(Continued From Cover) (Continued on Page 32) Len Grossi: Hollywood Insiders’ Insider On Going Through TV Eras Seamlessly 30 Leonard (Len) J. Grossi is a true Hollywood insider. Throughout his lengthy career, he worked at three of the six major Hollywood studios, astonishingly, managing to stay under the same bosses for almost the entire time, and keeping his sense of humor. He started at Paramount, moved on to 20th Century Fox, returned to Paramount, and then finally went to Columbia Tri Star TV. The corporate world was more dynamic during those years, and executives rotated around more often. Some of the legendary U.S. studio executives that Grossi routinely found in his path included Barry Diller, Jonathan Dolgen, Jim Gianopoulos, Mel Harris, and Lucie Salhany. Grossi can also claim to have gone through every phase of the TV era, starting with U.S. syndication, then moving on to international TV growth, cable TV, the mergers and acquisitions craze of the 1980s and 1990s, home video, the HBO wake-up call, Spanish-language TV rising to prominence in the U.S., and the digital transition. He left the business in 2002 just before the evolution of streaming. In the midst of all that, Grossi went through what author John Malone, in his book, Born to be Wired, called, “the massive technology shift in the early ’90s.” But let’s proceed in chronological order, starting in 1975, when Grossi, then 29 years old, went to work at Metromedia Television in New York City as business manager of its National Ad Sales division. Metromedia was formed in 1957 as Metropolitan Broadcasting under Washington, D.C.- based German investor John Kluge (1914-2010). Its name was changed to Metromedia in 1961. Today, from his Los Angeles base, Grossi recalled: “I was unemployed and my wife worked for Hughes Television Network and Hughes Sports Network. A sales executive there was a friend of the president of Metromedia Television Sales who was looking for a business manager. He told my wife I would be perfect for the role. Anyway, they set up an interview for me [with the president] and we really hit it off. He offered me the job, but I turned it down. My wife was very upset. I told her that they did not offer me enough money (remember I was unemployed) and [the president] hired someone else whom (I was told) he hated, and so he called me back a month later and offered me what I was asking for. This was on a Friday and he said ‘When can you start?’ I said ‘Monday morning.’ He then realized I had some negotiating skills beyond the financial background and really liked that about me too.” That might have been the beginning of his Hollywood career, but the show business seed had actually been planted years before. Here’s how Grossi joked about it: “Frank Sinatra was a fire captain who lived near my parents’ house in Hoboken, N.J., where my mother ran a store. Frank would often come to the store to flirt with my mother. When I became an executive at Paramount, I was involved in producing one of his concerts in the Dominican Republic. Before I sent him a check with lots of zeros, I photocopied it and sent it to my mother with the note, ‘This is for one day’s work, and to think it could have been my father!’ Strangely enough, my mother didn’t appreciate the joke!” At Metromedia, Grossi commuted to New York City from his home in Hasbrouck Heights, New Jersey, and that was when he decided to add “John” as a middle name. In his view, a middle name made him “look and sound more sophisticated.” Grossi moved to Paramount Television in New York City as director of Operations for Domestic Television Distribution in 1978, soon becoming a VP of the division. Subsequently, when relocated to the west coast of the U.S., he became VP of Production Finance. His oversight included the syndicated music TV series Solid Gold (which ran from 1980 to 1988) and Entertainment Tonight, which debuted in 1981 and still airs today. This is how Grossi explained his first move to Paramount: “Mel Harris [1943-2008], who from Metromedia had joined Rich Frank, headed up Paramount’s TV business, in 1977. Harris suggested to Randy Reiss, who headed up Paramount’s Domestic TV Distribution, to hire [Grossi] in administration, which he did.” At Paramount, Grossi had his desk at the G&W building in New York City, which was famous for swinging during windy days: “Our offices were on the 24th floor,” he recalled, “and I had a wall of windows in my room where I could look out over the Hudson River and watch the post on the windows move from one side of a chimney to the other, and I knew that the chimney wasn’t moving.” What Grossi credits for his entry into the entertainment business was his financial knowledge and experience acquired at previous jobs, first working on the construction of Newark Airport, and later, at various banks after receiving a degree on the Vietnam Veterans’ GI bill. Curiously, Grossi wasn’t the only banker who entered the U.S. entertainment business. At about the same time, Colin Davis, a British banker, joined MCA, and later became president of its International TV Distribution division (now NBCUniversal). Describing his various challenges, Grossi recalled that his first problem at Metromedia was created by “being a business-financial guy among mostly ad sales people,” and later, by “the acquisition [of Metromedia] by Fox, which for Grossi was a big surprise.” However, despite an energy crisis and stagflation in the U.S., the 1970s were considered the golden age of TV advertising. At Paramount the challenges were different: “[Local TV] stations were competing with each other for [our] domestic syndication rights,” he said. “I also spent many Len Grossi in his office at Metromedia Grossi can claim to have gone through every phase of the television era. VIDEOAGE October 2025 Hall of Fame
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