-A veteran publicist in the entertainment industry, Michael Caprio is our guest this week on Nevada Week In Person.

♪♪ Support for Nevada Week In Person is provided by Senator William H. Hernstadt.

-Welcome to Nevada Week In Person.

I'm Amber Renee Dixon.

Born in the Bronx but raised in New Jersey, he began working on Broadway as a junior publicist when he was just a teenager.

In Los Angeles is where he'd expand his clientele to include musicians, actors, and athletes, like the Beach Boys, Doris Day, and Martina Navratilova.

Currently based in Las Vegas, he represents the Chippendales, Human Nature, and Mat Franco, to name a few.

Likely his most prestigious client, though, was four-time Grammy winner, Olivia Newton-John, whose foundation and estate he continues to represent.

Michael Caprio, Founder and Owner of Caprio Media Design, thank you for joining Nevada Week In Person.

-Thanks for having me.

-So I say "born in the Bronx but raised in New Jersey."

That makes a difference, right?

(Michael Caprio) Yeah.

My family's from the Bronx originally.

And when I was about two years old, my parents said, Let's move to Jersey.

All my other relatives moved out to Long Island, so... -Okay.

What kind of impact do you think Jersey had on you?

-You know, I think a lot, because where I lived in Jersey, it was only about six miles from New York City.

So as a kid, my mother thought I was down at the football field playing with my friends and hanging out, and I was taking the bus to Manhattan and second acting Broadway shows, because I didn't have any money.

So I'd wait till the intermission would happen, and I'd go in for Act II, and I would go up to the balcony and watch Broadway shows.

-About how old were you then?

-Oh, God.

I think the first time I did that, I was 13 or 14.

-And did someone show you how to do that?

-Yeah, of course.

-What was your introduction?

Who introduced you?

-Well, actually, just friends of mine who we all wanted to go into the city.

But it was actually I had seen the Tony Awards.

This was 1982, I believe, and "Cats" was the big musical at the time.

I had been a gymnast my whole life, so I'm watching the Tony Awards and I saw one of the actors flipping, and I'm like, Wait!

They do that on Broadway?

So I went.

"Cats" was my first Broadway show.

And from that point, I said, Okay, I need to do this.

So every possibility that I had to go into the city, I would.

Oh, Mom, I'm going out with my friends.

Don't worry.

We'll be at the football field hanging out.

And we'd go into the city and go see half of a Broadway show, because we didn't have money to buy the ticket.

-So you go from sneaking in to getting a job.

How did that happen?

-Well, I went to Rutgers in New Jersey, and I was a journalism major.

And at Rutgers, you had to do an internship.

And not like, Oh, here's work for three hours this week.

It was, you had to work four days a week, and on your fifth day, the Friday, we would all go back to the classroom and talk about what we learned that week.

They had partnerships with Johnson & Johnson and all these corporate companies.

I'm like, I want to be in entertainment.

So I found out who the PR firm was for all the big Broadway shows at the time--which was "Phantom," "Les Mis," "Saigon," "Cats"--and applied.

A friend of mine, actually, who I'd met was in the original cast of "Phantom."

He put in a good word for me, and then I became an intern.

And then at the end of that internship, they offered me a job as an assistant.

So at 19, I was working on-- "Cats" was kind of the show, ironically, that I was, you know, updating the playbill and making sure the front of house, you know, had all the right names of the cast members.

And so it really was kind of a full circle moment.

-So then you decide to go to Europe.

And according to your bio, you set your sights on Europe and continued your association with Andrew Lloyd Webber.

So working on "Cats" and also "Phantom of the Opera," but in Germany.

-In Germany.

-So that association, what was it?

-It was amazing.

I went over to basically work at "Phantom" and just sort of be a part of the opening of this brand new company.

And it was in German.

And while I would, yeah, and while I was over there, I didn't speak German.

I didn't take German in high school.

I took Spanish like mostly everybody else in my school.

And luckily, I learned to speak German.

I mean, when you're in the environment and you're forced, you pick it up quicker.

And after about, I guess I was there about a year, I ended up working at "Cats."

