Chaperoning Sumner Redstone to sex clubs in Bangkok

Tom Freston reveals the wacky story in my latest Earn Your Luck column for the WSJ.

IN THE EARLY DAYS OF MTV, the receptionist sold cocaine, and the office had one clothing rule: no frontal nudity. Such was the circus atmosphere of the place, according to Tom Freston, whose memoir, “Unplugged,” reveals how a team of die-hard believers turned music into television.

Tom Freston in Afghanistan’s Hindu Kush in 1973.

In my latest Earn Your Luck column for the Wall Street Journal, Freston opens up about the early struggle to make people believe in the MTV dream…how they bugged David Bowie on vacation ski slopes and got him to scream, “I WANT MY MTV!” on video. Bowie and Mick Jagger helped market the fledgling network to cable stations that had refused to carry it. He also talks about Bob Pittman throwing tequila shots against the wall and his whole MTV team, in turn, uploading plants and overturning aquariums, destroying various bars in the process.

And, the most ridiculous story in the book: when Sumner Redstone asked Freston to take him around Bangkok sex clubs, even though sex clubs weren’t Tom’s thing at all.