Luck
February 17, 2016 7:23 AM   Subscribe

David Milch, creator of NYPD Blue and Deadwood, has burned through some $100 million in lifetime earnings, and is $17 million in debt to the IRS, due at least in part to massive gambling losses.
posted by Horace Rumpole (58 comments total) 13 users marked this as a favorite
 
I got an A in Discrete Probability and I'm like 15 grand in a hole on Microsoft Solitare.
posted by mikelieman at 7:31 AM on February 17, 2016 [14 favorites]


Sounds like the plot/tagline to a new HBO streetwise-earthy comic-dramady.
posted by sammyo at 7:31 AM on February 17, 2016 [1 favorite]


>Now the Milches must get by on David's HBO earnings, believed to be in the low-seven figures, and residuals, minus their payments to the IRS.

Poor bastard.
posted by anti social order at 7:31 AM on February 17, 2016 [27 favorites]


In case anyone was unclear as to how extreme an addiction gambling can be.
posted by GallonOfAlan at 7:32 AM on February 17, 2016 [9 favorites]


He should keep gambling, he's totally due for a win.
posted by bondcliff at 7:32 AM on February 17, 2016 [21 favorites]


You have to a big gambler to go into that business in the first place, and some people have no off button or compartmentalization abilities. Still, the loss just makes me shudder.

You really can't have everything, I guess, and no matter what opportunities you have, you are going to get whacked in the face with huge problems sooner or later...
posted by Alexandra Kitty at 7:33 AM on February 17, 2016 [1 favorite]


> "He was very serious about it, and he was a very good handicapper."

Imagine if he'd been bad!
posted by The Card Cheat at 7:37 AM on February 17, 2016 [23 favorites]


This New Yorker profile of Milch is a must-read for...well, anyone. It gets into his gambling a little, but it's not the focus of the article.
posted by Ian A.T. at 7:38 AM on February 17, 2016 [1 favorite]


Oh, so that's why we're getting a Deadwood movie.
posted by entropicamericana at 7:45 AM on February 17, 2016 [17 favorites]


I thought this was because he was a drunk.
posted by wormwood23 at 7:48 AM on February 17, 2016


Seven bucks," he answers, with a shrug.

"Well, it's either you or me," she says.

Multiply that man's losses by 17 billion, and you'll have something like the annual damage suffered by U.S. gamblers each year, a total of $119 billion in 2013, or about the same as Americans spent on fast food


Wow.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 7:50 AM on February 17, 2016 [2 favorites]


At one point, she writes, Maguire brought in his own $17,000 card-shuffling machine, known as a Shuffle Master. "Tobey won every week," she notes.

This bit piqued my attention, so I found some more info on Tobey Maguire and his $17,000 Shuffle Master.
posted by Iridic at 7:50 AM on February 17, 2016 [19 favorites]


> >Now the Milches must get by on David's HBO earnings, believed to be in the low-seven figures, and residuals, minus their payments to the IRS.

Poor bastard.


Yeah, addiction is a beast no matter where you are on society's ladder, but it's hard to get *too* choked up over someone who is, worst-case scenario, going to go "rich person bankrupt."
posted by The Card Cheat at 7:51 AM on February 17, 2016 [4 favorites]


I'm surprised at the jokes here - this is an extremely depressing story. I have addicts in my life (not gambling, but the behavior is the same even if the specifics are different) and it's very, very difficult to see people with every opportunity and a staunch crew of outspoken supporters blowing it again and again and again. I feel for him and especially for his family.
posted by something something at 7:51 AM on February 17, 2016 [26 favorites]


Gambling is a bitch of an addiction. A pure betrayal by your most important cognitive tool, the risk-reward engine. When it's booze or drugs, at least you have the intoxication to blame, and there's actually a certain underlying rational character: if I drink this fifth of vodka, I will definitely get drunk; but if I gamble sports or play blackjack for any reasonable period of time, I will definitely NOT to be a net winner over the house.

Something I've found fascinating is the cases where people instantly descend into a ruinous gambling addiction on account of a brain tumor or brain injury, or after a gastric bypass has deprived them of the ability to indulge an overeating addiction.
posted by MattD at 8:01 AM on February 17, 2016 [7 favorites]


Wow, that article that Iridic linked lets you know that Tobey Maguire is a Grade A arsehole.
posted by Kitteh at 8:01 AM on February 17, 2016 [15 favorites]


Tobey Maguire is a Grade A arsehole.

