The ongoing discourse surrounding whether we should separate an artist's creative output from their personal actions has long been a source of heated debate. With Leonard Cohen, the conversation takes on a more layered complexity. Cohen, celebrated globally as a poet, singer, and songwriter, has left an indelible mark on music and literature. But behind the magnetic, introspective facade lies a history of alleged deceit, manipulation, and financial misconduct.
The accounts provided by those who knew Cohen intimately depict a man whose public charm and wisdom masked a history of manipulative and self-serving behavior, undermining the myth of his compassionate and enlightened character. It is a tale of betrayal, control, and a ruthless streak hidden behind a carefully curated persona.
Steven Machat's Perspective
Steven Machat, the son of Cohen's original manager Marty Machat, has openly questioned Cohen's ethics. In his book Gods, Gangsters & Honour, Machat details the business relationship between his father and Cohen. He writes:
"Leonard was desperate to get rid of his two managers, Judy Berger and Mary Martin, who he believed had stolen the rights to his songs and records early on in his career. Even back then, Cohen was convinced that women were ripping him off. He signed an agreement, and when he wanted to get rid of the contract, he accused everyone of ripping him off. You could say it became repeat behaviour."
Machat further describes how his father set up Stranger Music for Cohen and agreed to manage him for 15% of his earnings, as well as a 15% share in Stranger Music. The intention behind the company was twofold: to maintain ownership of Cohen's copyrights and to minimize his exposure to American tax liabilities. Machat reflects on Cohen's duality:
"I’ve no problem with people trying to avoid tax, but as the years have passed, I couldn’t help but smile at the apparent contradiction between Leonard’s public persona and his private business arrangements. This was a supposedly devout Buddhist with no interest in material possessions, who was all the same happy to put his trust in business managers and companies he created with his knowledge and consent whose sole aim was to minimize tax liability."
Machat claims that after the sale of Stranger Music, Cohen never provided him with his share, and Cohen had control over Machat's father, despite pretending otherwise. He states:
"Far from being the poet of the spirits, Leonard was a hustler using Buddhism as a facade."
This deception extended even to bearer bonds, unregistered and used to conceal ownership, that mysteriously vanished from Marty Machat's office after his death. Machat also recounts:
"Do you know what happened to the $400,000 worth of bearer bonds in my father’s office? Bearer bonds are just unregistered bonds or paper money that are used to conceal ownership and, with it, tax liabilities. Cristini told me (who knows if this is true?) that he had found the bonds in my father’s office hours after he had died but the next day they disappeared. Cohen denied any knowledge of these bonds. I was unsure if they existed or were part of my father’s schemes cooked up to conceal Leonard’s money."
Machat also recalls an uncomfortable encounter with Cohen, reflecting on Cohen's betrayal:
"The next time I would see Leonard... We’d just seen The Hand That Rocks The Cradle where Rebecca De Mornay plays the psychopathic nanny who stalks this family. Who should walk along but Cohen, who was holding hands with DeMornay, his girlfriend at the time. Cohen was extremely uncomfortable because he knew he had stolen from me and it was clear he couldn’t get away quick enough."
Ann Diamond's Testimony
Ann Diamond, a writer who knew Leonard Cohen personally for decades, also provides insights into his manipulative behavior and the negative impact he had on those around him. In her declaration, she describes their relationship:
"I met Leonard Cohen through a mutual acquaintance in Montreal in November 1977, when I was 26 and he was 43. He was still married, but legally separated, from his wife Suzanne with whom he had two children. Leonard Cohen was known as a ladies’ man around our neighbourhood of Montreal, but he had just brought out a new record, Death of a Ladies’ Man (with Phil Spector) and a book of poems (Death of a Lady’s Man) which seemed to send a message he was turning over a new leaf."
Diamond reflects on the control Cohen exerted over people in his life and how he manipulated their perceptions:
"I realized he had a higher-than-average capacity to deceive people, even those he called ‘friends.’ Perhaps he liked pandering to people’s fantasies, or maybe he liked creating chaos. Or maybe this was his way of controlling people by divide-and-rule."
She also spoke about the professional and personal damage Cohen caused to both her and Kelley Lynch:
"When we ‘mutinied’ he used his personal power, oratorical skills and media contacts to damage us professionally and personally. Because Lynch’s side of the story had been ignored in the media, I ended up writing an account (‘Whatever Happened to Kelley Lynch’) which I posted on my blog in August 2008. Two weeks later I received a letter from Robert Kory demanding I take down the blog or be sued for libel."
Diamond also points to Cohen's troubling behavior concerning his daughter Lorca:
"In summer 1995, Freda Guttman, who had been Leonard’s first girlfriend when they were both teenagers, stopped me in the street and asked point-blank if I thought Leonard had ‘harmed’ his daughter from the age of four, as Lorca had told her friends. Based on things I had witnessed over 8 years, I thought it was possible."
Ann Diamond's declaration reveals the extent to which Cohen's manipulative tactics affected people both personally and professionally. She observed his capacity to use others as pawns and destroy those who dared to challenge his authority:
"Those who mutiny, like Kelley Lynch and me, receive the opposite treatment... I have learned the hard way that Leonard Cohen is a very gifted and skilled fabricator who does not back down even when confronted with evidence of his lying. His manipulative skills are exceptional and almost suggest early training in psychological warfare, including strategies such as putting people in 'double-bind' situations so they will discredit themselves."
Kelley Lynch's Struggle After Uncovering Fraud
Kelley Lynch's relationship with Leonard Cohen began to unravel when her new accountant discovered discrepancies and fraud in every Cohen-related corporate entity. Lynch, who had been deeply aware of Cohen's business and financial dealings, was alarmed by the fraudulent activities that were uncovered by her legal and tax professionals, which included tax liabilities, improper distributions, Cohen's own loans taken from corporate accounts without repayment, as well as substantial misappropriations from these accounts.
