Confidential: The Life of Secret Agent Turned Hollywood Tycoon- Arnon Milchan by Doron Meir & Gelman Joseph

Author:Doron, Meir & Gelman, Joseph [Doron, Meir]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780615433813
Publisher: Gefen Books
Published: 2011-08-15T06:00:00+00:00

13Once upon a Time in America

You kind of buy yourself into it to be humiliated, into becoming the next sucker in the business.

Arnon Milchan, Los Angeles Magazine, April 2000

New Year’s Day, 1983, a few days before the release of his recent prodction, The King of Comedy, Arnon Milchan was in New York, consumed with the debut of one of the most important films of his career.

A world away, Richard Kelly Smyth and his wife Emilie arrived at the Milco offices in Huntington Beach to work on a few orders. The office building was empty, quiet, and the two hoped to get in some productive work. It was not unusual for them, because they had trouble concentrating with seven employees running around and the phone ringing off the hook. Weekends and holidays were a good time to clear their desks.

Upon entering the building, each went to their own office. At first they didn’t notice anything was wrong – that is until Emilie needed to type something. She walked over to the reception area and noticed that the typewriter was missing. She then looked around and noticed that a number of computers were missing. “Richard!” she cried out for her husband, who was startled and came running.

They quickly checked every office, every room, and every storage area, including the warehouse out back. Electrical devices and a radio scrambler, a highly sensitive device that was rejected for export to Israel by the State Department, were all gone.

They knew that the missing computers contained secret information. The first thing that came to their minds was espionage. A deep sense of violation, paranoia, and fear set in. Richard understood that with his security clearance, he was obligated to report the break-in to the FBI. What kind of Pandora’s box would that open? He knew that the first question he would be asked is “Who, in your opinion, did this?”

He remembered his last phone call with Milchan. He’d told him that more stringent standards were forced on him, and that he couldn’t continue to send the krytrons the same way.

“Why didn’t you send them as before?” Milchan asked.1 Smyth explained that he could no longer do that, and Milchan eventually hung up the phone, frustrated. That was the last that Smyth would ever hear from him. Indeed, that turned out to be the very last direct conversation the two ever had.

Smyth called the Huntington Beach Police Department and the FBI to report the break-in. The police showed up in minutes and filled out a crime report. They quickly determined that the burglar had entered the building through a skylight while lowering himself with a rope. “It doesn’t look like a professional job,” the detective determined. He then asked Smyth to give him a list of all current and former employees. According to the police report, Smyth reported the missing equipment to be worth approximately $50,000, which included $12,000 in electronic equipment for NASA.

The next day, an FBI agent showed up to interview Smyth, mostly to gather

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