No kidding. Add Tobey to my list of 'Celebrities I Used to Like Until I Found Out One Tiny Thing And Now I Can't Stand to See Them'.
posted by Capt. Renault at 8:08 AM on February 17, 2016 [5 favorites]


Wow, that article that Iridic linked

I need to make sure I don't give him any money by accidentally watching one of his films.
posted by aramaic at 8:10 AM on February 17, 2016 [1 favorite]


I'm shocked to find out a guy who tried to get a series on the air about horse racing might have gambling issues.

Shocked.

I just hope this doesn't derail the deadwood movie, because I'm a selfish bad person
posted by Ghidorah at 8:13 AM on February 17, 2016 [1 favorite]


A pure betrayal by your most important cognitive tool,

When you're this rich, how do you decide how much to gamble? It must be the case that bigger bets yield more pleasure (or excitement or whatever) - otherwise you'd only ever make $1 bets and always be safe. But if bigger bets work better, why doesn't he bet a million every time? Or ten million, right on the nose and get the biggest gamblegasm ever?
posted by Segundus at 8:14 AM on February 17, 2016


Crikey, this is why I am so torn when considering Las Vegas for vacation. I love the glitz, glamour, excess and debauchery the city, but I realize that the city was built on the exploitation of people via gambling losses (not to mention other types of human and environmental exploitation).
posted by bitteroldman at 8:16 AM on February 17, 2016 [1 favorite]


When you're this rich, how do you decide how much to gamble?

For many, many people, it's not the money, it's the social experience that goes with it. So, there's very little "I make X, so I'm gonna gamble Y" calculation happening at the conscious level. Among the top-grossing iOS games are many, many virtual gambling apps. People spending real money on fake slot machines. If you ask these people why they're doing it, most of them will put "because my friends do it" near the top of their lists.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 8:19 AM on February 17, 2016 [2 favorites]


It's pretty common here for Premier League players to get heavily into gambling - you're a young man, you dropped your formal education at age 16, you are training too hard to drink and drug, you're too famous to go out to your local club, oh, and you're earning in a week about six times what the average person in the UK earns in a year. It seems a lot more fun when you know your bet isn't literally gambling the rent, and you don't think you'll ever stop earning that kind of money, I guess.
posted by mippy at 8:20 AM on February 17, 2016 [3 favorites]


But if bigger bets work better, why doesn't he bet a million every time? Or ten million, right on the nose and get the biggest gamblegasm ever?

Funny thing about gamblers -- it's not even about the winning sometimes. I can't find the article at the moment, but brain studies of slot machine players show that they get so into the rhythm that hitting a big jackpot actually fires less happy-neurons because it interrupts their process.

Also, if he bets $1M, then he stands to lose $1M. That's too much, obviously, but he may bet $1K, then $2K to make up for that first loss, then $4K to make up for that loss, then $8K, then etc. etc. and at the end of the day he's lost $1M, but it doesn't feel like he's lost $1M.
posted by Etrigan at 8:21 AM on February 17, 2016 [3 favorites]


Parkinsons' drugs side effects include compulsive gambling, uncontrollable shopping and a sudden obsession with sex.
I remember hearing this report on NPR. A woman with Parkinson's who had previously no interest in gambling almost instantly developed a severe gambling addiction when she started taking a Dopamine agonist. And as instantly as it started, it ended when she stopped taking the drug--she said she had zero desire to gamble thereafter. She said that the pull to gamble was so strong it would divert her from a shopping trip and the milk spoiled in the bag sitting next to her. It was a seemingly binary phenomenon.

There is a lot of evidence to suggest that gambling and other addictions are primarily a problem of biochemistry that regulate dopamine and other neural pathways rather than a problem with character.
posted by waving at 8:26 AM on February 17, 2016 [13 favorites]


Wow, Tobey Maguire is a major major asshole. Bark like a SEAL? WTF already.
posted by suelac at 8:40 AM on February 17, 2016 [2 favorites]


When it's booze or drugs, at least you have the intoxication to blame, and there's actually a certain underlying rational character: if I drink this fifth of vodka, I will definitely get drunk; but if I gamble sports or play blackjack for any reasonable period of time, I will definitely NOT to be a net winner over the house.

With serious substance abusers, the rational component is gone. A hardcore alcoholic, for example, derives no enjoyment from drinking. They get drunk, but they no longer enjoy getting drunk--the pleasure they used to derive from it is gone. They know this, and yet they keep doing it anyway. They cannot stop doing it, even if they want to. Once you're in deep enough, rationality won't save you.

