Bernie Brillstein

BERNIE Brillstein, who died Thursday at age 77, did a thousand things in show business, but he was one of a kind: agent, manager, producer, executive, raconteur, confidant, great source for lowly reporters in search of a good quote or a great tip. I first met him years ago on the set of a movie that was going down the drain, but you'd hardly know it from Bernie's demeanor. He always had an easy smile, a funny remark and the attitude that whatever was going wrong couldn't possibly spoil his day.

Bernie Brillstein--manager extraordinaire, former studio head and now coauthor of a memoir called "Where Did I Go Right?"--can be arguably said to have reinvented the career of the modern manager. From the most prosaic of beginnings in the William Morris Agency mail room, where he booked early television variety shows, he ultimately transformed himself into a show business entrepreneur.