The image that Richard Desmond, proprietor of the "Daily Express", the "Sunday Express", the "Daily Star", and "OK!" magazine, likes to project is that of a successful tycoon, generous to charity, and on the verge of joining the big league of international media groups. But, while there is no denying his success, there is a darker side to his story that he has gone to great lengths to conceal and deny. In this book, Tom Bower lays bare the succession of dubious deals and sharp practices which enabled Desmond to achieve billionaire status in the course of his thirty-year...Read more
The image that Richard Desmond, proprietor of the "Daily Express", the "Sunday Express", the "Daily Star", and "OK!" magazine, likes to project is that of a successful tycoon, generous to charity, and on the verge of joining the big league of international media groups. But, while there is no denying his success, there is a darker side to his story that he has gone to great lengths to conceal and deny. In this book, Tom Bower lays bare the succession of dubious deals and sharp practices which enabled Desmond to achieve billionaire status in the course of his thirty-year business career, which only began to take off when he discovered the profits that were to be made from pornographic magazines, sex chat-lines, and 'adult' television. It was in the pursuit of those profits that he crossed swards with the American mafia. The launch of "OK!' magazine marked Desmond's first bid for the respectability he continues to crave, and was followed by a no-holds-barred struggle with the rival "Hello". It also began Desmond's fascination with the celebrities to whom he paid tens of thousands of pounds in exchange for "OK!'s" exclusive right to cover their weddings, babies, parties, and homes.
His purchase of the "Express" newspaper group in 2000, seemed to finally establish his respectability when, after he had made a substantial donation to party funds and announced that his papers would switch allegiance from the Tories to Labour, Tony Blair's government declared, to the fury of many Labour supporters, that he was a 'fit and proper person' to own a national newspaper. Readers of this book will now be able to judge for themselves whether or not that decision was justified.
His purchase of the "Express" newspaper group in 2000, seemed to finally establish his respectability when, after he had made a substantial donation to party funds and announced that his papers would switch allegiance from the Tories to Labour, Tony Blair's government declared, to the fury of many Labour supporters, that he was a 'fit and proper person' to own a national newspaper. Readers of this book will now be able to judge for themselves whether or not that decision was justified.
- ISBN10 1845131223
- ISBN13 9781845131227
- Publish Date 5 February 2006
- Publish Status Cancelled
- Out of Print 28 December 2005
- Publish Country GB
- Imprint Aurum Press
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 256
- Language English