YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – Larry Jones, a former national television executive now blazing a path into augmented reality, had some extra time in his schedule.
He is using it to help the Youngstown museum that he has loved since he was a child.
The Austintown native is serving as interim executive director of The Butler Institute of American Art for the first half of this year. He has been a trustee of the museum for three years.
As interim director, Jones is overseeing day-to-day operation of the museum and also helping to find its next leader – the replacement for Louis Zona, whose 44-year stint ended in December.
Jones was president of the TV Land cable channel for 17 years and the producer of hundreds of sitcoms, including “Hot in Cleveland.”
Currently, he is co-owner of Adlar AR, a Los Angeles-based company that is taking art to a new level through digital technology.
Adlar AR merges high-quality physical prints of artworks with augmented reality technology. Users can scan artwork via a mobile app to trigger 3D animation and other digital enhancements.
The app can also be used to make multidimensional video that “moves” with the user’s point of view as it tells a story.
It’s a blend of two things that Jones knows and loves: visual art and entertainment.
Before Adlar, Jones was a co-founder of Blackthorn Media, which made virtual reality apps. He no longer is affiliated with Blackthorn.
Both companies are ahead of their time.
But Jones has a knack for setting future goals and accomplishing them. He’s been making that happen since he was a teenager.
The 65-year-old knew he wanted a career in the producing end of the entertainment business while he was still attending Fitch High School. He still credits Ken Carano, his speech team instructor at Fitch, for building his public speaking skills.
After graduating from Fitch in 1979, he enrolled at The Ohio State University to earn a business degree.
After graduating, Jones hurried to New York – it was either going to be there or Los Angeles, and he had a friend in New York who let him crash at his apartment – to launch a career.
Starting His Career
“It was always, I mean always, my original plan to be in entertainment,” Jones said. “I didn’t have a strong feeling of whether or not I wanted to be in television or if I wanted to be in film. At the time, when I was at Ohio State, I didn’t really understand or see the distinction between the two. I knew I just wanted to be in entertainment and I wanted to be a producer.”
His plan was to find work at a New York advertising agency with entertainment clients and then get assigned to one of those accounts.
That eventually happened, but it took a while.
“My goal was to get onto a movie account,” Jones said. “But when I got there, what did I get? Scott toilet paper, Sunlight dishwashing liquid and DeKuyper schnapps.”
After three years, he got a break when he landed a job with a firm that handled product placement in movies.
His career took a major step forward in 1988 when he was hired by Viacom, an entertainment giant at the time, to work on its new Nick at Night channel.
It was the big payoff that rewarded his relentless quest to get the job he wanted, and not just a pay raise.
“I always tell young people: If you know what you want to do, just go after that,” Jones said. “It can’t be about the money. Every single job I took during that period, I got a pay cut every single time. I got paid less. And the reason, to some extent, was that each time I was going into a little bit more glamorous business than working on toilet paper.”
The folks who hire know these jobs are in high demand, he said.
“They will get 1,000 resumes for 20 positions,” Jones said. “They can take the best people and pay them nothing.”
Because of his humble background growing up in Austintown, he adjusted to the pay decreases.
“I didn’t come from money,” he said. “I didn’t have money. My dad and grandpa were chauffeurs. I lived in the house at the trailer park that my parents managed [Central Trailer Park on Mahoning Avenue].” Jones’ grandparents owned the park – now part of Greenwood Chevrolet – before his father took over.
“I didn’t have money, so I just adjusted my lifestyle,” Jones said. “I didn’t live in a very glamorous apartment, and I ate pizza and rice and potatoes for years. I was making no money, but I was working in a glamorous job.”
The Viacom Years
Jones would make his way to the top of the ladder during his 27-year run at Viacom. The company’s portfolio of brands at the time included MTV, Nickelodeon, Comedy Central, BET, VH1, CMT and TV Land. Viacom merged with CBS in 2019.
“I was the first employee ever to be hired to work exclusively for Nick at Night,” he said. Nick at Night is Nickelodeon’s alternate identity from 8 p.m. to 6 a.m., airing sitcom reruns for an adult audience.
In 1998, Jones was named president of Viacom’s new TV Land channel, which he helped launch.
TV Land played off the popularity that Nick at Night had developed.
“Back then, we only had 37 cable channels, so the competition wasn’t nearly as much,” he said. “We were the only game in town as far as showing classic TV shows on Nick at Night. But we knew that there were so many other classic TV shows out there, and we couldn’t show them all. So we decided to launch a 24-hour network. It was a time when cable systems were looking for new programming, because they were going to, like, 87 channels.”
