The CultureMap Interview

Tilman on TV: Houston Rockets owner on new season of his reality show

Houston mogul Tilman Fertitta mentors, and hires, hopefuls on his show, Billion Dollar Buyer.

Courtesy photo

You’d be hard-pressed to find a Houstonian who’s had a more high-profile year than Tilman Fertitta. The Landry’s, Inc. CEO has long been a household name as the owner of 600 properties — including high-end restaurants such as Mastro’s and Morton’s The Steakhouse; mainstream destinations such as Rainforest Café, Bubba Gump Shrimp Co., Saltgrass Steak House; and five Golden Nugget Casinos.

But it’s his recent acquisition of the Houston Rockets, paired with his alpha presence as the star of the reality show Billion Dollar Buyer, that has rocketed Fertitta into the national spotlight. In its third season, which premieres tonight at 9 pm on CNBC, Billion Dollar Buyer pairs Fertitta with two small businesses in each episode; he samples their goods, gets to know the owners, and assesses their compatibility with Landry’s, Inc. The Houston native points out flaws in products and operations, shares his expertise, and pushes for improvements. In the end, he decides whether to place a transformative purchase order with one of the companies, both, or neither.

This season, five Houston business — BellaBreeze, Eat Drink Host, K&N Custom Granite, Mar-tea-na Tea Company, and Texas Mattress Makers — are among the 12 jockeying for Fertitta’s mentorship — and money. We caught up with Fertitta to talk reality TV, and tonight’s premiere:

CultureMap: You’re an NBA owner, you rub elbows with celebrities in sports, business and entertainment, and your businesses are nationwide. Could you be the next great brand ambassador for Houston to the rest of the country?

Tilman Fertitta: You know, I’ve never thought of that. I think it’s just the nature of Houston. When you take out your athletes — take out J.J. Watt, James Harden, Deshaun Watson — if you went around the country, and asked people to name someone from Houston who isn’t an athlete, it would probably be hard for them. That’s just the way it is right now.

CM: Which puts you in a unique position.

TF: Yes. Look, there are a lot of great business people in Houston, but for me, I think it’s because I have businesses that are across the country, and they’re high-visibility businesses. And now I own the Rockets, and have a TV show. I certainly didn’t position myself this way; it just kind of happened.

CM: Have you tried to create a Houston “feel” on the show?

TF: I think people see the Houston charm and hospitality. I’d like to think wherever I go, I’m an ambassador for Houston.

CM: Your trajectory is very similar to another reality star: Mark Cuban. You were both billionaires in your own right, you bought NBA teams based in Texas, and now are both on reality television.

TF: Wow, you know, that hasn’t occurred to me. No one’s ever told me that. I have a lot of respect for Mark, and it sure doesn't hurt my feelings to be compared to him.

CM: There are five Houston businesses on the show this season. Do you find yourself subconsciously favoring them?

TF: Maybe so. You probably look at a local company a little harder — you want to do deals with the locals. I know mentally I’m probably in that state. I will say: all the companies I meet with are good people, and they’ve been cast because they’re people who want to learn. It’s been a great pleasure for me to get out and meet new people and see these products.

CM: There must be a kinship between host and hopefuls, being that you were once in their shoes?

TF: One hundred percent. I like relating things that happened in my past with them. We’re not perfect — we make mistakes every year. I’ve just been fortunate to make more good decisions than bad.The show is just as much about mentoring as it is about me buying their product. So even if I don’t buy their product, I’m trying to help them as a company.

CM: Do you wish there had been a Tilman for you?

TF: I never had a mentor, but I had people I watched and wanted to emulate their success. I was always intrigued by Vincent Kickerillo. And I’ve been going to Vegas since I was in my teens, so I’ve always been intrigued by people like Steve Wynn. I can remember going to The Golden Nugget downtown and realizing that Steve Wynn’s vision was so far ahead of everyone else’s.

It’s interesting because later in life, I’ve become very good friends with Vincent Kickerillo and Steve Wynn. So I’ve been very fortunate that people I’ve looked up to, I’ve ended up becoming good friends with.

