The O.J. Simpson I knew was a fellow member of Vince’s North Hollywood gym, just off Ventura Boulevard, in Los Angeles. He was one of the most affable people I ever met. So was Carl Weathers, who in 1976 played the role of Apollo Creed opposite Sylvester Stallone’s Rocky Balboa. Both had been football superstars. Both retired in favor of acting careers. Weathers in 1974, Simpson in 1979. They were at the top of their Hollywood game when the famously flamboyant Vince Gironda invited me—via chauffeured courier, don’t you know!—to join his very special clientele that included prominent writers, movie producers, fashion designers and A-list movie stars. Among them was William Blinn, a screenwriter widely lauded for his work on the mini-series Roots. (After he had read It’ll Be All Right in the Morning, Blinn told me my portrayal of John Compton and George Odlum had strongly impacted him, so strongly that he suggested I do a fictional version of Morning that concentrated on the two characters!) And then there was Robert Blake (star of In Cold Blood and the TV series Baretta). We all had our own personal keys to the premises, which permitted us the luxury of working out at our convenience, day or night.
I knew nothing of O.J.’s private life. Or of Blake’s, for that matter. The proprietor was a New Yorker of Italian descent who had been a stellar bodybuilder in his own right. He treated his elite membership as if they were no different from the itinerants who did their weird lifting at the notorious open-air Muscle Beach pen in Santa Monica. Save for O.J., Carl and yours truly, I’m happy to report. He made us feel special, although, truth be told, not nearly as special as Carl Weathers. How Robert Blake continued to use Vince’s Gym for as long as he did was indisputable proof of his hippo hide. Or maybe he developed an immunity to Vince’s acerbic pricks. Or considered it beneath his five-feet-four stature to react to criticism by ordinary mortals!
On a particular morning when Southern California was being choked by the Santa Ana winds (Vince detested air-conditioning nearly as much as he hated squats!), some of us took refuge in the gym’s locker room. Our respective workout sessions completed, we were taking a breather before stepping under the showers when a disheveled Vince joined us. He’d obviously had another hard day’s night, perhaps one harder than usual. It was no secret he often over-indulged his appetite for fine wine. Before long he was regaling us with riveting tales about the proclivities of some of his more notorious Hollywood clients, mimicking their walk, their accents, their favorite bon mots and other idiosyncrasies.
A stark-naked O.J. Simpson emerged suddenly from one of the shower cubicles, at the same time a grumpy Robert Blake entered the locker room, sweating like a corrupt politician accounting for his assets before a judge. While most of Vince’s all-male clientele normally wore shorts or sweat pants with sleeveless tee shirts bearing his gym logo, it seemed the ever-angry Blake always dressed for winter. No one dared ask why.
Vince abruptly abandoned his story about Al Lewis (he played Grandpa in the CBS sitcom The Munsters) to address the sweat-drenched TV star. With his right hand, he roughly brushed his uncombed silver locks from his bloodshot eyes and growled: “Bobby, why can’t you be half as nice as O.J.? Why do you always have to be such a nasty asshole?” Unsurprisingly, no one dared to laugh. As for Blake, his towel wrapped like a scarf around his neck, he fished out an overloaded key ring from his soggy sweatpants, unlocked his locker, snatched his gym bag and exited the locker room. All of that without as much as a grunt. Only after we were certain he was out of earshot did we feel safe enough to exhale.
In all the time we worked out at Vince’s I never heard anyone speak of O.J. as a regular guy, even though he could not have been more regular in his manner. No one ever mentioned Nicole Simpson or their offspring or a Simpson relative. We were too busy appreciating his humility, how he laughed at our corniest jokes, how he always rushed to the assistance of an overzealous beginner in desperate need of a spot.
I easily recall, no doubt with the rest of the world, what would become known as “the Bronco chase” along the 405 Freeway. I was with my wife watching the evening news from our living room sofa in Saint Lucia when the Bronco item came on, with crowds shouting out encouragingly to O.J. from a Torrance roadway and from overpasses. Some waved handmade banners and signs, while others yelled: “The Juice is loose.” It never crossed my mind that the O.J. with whom I’d spent countless gym hours could possibly have done what the notoriously racist Los Angeles cops insisted he had done to the mother of his children. Of that, nuff said.
I next encountered Simpson some years later at Miami Airport. I was intransit to Turks & Caicos with my wife and Molly McDaniel, the editor of our newspaper. The ladies decided to do a little window shopping while I settled down in a chair to peruse an armful of magazines. We had some 90 minutes to kill before our flight. For no reason I can explain to this day, I looked up from the latest Vanity Fair toward the nearest escalator, in time to see one of my two traveling companions pointing with some excitement at someone or something. I turned my head instinctively in the direction indicated. What my eyes beheld did not register in my brain. At any rate, not simultaneously. When it did a nano second later I looked up again and shouted: “O.J.,” at the same time that he clapped eyes on me and hollered back: “Hey, Rick Wayne!”
Next thing you know, we are hugging, slapping each other’s backs, happy as only two accused criminals might be upon hearing a jury had pronounced them not guilty of bloody murder. I quickly regained my sanity, doubtless shaken by the startled looks in some five hundred pairs of dilated eyeballs. We talked about Robert Blake’s situation with Bonny Lee Blakely. O.J. informed me that while being interviewed by a TV reporter on the matter, he had offered Blake some good advice. He had cautioned him to “be careful not to do what I did. I should’ve kept my damn mouth shut.” I mentioned Fred Goldman, father of 25-year-old Ron Goldman, who was butchered with Nicole Simpson. I told O.J. I had recently seen him on the news, when he swore to get every cent O.J. may have hidden away. O.J. had just five words for Fred Goldman: “He can go fuck himself!”
It occurred to me that time had not been kind to O.J. Simpson. He was still a handsome man, yes, he still smiled easily. But the athletic physique that once had decorated a popular Hertz commercial, had taken a battering. Despite that he played a lot of golf, by his own account, daily, he seemed physically broken. He walked with difficulty. Finally, we shook hands, said our good-byes and I watched him limp his way down an escalator. While lying on a beach in Turks & Caicos two or three days later, O.J. came to mind. A perverse thought. I felt certain he’d have accepted my invitation to make some paid personal appearances in Saint Lucia. I’m equally certain Saint Lucians in their numbers would happily have paid to meet and greet O.J.—to shake his notorious right hand, to hear him tell his version of the story that had gotten him off the hook, if only in a criminal court. If asked, might O.J. have spoken the words Johnnie Cochran delivered in his closing argument, considered among the most famous ever uttered in a courtroom?: “If it doesn’t fit, you must acquit!” Doubtless publicity hungry local hoteliers would gladly have hosted him. (I can hear you asking why, considering our history, I did not contemplate letting O.J. stay at my own residence. Suffice it to say the thought just never occurred.)
By the time O.J. landed in jail for reclaiming his own property while wielding a firearm, most people I talked with had changed their minds about the outcome of the first trial of the fallen star with his dream team of lawyers. Now they were convinced the case that resulted in O.J.’s long-term incarceration was a set-up—but no more than O.J. deserved.
Although cancer claimed him today, O. J. Simpson will prove immortal. Carl Weathers has also passed away. He died from natural causes in February. O.J. paid him tribute via video. Another coincidence: both expired at age 76.
As for Bobby Blake who may also have sent Bonny Lee Blakely ahead of schedule to her maker, he took his leave at age 89 in March 2023. May they all find the peace denied them in this life!
