Interestingly, both Billy Jack and Trial indicated that, in addition to innovative ideas, Laughlin also possessed an awareness of his own shortcomings as a businessman. To achieve such successful distribution, he had relied on an alter ego -- a "conscientious, nit-picking son of a bitch," as he would later call it -- to attend to administration and management and translate his vision into hard reality. At critical points in the future, Laughlin's failure to recreate similar partnerships would become an important factor in his undoing.
Although The Trial of Billy Jack once again demonstrated Laughlin's aptitude for innovation, it did not do much for his public relations. The critics, it seems, were not overly impressed with the film, which featured several windy monologues in which Billy expounded on the tragedy at Kent State University and other related issues of the day. In April 1975, Laughlin countered with a full-page ad in the trade journal Hollywood Reporter, announcing a "Billy Jack versus the Critics" contest and offering a $25,000 first prize for the best essay to show, in effect, that movie critics would not recognize a hit picture if it bit them in the foot.
While all this was going on, Billy Jack Productions, the company Laughlin had founded to develop his film projects, continued to accumulate capital and people, both of which were trained on a growing list of new opportunities. An article in the Los Angeles Times, for example, announced that the enterprise had been "reorganized into five different companies covering all aspects of the entertainment industry," including family and children's films, records, and TV programming. Based on this report and others, an informed reader might well have concluded that Laughlin was indeed about to consolidate his new Hollywood economics into the studio of the future. But even then, in the fullness of his success, the job was easier described than done. Unfortunately, before Laughlin could perfect his technique any further, he was in court with Warner Bros. once again. In a $94-million lawsuit filed in September 1976, Laughlin charged that Warner Bros., NBC-TV, and then-Warner president Frank Wells had collaborated illegally to sell the television rights to Billy Jack. Laughlin also alleged that the various actions of the defendants were all part of a conspiracy to put him out of business. The efforts of the defendants, Laughlin charged, had seriously impaired his ability to raise funds to finance the production of future motion pictures, including Billy Jack Goes to Washington, a second sequel then nearing completion. In a later filing, Laughlin would further add that Wells and Warner Bros. had even pressured Laughlin's bank to withdraw financing for the new film.
"At that point," Laughlin says, "I was fully extended. I had this picture going and the bank pulled the plug. I couldn't even meet my payroll. I was in a fight for my life. So I closed down the offices in one weekend and got ready to go to war."
Whether there was, indeed, a conspiracy to put Tom Laughlin out of business will never be known. In August 1978, the Hollywood Reporter announced that Laughlin had signed a truce with his adversaries, settling the dispute out of court. Although the exact amount of the settlement was not revealed, industry observers claim that Laughlin walked away with a sum in the millions -- a speculation that he does not deny.
At this point, Laughlin found himself at a strange juncture. A series of successes seemed to corroborate his claims that he could transform industries and that his ideas were both revolutionary and realistic. But it was also apparent that these successes had been won at a price. He had lost an opportunity to distribute his latest movie, Billy Jack Goes to Washington, which was consigned to his personal film library, where it sits to this day. And as a result of the lawsuit and its attendant publicity, Laughlin found that he had greatly extended his reputation in the industry for being ornery and litigious. Whether Laughlin actually deserves that reputation no longer is at issue. Regardless of the facts, it seems to have become a permanent part of Hollywood lore.
In Laughlin's line of work, this situation is more than merely frustrating. It has become a threat to his very survival. On many occasions, Laughlin claims, studios and independent dealmakers have used his vaunted litigiousness to scare potential investors away from his projects. "After all," he says, "they want that money for their own clients. Why should they let some bigbucks guy come through and go to Tom Laughlin? And it's very easy to kill me. There's this feat of me, so it's easy to put a little poison in that well. And it works."
