved hearing Lee’s actual voice, but he found the experience somewhat frustrating, because he couldn’t change what he said based on timing. Still, he tried to “make the bits of narration sound like my own style.”20 The Hulk show did not last as long, because although the green giant remained popular with boys, the program couldn’t generate interest among young girls.
While the ups-and-downs of the television and film industries bedeviled Lee, particularly when his career producing comic books had centered on speed and teamwork, he had greater inroads and success in merchandising and licensing Marvel’s superheroes. This area may not have been the most glamorous part of Lee’s Hollywood work, but the kinds of deals he spearheaded were essential in broadening the Marvel brand. Creating tie-in opportunities pushed the characters deeper into the consumer psyche, while also giving Lee a chance to discuss his favorite cause—getting audiences aware of the benefits of comic books in literacy education.
To get corporate leaders excited about Marvel, Lee unleashed demographic information that revealed that the nation’s two hundred twenty-five million comics appealed to an audience ranging from ages six to seventeen, comprising about 40 percent girls and 60 percent boys. Some 60 percent of comic book readers were from middle- and upper-income families. Lee boasted that 92 percent of the youngsters in this age bracket read comic books. Moreover, while Lee spoke at industry conferences, actors dressed up as Marvel superheroes, which the company also offered on rental for mall openings, parades, conventions, and state and county fairs.21
The attempt to lure female readers led to the introduction of She-Hulk, followed by the Dazzler and plans for additional super-powered heroines. The first issue of the Savage She-Hulk #1 (February 1980) sold a quarter of a million copies. Lee told a reporter, “We’ve always wanted to do books about females,” yet he admitted that profits drove editorial decisions, saying, “But for years, we were never able to make any of our female characters sell well.”22 Unfortunately, like so many other attempts at female superheroes, She-Hulk only lasted two years, ending its run in February 1982.
By the mid- to late 1980s, Lee had completely distanced himself from the dayto-day events back in New York, despite several fancy titles, like “vice-president of creative affairs for Marvel Productions,” that made it seem like he was still in the loop. Actually, Michael Z. Hobson, Cadence vice president in charge of publishing took over most of Lee’s publisher responsibilities. Lee spent time writing scripts and treatments, keeping an eye on the work created for Marvel’s animated productions, and shepherding potential deals with numerous production companies. He barely even read the company’s comics, admitting, “Sometimes they stack up so high, I only have a chance to flip through them.”23
Although purposely staying at arm’s length from the print division, Lee never backed off his role as Marvel’s full-time spokesman, though he did up his speaking fee to $3,000 to give colleges less incentive to book him.24 When the Hollywood efforts forced him off the college campus lecture circuit, he upped his attendance at big-ticket events, like comic conventions, as well as his appearances on television and radio programs. The influx of cable television channels and the growing radio industry gave Lee more opportunities to reach audiences. For talk show hosts and radio deejays, Lee was routinely a stellar guest. Years of practice had honed his skills, so he offered great sound bites, as well as the tried-and-true, seemingly timeless stories about superhero origins. Lee had a knack for making each host or caller feel as if no one had ever asked him which superhero he liked best or if he had a single favorite comic book issue.
In 1984, prior to appearing at the New York City Dimension Convention, Lee did a radio interview, boasting that comic books were at that time “far bigger than they’ve ever been,” citing Marvel’s role in creating “a fan following for comic books, that never existed twenty or thirty years ago.”25 He also noted the connection between the collecting craze, the rise of independent comic book shops, and the intense fandom that Marvel had created over the years.
While Lee entertained fans that called in to the radio show with questions about changes in Spider-Man’s costume and how much old comics might be worth, the episode also revealed why many people grew angry with Lee over the years regarding the origins of the superhero characters. In the frenzied pace of television and radio programming, hosts and others who were not experts in comic book history and had no stake in it would take shortcuts to save time, like calling Lee the “creator of such characters as . . .” without attributing the cocreator status to the artists. The interviewers simply did not have the background to understand, but what about Lee’s responses? Should he have corrected or added information within the context of the appearance or let it slide? Sometimes he did and sometimes not. On the one hand, correcting the interviewer diverted time and attention, potentially leading to an awkward situation. But not mentioning the artists generated animosity among those in the know. Lee constantly balanced an on-air role that mixed spokesperson, provocateur, pitchman, historian, and actor—and in doing so, may have sacrificed truth for the sake of showmanship and audience entertainment.