CM: Do you see yourself staying in TV, as a star, and maybe as an executive producer?

TF: Shooting the show takes a lot of time, but I can see it. I can see myself staying in the business.

They had been talking to me about doing a show forever. But I told them that I’m viewed on Wall Street as a serious businessman. So I’m not gonna do a show that has a lot of drama; it has to be more of a teaching show. And it’s on CNBC, which is a business channel. That’s important.

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Billion Dollar Buyer airs at 9 pm Wednesdays on CNBC.

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Movie Review

Avatar: Fire and Ash returns to Pandora with big action and bold visuals

Photo courtesy of 20th Century Studios

Oona Chaplin in Avatar: Fire and Ash.

For a series whose first two films made over $5 billion combined worldwide, Avatar has a curious lack of widespread cultural impact. The films seem to exist in a sort of vacuum, popping up for their run in theaters and then almost as quickly disappearing from the larger movie landscape. The third of five planned movies, Avatar: Fire and Ash, is finally being released three years after its predecessor, Avatar: The Way of Water.

The new film finds the main duo, human-turned-Na’vi Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) and his native Na’vi wife, Neytiri (Zoë Saldaña), still living with the water-loving Metkayina clan led by Ronal (Kate Winslet) and Tonowari (Cliff Curtis). While Jake and Neytiri still play a big part, the focus shifts significantly to their two surviving children, Lo’ak (Britain Dalton) and Tuk (Trinity Jo-Li Bliss), as well as two they’ve essentially adopted, Kiri (Sigourney Weaver) and Spider (Jack Champion).

Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang), who lives on in a fabricated Na’vi body, is still looking for revenge on Jake, and he finds help in the form of the Mangkwan Clan (aka the Ash People), led by Varang (Oona Chaplin). Quaritch’s access to human weapons and the Mangkwan’s desire for more power on the moon known as Pandora make them a nice match, and they team up to try to dominate the other tribes.

Aside from the story, the main point of making the films for writer/director James Cameron is showing off his considerable technical filmmaking prowess, and that is on full display right from the start. The characters zoom around both the air and sea on various creatures with which they’ve bonded, providing Cameron and his team with plenty of opportunities to put the audience right there with them. Cameron’s preferred viewing method of 3D makes the experience even more immersive, even if the high frame rate he uses makes some scenes look too realistic for their own good.

The story, as it has been in the first two films, is a mixed bag. Cameron and co-writers Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver start off well, having Jake, Neytiri, and their kids continue mourning the death of Neteyam (Jamie Flatters) in the previous film. The struggle for power provides an interesting setup, but Cameron and his team seem to drag out the conflict for much too long. This is the longest Avatar film yet, and you really start to feel it in the back half as the filmmakers add on a bunch of unnecessary elements.

Worse than the elongated story, though, is the hackneyed dialogue that Cameron, Jaffa, and Silver have come up with. Almost every main character is forced to spout lines that diminish the importance of the events around them. The writers seemingly couldn’t resist trying to throw in jokes despite them clashing with the tone of the scenes in which they’re said. Combined with the somewhat goofy nature of the Na’vi themselves (not to mention talking whales), the eye-rolling words detract from any excitement or emotion the story builds up.

A pre-movie behind-the-scenes short film shows how the actors act out every scene in performance capture suits, lending an authenticity to their performances. Still, some performers are better than others, with Saldaña, Worthington, and Lang standing out. It’s more than a little weird having Weaver play a 14-year-old girl, but it works relatively well. Those who actually get to show their real faces are collectively fine, but none of them elevate the film overall.

There are undoubtedly some Avatar superfans for which Fire and Ash will move the larger story forward in significant ways. For anyone else, though, the film is a demonstration of both the good and bad sides of Cameron. As he’s proven for 40 years, his visuals are (almost) beyond reproach, but the lack of a story that sticks with you long after you’ve left the theater keeps the film from being truly memorable.

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Avatar: Fire and Ash opens in theaters on December 19.

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