Viacom’s aging lion, Sumner Redstone, is anything but embarrassed by his kooky voice mail that seemingly offered to bribe a journalist to out the confidential sources who exposed Redstone’s obsession with unknown girl-band the Electric Barbarellas, sources said.
“Sumner wants to be consequential. Sumner is really proud of what he did,” a source close to Viacom tells The Post’s Claire Atkinson.
“This guy is loving it, loving the fact it’s on the ‘Today’ show. He likes people to know he’s still alive,” the source said of the twice-divorced, 87-year-old mogul. Redstone offered Daily Beast reporter Peter Lauria a “reward” for betraying the tipster who dissed a proposed MTV reality show for the Barbarellas.
But other Viacom insiders are shocked that the object of Redstone’s attention, Barbarella songstress Heather Naylor, apparently was showered with insider stock options when she was a lowly MTV assistant.
That’s in addition to the $500,000 Redstone reportedly blew shuttling the California blonde back and forth to New York in a futile attempt to land her a record deal.
“As someone who worked at MTV Networks for 20 years, it is unheard of for a production assistant, who was most likely a freelancer, to be given benefits of any kind, let alone stock,” another source said. “It sounds very weird.”
Indeed, Naylor sold 4,950 shares for $157,000 in March of this year, records show.
Reached by telephone yesterday, Naylor hung up. Viacom spokesman Carl Folta had no comment.
Meanwhile, Naylor pal and sometime musical collaborator Melyssa Marie had a wild party last night in Los Angeles with other Barbarella girls, and posted pictures on Twitter of them guzzling booze with the caption “Barbarellas like it crazy!”