The initial rags-to-riches story limned in the opening minutes of “Good Fortune,” intoned by narrator Dan Aykroyd in tones suggesting he really wants you to buy THIS Bass-O-Matic, suggest something similar in the works. But no. Soon Aykroyd is condemning the pursuit of profit at all costs, and talking about American success stories that pursue a “Triple P” bottom line: Profit, People, Planet. This is all by way of introducing John Paul DeJoria, who often goes by J.P. The lanky, pony tailed figure is familiar: back in the day, he was the TV ad and magazine ad face of Paul Mitchell hair products, to such an extent that many people came to think he was Paul Mitchell himself. He’s not, and that’s a big part of his story, one I won’t entirely divulge here. In any event, J.P. is seen entering a company called Chrysalis, one of the many philanthropic concerns he’s founded, cofounded, or has a profound interest in. Once inside, he gives a talk to a seminar about the first time he was homeless.
“Success unshared is failure.” That’s one of DeJoria’s mottos, one he says he learned from his mom, who once gave a dime to a Salvation Army bell ringer in spite of being practically broke. The terrifically engaging and likable DeJoria tells his own story of a late 1940s childhood in L.A.’s Echo Park. His buddy Danny Trejo discusses DeJoria’s Greek heritage and laughs that it took a long time for DeJoria to understand he wasn’t Hispanic. Another childhood pal, singer and actress Michelle Phillips, remembers how she and J.P. were once singled out by a grade-school teacher who said “These two will never amount to anything.”
J.P. grew up in a circumstance in which military service offered opportunities to learn not just discipline but specific skills, and his time in the Navy is recalled as productive and instructive. It also instilled him with a love of the sea, which he applied, once he became a multi-millionaire, to aggressive conservation and anti-poaching charities. Out of the Navy, he discovered he had great salesmanship skills. He applied them vigorously, to the extent that he got fired from several sales jobs for being too good. (This sounds improbable, I know, but as told by J.P. it makes complete sense.) A meeting with the influential stylist Paul Mitchell led to a go-for-broke attempt to conceive and market a viable line of hair-care products. It succeeded beyond each of their wildest dreams.
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