They hired me to do all the backstage-- backstage, sorry-- teaching backstage the acrobatics to the dancers who were not acrobatics.

So like three, four times a week.

-Quite a change.

-Oh, it was, it was crazy.

And I thought, Oh, I want to, you know, this is going to be my, my performer bug.

It's bitten me.

And then after watching all of this happen and doing the acro, you know, three, four times a week, I'm like, Okay, if this hurts at 19, 20, this is really going to hurt at 30.

And at 40, what am I going to do?

So I decided, nope, I'm going to go back to New York and get back into the PR side of everything.

-Another influential person you told me off camera about is Linda Dozoretz.

This is when you move to LA and you get into publicity in Hollywood?

-Yeah.

That was interesting.

-What did you think of her initially, and who was she?

-Well, she was a, she was a big publicist.

She worked at Rogers & Cowan for many, many years and then started her own agency.

And a friend of mine worked for Rosemary Clooney, who was one of the stars of White Christmas , a big, big star back in the '40s, '50s.

-And-- -And George Clooney is her nephew.

So that's how everybody knows who the Clooneys are.

And she, her assistant, called and said, you know, Linda, her publicist, needs a temp for a few days.

Would you mind coming in?

And I had just moved to LA because it snowed in April in New York City, which is why I left New York.

I'm like, nope, I'm out.

I'm going to California.

I said, I don't want to work yet.

I'm enjoying my life.

Like, I want to go to the beach.

Stupid 23-year-old at the time.

And I finally said yes.

And I get there, and I'm working out of her house in Laurel Canyon, which is right in the heart of Hollywood.

And I find out, oh, she also reps Doris Day and Henry Mancini and The Beach Boys and Martina Navratilova.

And I was like, okay, this is gonna be a fun three days.

Well, she ended up not keeping the girl I was temping for and offered me the job.

-Because she was so impressed with you?

-Well, I guess.

-What do you think it was about you?

-You know, I'm always-- I've always been that person who doesn't like to just sit idly and wait for someone to tell me what to do.

So even when I was an intern--I think it's why I got the job on Broadway--they would say, Okay, here's what you need to do.

And I would do it.

And I'd go, okay, well, the next step will be to do this, so I'm just going to do it instead of waiting for them to ask me.

And they come in, Well, we need you to-- Oh, you've already done it.

So I was always just, Let me just go at it.

And I was temping.

I didn't want to be bored just typing memos, because this is back in the '90s.

So they were like, Oh, well, here's this or this.

What do you want to do?

And I just kind of went rogue.

-What did you learn from Linda Dozoretz?

-I learned how to be a great writer and how to be a great communicator, because she was incredible.

It was before internet and everything else.

It was a fax machine.

And Doris Day was one of her clients, and I, of course, was a crazy Doris Day fan.

And my job was to help write the Doris Day Animal League and Doris Day Pet Foundation newsletters.

-Wow.

-Back when they still mailed out newsletters.

And I would write something up, we would fax it to Doris' office up in Carmel, and the first time her, Linda's assistant said, Oh, Michael, it's Doris on Line 2.

I was like, I'm gonna talk to Doris Day?

And I picked up the phone, and I had a conversation.

Oh, Michael change this or..., and then she would fax back.

I was like, did that just happen?

So that was-- And the sad part is I never met her face-to-face, which was hard.

-Well, and so that makes me think we have to fit in Olivia Newton-John here.

And so Linda, she stayed at home in her office.

But the way that you met Olivia Newton-John was you were out at a Grease anniversary party.

She had no one with her-- -Correct.

- --to help her with publicity, and that's where you stepped in.

-Yeah.

I was very lucky.

She-- So I had left Linda's to go work for a record company.

While I was at the record company, one of our clients was Didi Conn, who played Frenchie in the movie Grease, who-- I just talked to her yesterday.

She's still one of my clients, but she's family.

And Didi was going to take her brother to the big 20th anniversary of Grease at the Chinese Theater, red carpet... I was like, Oh, my God, because I was a huge fan of Olivia's, I was a huge fan of the movie.

And Didi, her brother dropped out.

And she just called me with that squeaky little voice, Honey, what are you doing on Sunday?

