Larry King dishes dirt on Miami...and himself

From 50 years and 3,000 miles away, Larry King can laugh about how South Florida nearly ended his broadcasting career before it really began, but it didn't seem that funny at the time. He was working the overnight shift at a little Miami Beach radio station when the phone rang.

''I really want you,'' cooed the breathy female listener on the other end. ''And I'm only 11 blocks from the station.'' King promptly slapped a Harry Belafonte album on the turntable and raced out the door -- only, when he arrived at his wannabe paramour's house, to hear Belafonte on the radio: Down the way where the nights are . . . where the nights are . . . where the nights are. . . .

Reporting for work the next day, King was petrified, but the station manager never said a thing. Possibly, he didn't even know what had happened -- ''The truth is, management never listens; the suits make decisions, but they never listen,'' says King -- and possibly he knew but understood that in South Florida, hormones rule. ''Miami,'' muses King wistfully, ``is the sexually loosest place I've ever lived.'' Read my full story on King and his reminiscences about the seamy side of South Florida in Sunday's Miami Herald.

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Comments

[FLORIDAHAWK]

King failed to mention his financial failure in Miami and those that he owed $$$$

[Liza]

Why anyone would want to be alone with Larry is beyond me. And how this unattractive, uninformed jerk made it to "the big time" is one of life's enduring mysteries. He was clueless when he worked in Miami and he's even more clueless now. Night after night he ridicules himself, mouth agape, without an original thought or follow-up, not listening to the answers but looking down at the card that tells him what to say next. What he needs to do is (A) retire and (B) use the profits from this book to repay the millions he owes to all those South Floridians who stood by him during his lean years.

[Jeff]

I have avoided watching LKL lately because of his obsession with Michael Jackson(the L.A. Times posted a fascinating showbiz opinion column today about this). Whatever happened to the King we used to know? Where are the hours with people who are willing to open up about their lives and careers? And his colleagues on both CNN and HLN are just as Jacko wacko...to the point that Jane Velez-Mitchell, host of "Issues," has to bang her gavel to bring some order to the multi-satellite-fed panel discussion of the case...and I've watched about 30 seconds of that show until I realize it also has fallen in line to dwell on MJ. Please. Even an hour with Bill Maher, or a tribute to a recently deceased celebrity truly worthy of all sorts of attention(in the same league with Johnny Carson, Bob Hope, etc.)is a lot more interesting.