Biografía

He was the son of Bette Nesmith Graham (born Bette Clair McMurray) and Warren Audrey Nesmith. Michael's mother was a legal secretary/typist in Houston, Texas. On account of her hobby of painting, she came up with the idea and invented Liquid Paper typing correction fluid and made an enormous fortune overnight.

Invented the idea for what became MTV. Sold the idea to Time-Warner and created a proof of concept for 24-hour music television in the form of six half hour shows called "Pop Clips". Time-Warner aired Popclips on Nickelodeon Channel for testing and it was an instant hit. Nesmith moved on to other projects after the testing phase as he did not wish to be involved in managing a television network.

Michael spent fourteen months in the United States Air Force where he tipped over a general's airplane while cleaning the airplane.

During the 1980s, he built up the largest non-theatrical home video catalog in the world called Pacific Arts Corporation. It owned rights to everything from Koyaanisqatsi (1982) to The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau (1966) to Ken Burns The Civil War (1990). Pacific Arts licensed the right to use the PBS logo on the titles in its catalog which had been aired on PBS, and developed the PBS Home Video label. The venture ended in a lawsuit with PBS that resulted in a six-week trial in federal court. A jury unanimously found PBS liable for intentional misrepresentation, intentional concealment, negligent misrepresentation, intentional interference with Pac Arts' contractual relations with the program producers and in breach of the covenant of good faith and fair dealing. They awarded Pacific Arts and Nesmith real and punitive damages totaling more than $47,000,000. PBS and Nesmith subsequently settled for an undisclosed sum.

Arrived for his first interview for The Monkees wearing a wool cap, to keep the hair out of his eyes while driving his motorcycle around town (Nesmith also carried a bag of laundry, to be done at a nearby laundromat on his way home). Producers Bob Rafelson and Bert Schneider remembered him as "Wool Hat"; they wanted to name his Monkees character that, but Nesmith refused.

[As to why he didn't rejoin The Monkees when Peter Tork, Micky Dolenz and Davy Jones re-formed the group, c. 1986] "It would be kind of like Ronald Reagan making another movie."

[describing his financial slump, after paying a huge default to leave The Monkees in 1969] "I had to start telling little tales to the tax man while they were putting tags on the furniture."

[about his famous wool hat] "It had a life of its own. I used to take it off and put it in a little house, feed it . . . "

[on the death of fellow Monkee Davy Jones] David's spirit and soul live well in my heart, among all the lovely people, who remember with me the good times, and the healing times, that were created for so many, including us. I have fond memories. I wish him safe travels.

I'm clearly in my endgame. I mean, we're not talking about deciding to do something else. We're talking about dying. [Laughs] So I don't know. Who knows where that is? That's somewhere . . . that door is coming up. I can't make it out on the horizon just yet. But at a certain point it's going to be time for me to say, "Eh, I think I'll lay down."