Hippie millionaire gave away fortune, tried to land chopper at White House
nypost.comDear Mr. Brody,” available on demand on Amazon Prime and Google Play. Never mind that Brody did not have, as he once claimed, $10 billion.
He apparently had a $1.25 million trust fund (worth $9 million in today’s dollars) from a grandfather who was the first person to brand margarine and sold the company, Good Luck Margarine, in 1948.“At the age of 21, I’ve been told, Michael received maybe $250,000 of the trust and a monthly allowance of $20,000 or $30,000,” Keith Maitland, the film’s director, told The Post.Brody’s caper began when he met a girl named Renee in December 1969: She showed up at to his house to make a hash delivery for her drug-dealing boyfriend and didn’t leave.
Three weeks later, Brody married the 19-year-old.“Michael was on a beach in Jamaica, on his honeymoon [in early] January 1970,” Maitland said. “His feeling was that there was love between [he and Renee], blue skies above them, and the world should experience what they were experiencing.”Spreading the love, Brody apparently gave away some $50,000 in tips during the trip.
As a romantic gesture, he bought out a Pan Am 707 flight back to New York, so that he and his bride could fly home private. When they landed, an army of reporters awaited them at the airport. “I think Pan Am got wind of the plan and tipped off the media in order to get publicity,” Melissa Glassman, a producer on the film, told The Post.
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