A planned collaboration between late night host Jimmy Fallon and powerful entertainment executive Tommy Mottola to launch a branded line of pasta sauces is now kaput as the entertainment mogul’s name is being discovered all over the Epstein Files, exposing his close relationship with the late financier and convicted sex offender and trafficker.
Fallon and Mottola have been close friends for years, often spotted palling around New York together for years, frequently enjoying Italian-American dishes at East Harlem mainstay Rao’s. They’ve reportedly even entertained the crowd there, with the Saturday Night Live alum and the industry starmaker, who launched the careers of diva icons Mariah Carey and Celine Dion, performing impromptu a capella songs for dinner-goers. Mottola has also appeared as a guest on Fallon’s show to promote his projects.
Now, another longtime friendship of Mottola’s has torpedoed their plans to go into business together. The plan for the line of sauces that the two pals planned to produce was in the early development stages, according to two people familiar with the matter who spoke with The Hollywood Reporter, and may have been targeted for as late as 2027. But one source told THR that their planned venture is definitely not moving forward as the ongoing Epstein story draws in Mottola and questions arise about his friendship with the convicted sex offender who died while behind bars as he was facing deeply serious federal sex trafficking charges in 2019.
Page Six first reported the story on Thursday, stating that the project was on “pause,” with an anonymous source close to the sauce project stating, “Nobody wants to be within 50 feet of anyone in the Epstein files.”
The caches of documents in the Epstein files — 300 gigabytes of documents, emails, images and videos detailing his criminal activities — have been released after the Justice Department was compelled by a Congressional Act to make the files available to the public. The releases have not only exposed Epstein and given a window into his world and how he operated, but implicated several high-profile individuals by association, as journalists and members of the public can easily search communications, including emails, sent from and to the late billionaire.
Mottola’s association with Epstein is laid out in around 600 of the documents that the Department of Justice has so far released. A picture of their friendship is emerging, showing that from 2010 until his death nine years later, the two men were in close contact on several matters, including travel arrangements that involved Mottola’s requests for helicopter rentals in 2014, emails around the time of the emergence of the #MeToo movement in 2017 where Mottola allegedly discussed needing to “shut up and lay low,” and in helping Epstein find a private detective as his many secrets were threatened following a Miami Herald expose on his private island.
The files also show Mottola making dozens of calls and visits to Epstein’s properties in Manhattan and Paris. The majority of these took place between 2006 and 2008 as Epstein was already serving time for soliciting minors following his first arrest.
Powerful men whose names appear in the tell-tale files are now facing a reckoning, with several on the brink of losing their careers and companies as the backlash rips across. Casey Wasserman, the powerhouse agent at the helm of Wasserman Media Group, is being called on by several music artists to step down from his position after the Epstein files showed a flirtatious relationship with Epstein’s sidekick and ex-girlfriend, Ghilaine Maxwell, who is serving 20 years in prison for her role procuring underage girls for him over several years. Recording artist Chappell Roan is the biggest name to leave Wasserman following the revelation.
Mottola, who was married to Carey for five years in the 1990s, is the chairman of Mottola Media Group, which, since its founding after he left his job as CEO of Sony Music Group, has produced theater, TV and film projects. He’s also the co-founder of Latin-focused entertainment and media company Ntertain Studios and a founder of representation firm Range Media Partners. So far, the sauce project with Fallon is the only repercussion Mottola has seen since the release of the Epstein files, and just how close he was with the social pariah has become clear.
Representatives for both Fallon and Mottola declined to speak on the record with The Hollywood Reporter regarding the status of their sauce brand.
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