[Deathwatch] Warren Cowan, Hollywood press agent, 87

[Deathwatch Central <cdw@slick.org>]

Warren Cowan, 87, Hollywood press agent
By Dennis McLellan

LOS ANGELES - Warren Cowan, a legendary Hollywood publicist who
co-founded Rogers & Cowan public relations company and was known as an
innovative pioneer of publicity for the biggest names in show business,
has died. He was 87.

Cowan died Wednesday at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center of cancer, which
was diagnosed three weeks earlier, said Daniel Bernstein of Warren
Cowan & Associates.

A New York native who began moonlighting as a Hollywood publicist while
attending the University of California-Los Angeles, in the early 1940s,
Cowan joined Henry Rogers' publicity company in 1945 after serving in
the Army Air Forces.

In 1950, the two publicists became partners in Rogers & Cowan, which
became the largest entertainment PR company in the world. Cowan
launched his own company in 1994.

In a more than 60-year career that continued until his death, Cowan
represented a glittery array of stars, including Kirk Douglas, Frank
Sinatra, Tony Curtis, Lucille Ball, Judy Garland, Steve McQueen,
Natalie Wood, Cary Grant, Audrey Hepburn, the Doors, John Wayne, Paul
Newman and Clint Eastwood.

"He was a giant," said Dale Olson, a veteran entertainment publicist
who spent 17 years at Rogers & Cowan as a key executive.

"Warren Cowan was the ultimate Hollywood press agent. . . . There was
nobody in this business - and never will be again - who was more
innovative."

Kirk Douglas, who first met Cowan in the late '40s and later tapped him
to be best man at his second wedding, said in a statement: "Warren was
loved by everybody because he cared for people. I will miss him."

Cowan was considered an "old-school" Hollywood publicist.

"He doesn't yell, preferring instead to seduce and cajole," Amy Wallace
wrote in a 2001 profile of Cowan in Los Angeles magazine. "His approach
is less adversarial and more complimentary - a product of the era in
which he started out, when movie stars needed the general-interest
media more than the media needed them."

As a publicist, Cowan once said, "I like to create news."

He was handling publicity for director Frank Borzage in 1950 when he
came up with the idea of a celebrity sports tournament for charity to
get the two-time Oscar winner's name in the news.

In a 1999 interview with the Los Angeles Business Journal, Cowan
recalled "saying to my partner that Frank doesn't have anything going
now. I don't know what to write about him. What does he do? And Henry
said that (Borzage) played golf every day."

Thus was born the Frank Borzage Invitational Golf Tournament.

"To this one-day tournament came Bing Crosby, Fred Astaire, Mickey
Rooney and many others," Cowan recalled. "The second year we got
Marilyn Monroe to be the scorekeeper. I also arranged for Frank Sinatra
to land on the first tee in a helicopter, get out carrying Bing
Crosby's bag and caddy for him. It was all fun and made for good
coverage."




Many thanks to Deathwatch Central for posting this obituary