LIVES IN BRIEF

This week: A media mogul, a star of Dallas, and a prize-winning author

THE media mogul Jerry Perenchio, pictued, who has died aged 86, was a billionaire producer and promoter who helped engineer the 1971 “Fight of the Century” between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier. He also represented movie and music stars such as Marlon Brando, Elizabeth Taylor, Andy Williams and Glen Campbell.

Perenchio’s half-century in the entertainment business included many roles: talent agent, sports promoter, television and motion picture tycoon, but he preferred to work behind the scenes.

His wealth, recently estimated at $2.8billion, allowed him to be a generous political donor and philanthropist. He contributed some $50million to candidates and causes and tens of millions more to schools, hospitals, museums and charities of all types.

He turned to showbusiness after attending UCLA and serving in the Air Force as a jet pilot and flight instructor.

In the late 1950s he became a talent agent with Music Corp of America. He went on to start his own agency and as a sports promoter helped engineer the Ali versus Frazier fight as well as the 1973 “Battle of the Sexes” between tennis players Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs.

The 1970s also saw him produce and distribute television hits such as Diff’rent Strokes. In 1992, Perenchio and two Latin American media tycoons bought Univision, then a struggling Spanish-language network. He became chairman and chief executive of the company, which today is the fifth-largest network in the United States — before selling it in 2006 and reaping a personal paycheck of moe than $1bn. He seldom ventured into the limelight, once saying: “I really don’t want my name in the goddamn paper.”

He amassed a significant art collection that included works by Picasso, Cezanne and Monet and in 2014 announced he would bequeath 47 pieces – worth an estimated $500 million — to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. He also donated $25m for a new building to house it.

THE actor Jared Martin, who has died aged 75, was best known for portraying the charming cowboy Dusty Farlow in the 1980s soap opera Dallas.

As the lover of Sue Ellen, wife of JR Ewing, Dusty was a suspect in the 1980 series cliffhanger that left viewers wondering who shot JR. The catchphrase “Who shot JR?” became part of the common vernacular around the world.

When viewers tuned in for the answer in November1980, the culprit was revealed to be JR’s vengeful mistress and sister-in-law, Kristen Shepard. That episode was seen by more people than any programme in TV history until that time.

Farlow was supposed to be a temporary character on the show, and supposedly died in a plane crash, but he proved so popular he was reintroduced. Fans called him “Lusty Dusty.”

Martin was the son of New Yorker cartoonist Charles E. Martin. In addition to Dallas he appeared in a number of popular television shows including the 1970s science fiction series The Fantastic Journey plus episodes of The Love Boat, Magnum PI, War Of The World and Murder She Wrote. Most recently, he directed a 2013 movie called The Congressman.

After retiring from acting, he founded a non-profit organisation that introduces inner city children to filmmaking.

“He had a great life,” his wife Yu Wei said. “He had more to do, but cancer took him.” She said he was working on a book about his struggles with cancer at the time of his death.

He survived by a son, Christian Martin, and two grandchildren.

THE writer Denis Johnson, who has died aged 67, was the prize-winning author best known for his classic story collection Jesus’ Son.

Johnson won the US National Book Award in 2007 for Tree Of Smoke, and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2012 for his novella Train Dreams.

Many will remember him for Jesus’ Son, his surreal and transcendent account of the lives of various drug addicts which was compared to William Burroughs’ Naked Lunch.

The book was published in 1992 and was adapted into a 1999 film.