UJA-Federation Recognizes
Integrity
As Performance
By
TIM BOXER
A UNIQUE
invocation was offered at a UJA-Federation dinner as Henry Schleiff
intoned: “They tried to kill us, we won, let’s eat!”
A formidable roster of media
types jammed the Waldorf-Astoria ballroom as the Steven J. Ross
Humanitarian Award was presented to two honchos of the entertainment and
media worlds -
Martin Pompadur, executive vice president of Rupert Murdoch’s
News Corp., and Edward Bleier, president of Warner Bros. Pay-TV,
cable and network features.
After dinner, Roone Arledge,
the ABC-TV sports honcho who anchored the program, called upon New York
Times columnist William Safire and comedienne Joy Behar.
Roone said his role is similar to
Ed Sullivan of whom it was said: He would survive as long as other
people have talent.
In identifying the qualities that
Bleier has shown which deserve a UJA-Federation award, Safire said,
“What can you say about a man who spent his entire life selling Loony
Tunes?”
Actually, Bleier’s success
hinges on his belief that “integrity doesn’t hinder performance –
integrity is performance.”
PR
maven Howard Rubenstein, co-chair of UJA-Federation Entertainment,
Media & Communications Division, announced the establishment of a
summer camp scholarship named for Bleier and Pompadur. That pleased the
two honorees, who helped bring in $3 million during the evening.
|