The key to understanding this is that wanting and liking are two different things. The mesolimbic dopamine pathway is concerned with pleasure-seeking, not pleasure. More specifically, its function is to link associative cues with ritualized behaviors. Press button, get pellet. With enough reinforcement, the mouse will keep pressing the button long after the pellets have run out.
posted by dephlogisticated at 8:45 AM on February 17, 2016 [12 favorites]


that article that Iridic linked lets you know that Tobey Maguire is a Grade A arsehole.
I wasn't there for the game she describes in the article, but I've spent some time with both of them. Although Tobey can indeed be a real jerk (he's fiercely competitive at poker and lives a pretty unnatural life), Molly is not exactly a completely trustworthy source either. I've heard very different versions of many of the stories she tells in her book from people who were there.
posted by Lame_username at 8:46 AM on February 17, 2016 [16 favorites]


Alcohol is a physical dependency, though, right? As I understand it, once you're hardcore alcoholic, your body will be screaming for a drink.
posted by mippy at 8:50 AM on February 17, 2016


It's come to the point where I really despise gambling, casinos, and lotteries. They operate largely by exploiting a bug in the human brain. I guess it would all go underground if it was illegal, but I don't have to like it, and I definitely think the government should get out of it altogether (doing lotteries and such, I mean, not regulation.)
posted by Mitrovarr at 9:04 AM on February 17, 2016 [6 favorites]


dephlogisticated : With serious substance abusers, the rational component is gone.

I know a guy who had a serious sports gambling problem, and I would have thought that he was "too smart" for it. I think he got so far into the hole that he had to keep going to try to win his way back out -- which of course is a Sunk Costs mistake, and one I would assume a finance guy wouldn't make. But, again, the rational component is gone.

Man, I hate gambling. I believe that the way that sports media includes the Vegas line in so much coverage of events normalizes it to young men in particular, and makes them think gambling is harmless and acceptable. I have told my own sons that it very much is not, but who knows what they will hear from their friends. (When I was in high school, there was an AMAZING amount of betting going on among the other boys.)
posted by wenestvedt at 9:06 AM on February 17, 2016 [5 favorites]


I look at gambling ads all day at work and I've never seen any appeal. Having said that, though, I owe Windows a LOT of money...
posted by mippy at 9:07 AM on February 17, 2016 [1 favorite]


The creator of Deadwood is broke? This is a sad story and my heart goes out to him and his family.

But I can't help but imagine the florid and colorful language he would use to recount this series of events himself.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:27 AM on February 17, 2016 [6 favorites]


Alcohol is a physical dependency, though, right? As I understand it, once you're hardcore alcoholic, your body will be screaming for a drink.

It becomes a physical dependency, but nobody would get to the physical dependency part if the main underlying drive wasn't psychological.
posted by something something at 9:48 AM on February 17, 2016 [2 favorites]


Gambling isn't any more inherently harmful than alcohol or drugs. Which is to say: most people can try it out and be fine but a not-insignificant portion of people could have their lives utterly ruined by it.

Luck is somehow even more amazing of a show knowing this, and even more amazing that a horrible sting of luck forced its cancellation.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 9:49 AM on February 17, 2016 [3 favorites]


Horse racing is a disgusting sport and I was very happy when I heard Luck was canceled after they managed to kill three horses during production.

Race houses are dying of injuries every day so jackasses like Milch can hang out and feel like big men. I'm not shedding a tear in my beer for this guy's money problems.
posted by Squeak Attack at 9:53 AM on February 17, 2016 [3 favorites]


Potomac Avenue, if you mean the "horrible sting of luck" was the horse deaths, then I disagree. As I noted above, horse racing has a high injury and death rate and Milch wanted verisimilitude in the production so he filmed real races.

It was a terrible harmful concept for television entertainment and should never have been produced.
posted by Squeak Attack at 9:57 AM on February 17, 2016 [4 favorites]


Alcohol is a physical dependency, though, right?

Alcoholism involves both physical and psychological dependence. The physical dependence can result in seizures or delirium (the DTs) after acute withdrawal. Essentially the brain has adapted to being under the continual influence of a depressant; removing the brake too suddenly causes hyperexcitability. Acute alcohol withdrawal can be fatal if not medically managed but does not last very long.

