OLD ARTICLE FROM 97 SHOWING HOW THEY PUSH GANGSTA RAP/DEMONICNESS
TED FIELD GETS EMOTIONAL remembering it now, that quiet moment less than a year ago. Field, the entertainment mogul and scion of Chicago's Marshall Field retailing fortune, was in his office high above Wilshire Boulevard in West Los Angeles. Standing in front of him, bathed in the soothing neutral colors of the huge room, was Tupac Shakur, the gangsta-rap star who had just been bailed out of a New York prison while he appealed a sexual-battery conviction. The unlikely pair talked about Tupac's upcoming film, "Gridlock'd," for the company Field founded.
Then, Field remembers, "we hugged," and the moment passed. Tupac's fast-lane, workaholic life sped on. He completed the movie, meanwhile stockpiling enough new rap recordings to fill new releases--and the burgeoning coffers of Interscope Records, the extraordinary company Field helped launch, now the most successful new musical enterprise in the world. Last week "Gridlock'd" opened to positive reviews. The soundtrack, including four new Tupac songs, seems headed toward the top of the music charts. But last September, of course, Tupac Shakur was shot and killed in a gangland-style murder in Las Vegas. "What Tupac could have accomplished would have been awesome," says Field, his eyes misting.
For Ted Field, you see, some of it is personal. Hollywood empires are famously built by driven, ruthless men, by immigrants and glove makers and hungry sons of Brooklyn and Van Nuys. But Hollywood has also always been a magnet for wealthy drifters, heirs to fortunes. What they are looking for, and fleeing from, is a little different, but the town can be just as unforgiving. They "produce" (read: pay for) a movie or two, troll for starlets and find themselves, by the end, relieved of a goodly portion of Grandpa's money.
Field arrived in Hollywood like that, but he turned out to be an entrepreneur of a different kind. Competing against global music titans, tiny 6-year-old Interscope Records now monopolizes the upper reaches of the record charts, and has done so for months, including a week when it had the top four spots. In a business where finding a successful act is about as easy as spotting a necktie at the Grammy Awards, Interscope has assembled an unmatched array of alternative-rock and urban-music hit makers. Field's film operation hasn't been too shabby, either, with several hits among 40 movies.
But Interscope's explosive success has an equally explosive underside. Some of the music at the heart of Interscope is considered by many to be downright dangerous--Snoop Doggy Dogg, Marilyn Manson, Tupac. And the mild-mannered Field finds himself standing in the middle of the nation's noisiest intersection of commerce, culture and politics: the debate over whether music that traffics in shocking violence and sexually degrading behavior is a destructive force or a protected art form. So far, Field remains relatively unscathed, but he knows he can't avoid trouble forever. Already his once major role as a contributor to the Democratic Party has effectively ended. "I literally can't donate," he says. A contribution last year to Sen. Paul Wellstone (Democrat of Minnesota) was promptly sent back. Too much heat.
Field Marshal - Newsweek and The Daily Beast