the chance to spend a lot of time innHollywood now that he is runningnChevrolet. He will attend celebritystuddednparties, where he got a prevuenof his third wife and struck what wasnlater to be his cocaine connection. Stillnlater GM will discover, according tonSrodes and Fallon, a host of missing “gift”ncars from its California inventory. Muchnlater Johnny Carson will sink somen$500,000 into DeLorean Motor Car,nwhose product he was to represent as advertisingnsymbol and national spokesman.nAct Two has its difficulties fornDeLorean, the engineer, in the executivensuite. Knudsen leaves for the presidencynof Ford, and the l4th floor at GM turnsnhostile. But DeLorean, the shady financier,nis learning how to turn pose intonprofit, as well as the techniques of cashndiversion, and how to buy, sell, and buynback auto patents and the rights tonproduction processes. He also gets anlesson in how to be a socially responsiblenbusinessman from liberal activist andnjournalist William F. Haddad, who is gladnto include a chapter by DeLorean,nwhipped up in the GM publicity works,nin a book on the Black economic struggle.nEventually, Haddad will becomenpublic relations director for DeLoreannMotor Car. Finally, he will call DeLoreanna “racist.” Indeed, the total corruption ofnHaddad is one of the subplots oi DreamnMaker, and a dirty, low account of greed,nfear, and trembling. DeLorean’s medianmanipulation in the form of leaks ofnsensitive GM material notwithstanding,nhe is forced out of Detroit in May 1973,nan unwanted prophet, but not yetndishonored. In the same month, henbegins his third marriage, to ex-starletnand model Christina, just as the curtainncomes down. The intermission is notnlong.nOnly a very small part of the third actnhas to do with the development of thendream car. DeLorean the engineer isnhardly seen, and there are strong indicationsnthat the car was never more than anfiand-raising device for the man with thengull-wing eyebrows and designer jeans.nTen thousand dollars a month plusnexpenses went to a public relations firmnto promote him—not his car. All thenpublic saw in the August 1975 issue ofnAutomotive News was a glossy of somethingncalled the DSV—for DeLoreannsafety vehicle—and a hyped manifestontouting the ethical car which would laternbe designed, in DeLorean’s words,n”specially for horny bachelors.” ButnSrodes and Fallon go behind the imagenand detail how DeLorean, the medianmagician and financier, multipliednhimself into at least three domesticncorporate entities, and then show usnhow these turn into five, including thenGeneva-based and Panamanian-registerednGPD services, and something called TKnInternational, which bears the initials ofnDeLorean’s attorney and personal financialnadvisor. Concurrently, we watchnhow a puffed »350,000 becomes »3.5nmiUion, then »30 million, then »300nmillion. The man and the money multiplynjointly, and not without interconnection.nWhen Srodes and Fallon do theirnfinal accounting, $30 million dollarsnhave been siphoned off to nowhere.nBecause his ambitions were trulynglobal, DeLorean needed more than an$20 million Oppenheimer and Company-sponsorednpartnership to mishandle;nhe needed a national treasury. Henfound one in the form of the NorthernnIreland Development Authority (NIDA).nThis was unfortunate for Belfest—now itnis known as the town that launched bothnthe Titanic and the DMC-12, eachnsupposedly unsinkable. British taxpayers,nstuck with a biU in excess of $200nnnmillion dollars, will never forget eitherndisaster. DeLorean was no longer interestednin the actual creation of hisndream car. He gave that job up to CoUinnChapman of Britain’s Lotus Group. ThenEnglish designed his car; the Irish builtnhis factory; and the two groups neverncooperated, which helps explain whynthe car was astonishingly unsuccessful.nThe money which NIDA gave DeLoreannto build the car went to DeLorean MotornCar; DMC then paid Lotus; Lotus, accordingnto Srodes and Fallon, then paidnDeLorean’s GPD. It isn’t clear who gotnexactly what—but it appears that the carnwas paid for three times over. There wasnno division of spoils—only multiplication—DMCntook its money and thennasked NIDA for more in order to paynLotus and so on down the chain. ThenDMC-12 failed because its costs werenthrice inflated, and DeLorean’s dream—nnot his car—was worth $30 millionnmore. “I can’t wait the five or six years itnwill take for the company to perform,”nDeLorean told his financial officernWilliam Stryker, “I want to live now.”no nee DeLorean had taken all he couldnget from NIDA, he went after Parliamentndirectly. The British were forced to upntheir ante by means of public relationsnscenarios delivered by Haddad—thendeath of Bobby Sands, the IRA at thenfactory gates, and always the need toncreate more and more jobs. DMC deliberatelynhired more hands than it needednin order to increase pressure on thenParliamentary purse. And preferring itsnbleeding heart more than its bled purse.n^m^mmllnJune 1984n