Psychological dependence is trickier and longer-lasting. It can last for years, or potentially a lifetime, even after long periods of sobriety. It is unrelated to physical dependence. Although it was once thought that the desire to avoid withdrawal symptoms was a primary driver of substance dependence, it is now understood to be neither necessary nor sufficient.
posted by dephlogisticated at 10:15 AM on February 17, 2016 [5 favorites]


I've got $18m for a 4th Deadwood season.
posted by sfts2 at 10:47 AM on February 17, 2016 [1 favorite]


Think how much good he could have done in the world with that $100M rather blowing all at the track.
posted by octothorpe at 11:44 AM on February 17, 2016 [1 favorite]


I just hope this doesn't derail the deadwood movie, because I'm a selfish bad person

It makes it more likely, doesn't it? He has to keep working, no early retirement to write novels in free verse.
posted by betweenthebars at 11:46 AM on February 17, 2016


I'm just an ordinary nobody, but I understand that the house always wins. And as someone struggling to stay afloat in Southern California, a bungalow in Santa Monica and annual "low seven figures" income would be heaven for me. The rich guys--even when they're not so rich any more--still prevail.
posted by Sassenach at 12:15 PM on February 17, 2016 [2 favorites]


Kanye West was quoted as saying: "David Milch, Imma let you finish but I'm one of the biggest debtors of all time, I've got more than 3x as much debt as you."
posted by theorique at 12:37 PM on February 17, 2016 [1 favorite]


While reading this, I wildly vacillated between genuine pity for the man (to be in the grips of anything that strongly must be a nightmare) and disgust that he was able to set an obscene amount of money on fire and still keep doing his sick addict thing. It's sure tough out there for a rich white man.

But, I don't know, while joking about it sure is tempting (poor guy had to sell his mega mansions! he has to now go write more words to make more glossy, glossy millions of dollars!), I imagine it's pretty ugly inside his head an awful lot of the time.

I would covet his talent, his connections and his money, but then I'd have to take on his demons, too.
posted by Ink-stained wretch at 1:09 PM on February 17, 2016 [5 favorites]


David Milch is a once in a generation incandescent genius and I forgive him everything...as long as that Deadwood movie happens.
posted by Falconetti at 1:26 PM on February 17, 2016


It's not that I look down on gamblers - not at all, I have my own history of addiction - I just don't really get a lot of its forms. Poker I kind of understand but I don't enjoy it that much - I think the most interesting card games I know are mostly non-gambling games. I would enjoy it more if I were good at it, but I'm not and playing endless hands pissing away dribbles of money is a real drag to me. I guess I can imagine horse racing fitting into a similar category where you feel like you have some amount of control, you get really into doing your research - I mean people in the story keep saying that Milch is good at gambling. Well, maybe they should stop telling him that. Slot machines? Ugh that's what you're gonna do with $100?

Small-scale bets with your friends I get - on sports or otherwise - but that's more of a bonding/social competition thing to me where the winner is gonna take the loser out for drinks anyway.
posted by atoxyl at 1:28 PM on February 17, 2016 [2 favorites]


In case anyone was unclear as to how extreme an addiction gambling can be.

Really, really cannot fathom it. How does one ignore the shrinking resources, the mounting horrific losses, and the time sink it must be?
posted by Mental Wimp at 1:57 PM on February 17, 2016 [1 favorite]


I'm surprised at the jokes here

As with everything else in Rich v. Poor, financial issues I’ve had have hit me proportionally way harder than it has rich out-of-control dudes. So part of me thinks screw em. (Including the incredibly overrated Ben Affleck mentioned here too.)

But I’ve had a secondhand connection to the extreme of horrible tragedies due to gambling. (Ugh, I still get angry at what a control-freak he was to think his wife and kids shouldn’t go on either. So screw him in hell too.)

Anyway yeah, gambling must be part of an array of psych issues. Wonder how many gamblers are also ADHD.

Tobey can indeed be a real jerk (… lives a pretty unnatural life)

Leans chin on hand: Tell me more … (Or maybe don’t, as it’ll worsen a once-favorable impression I had.)
posted by NorthernLite at 2:26 PM on February 17, 2016


I am actually much more interested in Tobey Maguire as an actor now that I know that he's a good, take-no-prisoners poker player. Great acting and great poker playing are each powered by a terrific insight into human psychology and utter ruthlessness (to self and others) in deploying it.

(Of course this could mean that I ultimately conclude that what I previously thought were good performances were more likely to have been phoning it in.)
posted by MattD at 3:52 PM on February 17, 2016 [1 favorite]


Milch is one of my favorite people. For those of you with the "boo hoo for the rich" attitude:

- During the writers strike, Milch gave free lectures to writers and during more than one said, "If you're going hungry because of the strike, call me, I'll cover it." And then he gave out his number. To a lecture hall full of strangers. He also used to give away story ideas during those lectures. (One of them went on to be turned into a show: The Nick.)