And I said, Didi, don't screw around with me.

You know what this would mean.

She goes, Meet me at the Four Seasons.

So I met her at the Four Seasons where they had all the cast of Grease getting glammed up for the big premiere.

And I met Olivia.

I had met her a couple times before, but not in any capacity where she would remember me.

But that day, it was Didi, Olivia, Olivia's daughter, and myself.

And we pretty much spent the day together.

It was like nine hours.

And at one point she was being pulled by everybody.

Because Travolta wasn't there, so everybody wanted Sandy.

And I said to Didi, Can I go save her?

She goes, Please do.

So I grabbed her.

I said, I'll bring her back.

We walked out this back door of the Palladium in Hollywood where the party was.

She goes, What are we doing?

There's a garbage dumpster here, kitchen door here.

I said, you looked like you needed rescuing.

She goes, Thank you.

And we chatted for like, 20 minutes.

We went back in.

A few days later, there's a voicemail on my machine saying, I felt such a great connection with you.

You took such good care of me.

I would love to work with you.

And that was 1998.

-So fast-forward and there's a video of you, and John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John are behind you on the red carpet celebrating which anniversary of Grease?

-That was the 40th anniversary of Grease.

-Wow.

-Yeah, the 50th is coming up in 2028.

That's what Didi and I were talking about.

We have all these plans.

We've got Travolta involved, so we're-- Hopefully this is all going to work how we want, but I can't say anything.

-I think we only have time for one more story, and that is, she passed away in 2022.

And that day, you were getting surgery.

-I was having spinal injections.

I had spinal surgery years later, about a year later, but I was doing these epidural injections for the pain.

And Olivia hated when I would do it.

She'd say, Honey, don't do it.

They're gonna paralyze you.

You're-- I'm like, no.

And she passed that morning.

And we knew that she was home with hospice and it was a matter of time.

When it happened, I literally was heading out to go to get my surgery, but I had to go back to my house to get my laptop because the statement that we had prepared, I had to deal with all of that.

Literally, I am in the hospital with the cap on, posting, going back and forth with her husband and daughter what the post is going to say.

And I finally go to post it, and I go, Oh, my God, I've got to text Travolta because he needs to know, because TMZ is going to go to him first.

So I texted John, and he goes, Oh, my God, Michael.

Can I call you?

I had this weird feeling this morning.

And I said-- I sent him a selfie with the hospital stuff on.

And he said, Okay, I'll call.

Called my husband, Randy.

So I was like, All right.

And I put the phone in the little baggie, put it underneath.

They wheel me into the surgical room.

And I don't know any of these nurses, because it's just the surgical center.

And I hear on the loud speaker, ♪ You're the one that I want ♪ ♪ You are the one I want ♪ ♪ Ooh, ooh, ooh ♪♪ And I just-- It was the first chance that I actually lost it, because I'd never lost a client.

I mean, she was my family.

I mean, she married my husband and I on our 25th anniversary on the High Roller.

And, you know, I had clients with me, I had friends with me, but she was my family.

And to lose someone who's family and then have to put your work hat on was a tough thing to do.

And, you know, I just-- We're doing a documentary on her life for Netflix.

And they interviewed me, and I thought it was going to be-- Who wants to talk to me?

You want to talk to all the stars.

Three and a half hours later, I was like, what time is it?

I was like, Oh, my God.

We were sitting here for three and a half hours?

They're like, you knew her from so many-- from the professional side, from the personal side, and your stories have a completely different tone, because you did do both sides.

You were family and you were work.

So I was like, oh, okay.

And it's been, it's been hard, but keeping her mission going is probably going to be my legacy.

And when I decide I'm going to retire, I'll probably keep her estate as my one passion project, just because the work that she used to do.

Well she did, and her cancer center in Australia and her foundation here in the US does, is cancer touches all of us.

So to be a part of something bigger than just a movie, where you're actually impacting, to see her interacting with patients and how she just uplifted people who were at the lowest of low is just something I'll never, never forget.

Kindest woman ever.

-Michael Caprio, thank you so much for joining Nevada Week In Person.

-Thank you.

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