Tel Aviv - The king is not dead, but he is facing jail time. Israeli entertainer Dudu Topaz, whose popular television shows of a decade ago earned him the title of "King of the Ratings," has admitted he masterminded attacks on television executives in revenge for having his ideas for TV shows rejected by them.
It is an affair which has transfixed Israelis with its coherent narrative of hubris, shifting tastes, frustration, desperation and violence.
But at its centre is no longer the ebullient, polished entertainer of ten years ago, but instead a pressured, sweaty 62-year-old man trying hard to disguise his turmoil as he was led away by police on Sunday.
Although at first Topaz denied the charges against him, despite persistent rumours to the contrary, on Tuesday, after four-and-a-half hours of questioning, he finally cracked, reportedly telling police interrogators that "it's hard for me. I want to get it out."
He admitted to hiring the men who savagely beat Channel 2 television executives Avi Nir, in November 2008, and Shira Margalit in May, as well as actors' agent Boaz Ben-Tzion six months ago.
Police also suspect Topaz of planning an attack on a newspaper editor who rejected his idea for a column.
Depending on the charges filed - and even before he confessed - police said they had enough evidence for an indictment. Topaz could face up to 20 years in jail, one criminal lawyer said, albeit basing himself only on published accounts of the incidents.
"I don't have a rational explanation why I did it," Topaz reportedly told his police interrogators.
Hours after Topaz was arrested, Israeli television channels were airing speculation that their former star attraction had decided to revenge himself on the television executives who had turned down his ideas for new shows and were thus keeping him off the air.
Topaz himself confirmed this, reportedly telling his interrogators that "they didn't want me on television and I decided to take revenge."
Topaz was said by his attorney Wednesday morning to be "at one of the lowest points in his life."
Courting, or being caught in, controversy, is not a new experience for the man born David Goldenberg who studied acting in London.
In 1995 he reacted to a negative review of his TV show by attacking the critic responsible, breaking his glasses because "he doesn't understand what he sees anyway. " He paid the critic thousands of dollars in compensation.
Seven years later he was accused of kissing a female security guard against her will. He reacted to the accusation by trying to do the same thing to a female radio reporter covering the case, which in the event was dropped though lack of evidence.
That same year he bit a Latin-American actress on the shoulder during a live broadcast.
For many, however, Topaz's most notorious moment came long before commercial television catapulted him to fame.
Speaking at a election rally for the left-of-centre Labour Party days before the 1981 general elections, Topaz used an ethnic slang term to describe supporters of the right-wing Likud Party, many of whom are Jews with origins in Arab countries.
In a recent interview with Israel Army Radio, Topaz admitted that "there are two of me", one a person who wanted to do good, the other, which he said he tried to suppress, "a vindictive and unforgiving person."
So long as Topaz's low-brow shows brought in high ratings, television executives appeared willing to tolerate the vindictive and unforgiving Topaz.
But as Israeli viewing tastes shifted, Topaz found himself and his brand of television entertainment sidelined in favour of Israeli versions of such reality shows as Big Brother and Survivor, which increasingly dominate local television listings.
Television executives who commissioned reality shows, Topaz complained to Army Radio, were out of touch and did not know "what needs to be on TV."
With the extensive news coverage of the affair, Topaz now finds himself once again a star of the medium, on prime time and starring in a reality soap opera of his own making.