- At one point John Milius came to him about a job (I think it was on Deadwood) and Milch said, "What the hell are you doing here? You're an academy award nominated writer. You wrote Apocalypse Now for fuck's sake." Milius confessed to being down on his luck but said that he had promised his kid when he was very young that if he got the grades, he'd pay for him to go to law school. Milius needed a job. Kid got the grades but Milius couldn't afford it. Milch paid for the stranger's kid to go to law school.

- Milch has many, many times given free weekly lectures to classes of writers at which many dozens of people showed. Milch personally read and critiqued their writing every week.

- He's had a ridiculous life. He's been in jail. He's sold his identity. He's been abused. His father committed suicide in front of his brother and mother.

- Milch is a self-declared sociopath. To say he has an "addictive personality" would be to put it mildly: heroin, pills, lsd ("I dropped acid on more consecutive days than every person in this lecture hall has done drugs, combined."), booze. He's beaten everything but gambling. He's a suicidal fuck and I hope he doesn't off himself over this huge misstep.

In my opinion, he's the greatest writer television has ever seen and no one else comes close. He's my favorite writer, period, and I've learned heaps about writing and life from his talks.
posted by You Should See the Other Guy at 3:52 PM on February 17, 2016 [22 favorites]


Maybe he should have taken Elmore Leonard's advice.
posted by clavdivs at 4:38 PM on February 17, 2016


something something: "I'm surprised at the jokes here - this is an extremely depressing story."

I agree. This is a terrible story. Most people have it far worse than Milch, but that doesn't make his sort of addiction any less terrifying. I can't imagine feeling so not-in-control of yourself, and I shudder and just count myself extremely lucky that I don't have any addictions like that.
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 9:06 PM on February 17, 2016 [2 favorites]


But I can't help but imagine the florid and colorful language he would use to recount this series of events himself.
posted by DirtyOldTown


Eponysterical?

"It's not that I look down on gamblers - not at all, I have my own history of addiction - I just don't really get a lot of its forms."

Me either, but I think I just don't go into it ever, ever thinking I could win even for a second. I'd rather buy a gumball (and I don't like gum) than throw money into a slot machine because then I'd at least get something for my money. That particular optimism/delusion is beyond my comprehension, really.
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:53 PM on February 17, 2016


Etrigan: "...hitting a big jackpot actually fires less happy-neurons because it interrupts their process."


From the New Yorker piece linked above:
After he hung up the phone, I asked, “When you win, is the satisfaction in winning money or just in winning?”

“There’s no satisfaction,” he said. “Just a release of anxiety. There is no joy in the compulsive act. It’s a sterile recapitulation, a sterile release of tension.”
posted by Freelance Demiurge at 10:40 PM on February 17, 2016 [4 favorites]


Really, really cannot fathom it. How does one ignore the shrinking resources, the mounting horrific losses, and the time sink it must be?
Denial is the hell of a drug.
posted by fullerine at 11:26 PM on February 17, 2016 [2 favorites]


“There’s no satisfaction,” he said. “Just a release of anxiety. There is no joy in the compulsive act. It’s a sterile recapitulation, a sterile release of tension.”

I've read similar about opiate addiction (no personal experience, just reading, thank God).

For the practiced junkie, there is no fun, just a relief that you won't have to find a fix for a little while, that you're keeping the junk sickness at bay for another few hours. (How To Stop Time by Ann Marlow is an interesting memoir about heroin use.)
posted by theorique at 3:02 AM on February 18, 2016


Crikey, this is why I am so torn when considering Las Vegas for vacation. I love the glitz, glamour, excess and debauchery the city, but I realize that the city was built on the exploitation of people via gambling losses (not to mention other types of human and environmental exploitation).

Well, you’d have to say the same thing about every bar in the world. And to some extent every other business that sells a product that people become addicted to. Addiction will happen. I don’t think it’s right to keep everyone else from enjoying things in moderation (if "enjoying in moderation" is a reasonable expectation for that particular vice)

I go to Vegas, I lose a couple hundred bucks. I’m paying for entertainment. I’m donating to keep the carnival going. I’m well aware of that. Lots of people do that, the majority, so don’t feel bad.
posted by bongo_x at 12:10 PM on February 18, 2016 [1 favorite]


Well, you’d have to say the same thing about every bar in the world. And to some extent every other business that sells a product that people become addicted to. Addiction will happen.

Agree. Puritanical thinking that if one person is harmed by this, let's make it a no-no gave us prohibition and the fruits of our current War on Drugs. In both the harm of prohibition far outweighs the harm prevention achieved.
posted by Mental Wimp at 10:07 AM on February 19, 2016


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