In 1986, Lee wrote a long essay, “Spidey and Me,” for a book that collected a number of his Spider-Man newspaper strips: The Best of Spider-Man. While the piece describes the character and revisits the origin story, it is also a kind of mini-autobiography. Lee admitted that his own ideas slipped into the strip, explaining, “I feel that it’s as difficult for writers to keep their own personal convictions out of what they write as it is for people in general to keep their personal thoughts . . . out of what they say in conversation.”26 Moreover, Lee wrote at length that each character “is really me. . . . I’m every single one of them . . . [but] Spider-Man is practically my autobiography.”27
Lee dedicated three days a week—Saturday, Sunday, and Wednesday—to writing projects, while leaving the other four days for business meetings and strategy sessions. Just as he did in New York, he wrote outside, covering his word processor with a cardboard contraption of his own devising so that the glare didn’t blind him and the West Coast sun didn’t melt the various moving parts. Lee kept up his seven-days-a-week schedule, feeling that the move to Los Angeles “served to keep the creative juices flowing.” In an environment where everyone is dedicated to creativity, “I find myself ‘thinking story’ almost twenty-four hours a day.”28
As Lee settled into his Hollywood role, Cadence Industries sold Marvel for $46 million in November 1986 to New World Pictures, a film production company and distributor that wanted to pair its TV and film efforts with Marvel characters. Harry Sloan, one of the partners who had purchased New World from director Roger Corman and his brother for $16.5 million three years earlier, told everyone who would listen that he believed the Marvel purchase would turn the company into a “mini-Disney.”29 Many at Marvel might have loved hearing such aspirational language, but Disney made its mark through film and merchandising, not publishing. What seemed like happy days might actually be a little portentous.
New World leaders, including chief executive Robert Rehme, welcomed Lee to the company and relocated him to a fancy new office in its Westwood headquarters. On the surface, they respected Lee. Several members of the board of directors asked for his autograph for themselves or their children. It seemed that he finally would get some of the admiration that he earned through his dedication to Marvel and the superhero genre, as well as creative control over them in the transition to television and film.30 At the same time, though, there were conflicting reports that Rehme didn’t really know Marvel from DC or the comic book business in general, confusing the two publishers (and their respective superheroes) when discussing the purchase with New World employees. Supposedly, when Rehme realized that New World bought Spider-Man, not Superman, he yelled: “Holy shit. We gotta stop this. Cannon has the Spider-Man movie.”31 Rehme didn’t know the characters that well or read the comic books to find out, but he did push the company to pursue new ideas.
New World quickly sought to use superheroes in attention-grabbing ways, especially Spider-Man. The web slinger would soon be turned into a 9,522-cubic-foot helium balloon for the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade at a cost of $300,000. Officials estimated that about eighty million viewers would see the televised parade each year, along with two million in person, so that marketing push would offset the initial expense. Next, company marketers decided to bring the character to life in the summer of 1987, having Spidey marry longtime sweetheart Mary Jane Watson at home plate in Shea Stadium before a sellout crowd of fifty-five thousand on hand to watch the world champion New York Mets.32
At the center of the spectacle, Lee played the role of justice of the peace presiding over the wedding ceremony. The event parlayed Lee’s celebrity status and more or less rewarded him for coming up with the idea of having the pair wed in the daily newspaper strip (also replicated in the comic books). New World created a branding campaign for the live-action nuptials, getting Lee a morning television interview with popular newscasters Maria Shriver and Forrest Sawyer on Good Morning America and coverage on the nightly tabloid Entertainment Tonight. Countless newspapers around the country covered the marriage, getting the iconic character back into the national spotlight, not to mention its human creator. Lee worked tirelessly to provide a voice for the character to the myriad of journalists and broadcasters who wanted to chat about the event.
Despite the public relations successes and Marvel’s ability to generate profits, New World limped along on a financial shoestring. The stock market collapse in late 1987 and the lackluster performance of its big-budget films left the company deeply in debt and exceedingly vulnerable in an age of corporate raiders who liked to buy up struggling companies and profit off the juiciest pieces of the carcass.
Lee, fixated on pitching superheroes to New World producers, was once again pushed to the sidelines. A New World insider reported: “Stan’s not in the loop, because he’s not a player; he’s not a partner. He wasn’t a vote. But he was like a pit bull. He just didn’t want to walk away.”33 The internal politics took a turn for the worse for Lee, but no one realized how the company teetered on the edge of bankruptcy.
Gradually, the whole story would be revealed as a series of financial manipulations that led to New World putting Marvel on the chopping block. Many suitors took immediate interest, as long as Lee signed a deal to stay onboard. Eventually, Ronald O. Perelman, one of the biggest sharks in the capitalist seas, won the bid, putting up $82.5 million via a series of shell corporations.
Celebrating fifty years as a Marvel employee in 1989, Lee once more faced a new scenario, with chaos perhaps being the most consistent theme of those five decades. But, Stan had endured all the upheaval, based on a mix of tenacity and enthusiasm and his trump card—he symbolized the Marvel Universe for generations of fans. Lee was Marvel, no matter who actually owned the company, just as he became the father of superheroes to generations of readers and viewers, regardless of his actual role.