Jones was president of both TV Land and Nick at Night for 17 years. He began introducing original sitcoms to TV Land, serving as the producer for each one.
A producer for a TV show is the ultimate boss of the production, he explained, with authority over hiring, firing, budget and final creative output.
“I was responsible for $500 million in revenue,” he said. “I operated the company most of the time at a 55% gross margin. It was an amazing cash machine that produced over 500 half-hour sitcoms, original sitcoms, including ‘Hot in Cleveland,’ which was my nod to Ohio.”
The stars of “Hot in Cleveland” were already famous because of their work on earlier sitcoms. Jones repeated the tactic in launching other successful sitcoms.
“We figured, if you came to TV Land to watch ‘Golden Girls,’ why not get Betty White again in one of our new shows? It was a natural segue from the classic show to a new show that felt like a classic show.”
Jones oversaw a staff of hundreds of people at TV Land.
“It was a great ride,” he said. “We had a ton of fun and met a lot of people, made a lot of stuff. And then Netflix came along, and they let people program their own shows.”
Netflix and other streaming outlets allow viewers to watch a show whenever they want – a massive change from the scheduled air times that were the norm. It wasn’t good news for some cable channels.
“If [viewers] can watch whatever they want, whenever they want, they don’t really need a channel programming to them,” Jones said. “So that was the beginning of the change.”
With this upheaval underway and a corporate restructuring being rumored, Jones resigned from TV Land and Viacom in 2015. He had been with the company for 28 years.
Growing Up in the Valley
Jones is a serious art collector with a lifelong appreciation for The Butler. He was approximately 10 years old when he first visited the museum.
His family came to Youngstown in 1912, when his paternal grandparents moved into a home on Wick Avenue a few blocks from The Butler.
His grandfather was a chauffeur for a wealthy banker – a job his father would later take over. Jones occasionally rode along with his father in the limousine, and the two would stop at The Butler during the downtime between trips.
His connection to The Butler came full circle three years ago, when he was named a trustee. It all happened because of his friendship with the late Al Bright, who was one of Youngstown’s most revered artists.
“Al and I were pretty close, and I collect his art,” Jones said. “He introduced me to Lou Zona about 14 or 15 years ago. Al loved Lou, and I loved Lou and stayed in touch with him over the years.”
Bright died in 2019.
Butler trustee Virginia D. Banks – a Youngstown-based doctor who had been married to Bright – cleared the way for Jones to become a trustee.
She recalled the day when she and Bright were first contacted by him.
“He called out of the blue to ask about buying one of Al’s artworks,” she said. “He said, ‘My name is Larry Jones and I own one of your artworks, and I would like to buy another one.’”
About four years ago, Jones asked Banks how he could get more involved with The Butler. She asked him if he would like to become a trustee and – after he said yes – introduced him to the board, which approved him.
Banks could always sense the connection Jones has for The Butler. She walked through it with him one day after he took over as interim director and asked if this was his dream job.
“He turned to me and said ‘Yes.’ He has worked with $500 million budgets, ran TV Land and spent time with all the Hollywood greats, but his dream job is coming back and being the interim director of this museum,” Banks said. “I think that speaks volumes.”
Today’s Task
Jones has taken over the top spot – albeit temporarily – on the heels of an icon.
Former director Zona is renowned for growing The Butler into a place of global significance. He is now director emeritus of the museum.
“It’s hard coming in on the shoulders of Lou Zona,” Banks acknowledged. “Anybody [who takes the executive director position] in the near future is going to be standing on his shoulders.”
The trustees have hired an outside search firm to seek candidates. The firm has been instructed to find applicants who will continue the values and tenets that Zona instilled, Banks said.
Jones and his own search committee will then scour the top selections and submit their choice to the trustees board for final approval.
To guide the museum through this critical period, Jones commutes between his New York home and Youngstown with two-week stretches in each city. His duties with Adlar AE do not require all of his time, but he knows some new project could arise in the future that will.
“When people ask me, ‘Are you retired?’ I say, ‘I’m not retired. I’m just not working right now.’ It’s just the way I feel. I didn’t want to retire, and when this [Butler] opportunity came up, I had the time to do it. I love this museum and I love art. Being able to walk around looking at this place is kind of ridiculous. And I love managing people. All of these things made sense, and The Butler needed help. As a board member, I said I can step in and help out.”
Pictured at top: Former television executive and producer Larry Jones is serving as interim director of The Butler Institute of American Art. He is pictured in the museum next to the painting “Riverbank Steel Mills” made by his friend, the late Al Bright.