When Lynch began asking questions and attempting to address the fraudulent activities, she quickly found herself on the receiving end of Cohen's wrath. Cohen, along with his lawyers and publicists, went to extraordinary lengths to demonize and destroy her reputation. The media portrayed Lynch as an embezzler who had stolen millions from Cohen's retirement fund, ignoring her side of the story, as well as evidence, entirely. Cohen leveraged his extensive network of media contacts and lawyers, including Robert Kory, to file lawsuits and initiate a smear campaign against her.
The extent of Cohen's efforts to discredit Lynch was staggering. She faced a highly publicized lawsuit in which she was accused of stealing from Cohen—an accusation that led to her losing her home, custody of her son, and her career in the entertainment industry. Lynch was also subjected to multiple incidents involving the celebrity friendly police, including an unwarranted SWAT raid on her home, which left her further marginalized. Cohen's actions and the coordinated attacks by his legal team, which included threats, defamation, and financial ruin, painted a picture of a man willing to use all available means to silence and destroy someone who had become inconvenient.
Despite Cohen's attempts to portray Lynch as mentally unstable and dishonest, her account reveals an intelligent and capable businesswoman—someone Cohen once publicly described as a “blessing” to him and his family—who faced relentless and cruel persecution. Cohen employed highly vile and misogynistic tactics, falsely claiming that Lynch was his ex-lover, despite never discussing her in that context in interviews where he openly spoke of other relationships. He also took offensive measures to preemptively confront allegations of his inappropriate behavior towards her over the years. Lynch's story is one of resilience and courage, offering a stark contrast to the carefully curated public persona of Cohen as a wise and benevolent figure.
Cohen and his lawyer, Robert Kory, went to shocking lengths to discredit Kelley Lynch, including attempting to stir up tensions with the father of her younger son. In an extraordinary move, they visited the father's office and blatantly lied, claiming that Lynch had an affair with Oliver Stone. Nothing could be further from the truth. Stone himself has publicly confirmed that he and Kelley Lynch were never "lovers," directly contradicting Cohen's claims.
Lynch has consistently and vehemently challenged these misogynistic lies, pointing out Cohen's pattern of using smear tactics against women who stood up to him. These deliberate actions by Cohen and Kory were not only aimed at damaging Lynch's personal relationships but were part of a broader strategy to undermine her credibility and shift the focus away from Cohen's own misconduct.
Such behavior illustrates the lengths to which powerful figures will go to protect themselves, using deceit to manipulate the narrative at the expense of others.
A Carefully Curated Public Image
Leonard Cohen's public image was one of introspective wisdom, of a man who had experienced great depths of love, loss, and existential contemplation. He was the "poet of the spirits"—a persona he cultivated through his songs, interviews, and public appearances. Cohen spoke of his time in Cuba during the revolution, claiming to have been detained by Castro's forces. He also spoke of his intentions to join the Israeli forces as a paratrooper during the Yom Kippur War and recounted his intimate moments with Janis Joplin at the Chelsea Hotel, never mentioning how he treated other women in his life.
Cohen’s willingness to exploit his interactions with other artists, particularly women, is further highlighted in his references to Janis Joplin. Despite his romanticized version of their supposed relationship, Joplin herself had a starkly different take on the experience. In a candid interview, she described her encounters with Cohen as deeply disappointing, saying, "It was really heavy, like a slam-in-the-face; it happened twice. Jim Morrison and Leonard Cohen. And it’s strange ’cause they were the only two that I can think of, like prominent people, that I tried to... without really liking them up front, just because I knew who they were and wanted to know them. And then they both gave me nothing." Joplin’s words underscore Cohen's tendency to rewrite events in ways that glorified his experiences while disregarding the real impact on others, particularly women who were left feeling exploited and empty after his attention had faded.
These tales, highly embellished and often portrayed as "good rock 'n roll" stories, were part of his carefully managed narrative. He frequently told individuals like Ann Diamond about his participation in the CIA's MK Ultra, and dazzled Kelley Lynch with anecdotes about being a CIA recon operative during the Bay of Pigs, or simply "hanging out with junkies and hookers." In one letter to his publisher Jack McClelland, Cohen even wrote that his adventures in Cuba could provide good publicity for his next book project.
Cohen's ability to present himself as a revolutionary figure—a poet willing to die by firing squad like García Lorca—only further solidified his enigmatic appeal. He spoke of being in psychologically disturbed states, like attempting to start a riot at a concert in Israel while on LSD, adding a layer of complexity to his public persona. His audience bought into this image, as well as into his relatable struggles with mental health.
Leonard Cohen was well known for his compelling storytelling, and he often recounted wild tales from his days in the music industry—some of which took on an almost mythical status over the years. Among these was the infamous gun incident allegedly involving Phil Spector, a legendary producer known for his eccentric and sometimes dangerous behavior. Cohen offered countless contradictory versions of the story, each one more embellished than the last, which only added to its allure. In one account, Spector pointed a gun at Cohen while telling him he loved him, a bizarre moment that Cohen recounted with a mix of humor and detachment. Other times, Cohen portrayed himself as the unflinching protagonist in a chaotic scene, surrounded by armed bodyguards and the erratic Spector. The varying narratives only deepened the sense of mystery around the incident, making it difficult to discern fact from fiction. These stories became part of Cohen's rock and roll legend—a reflection of the unpredictable, surreal nature of the music industry during its most tumultuous era. This is also a common way celebrities advance their careers and how media outlets drive narratives using sensational soundbites that sell.
The Dark Side of the Legend
The question of separating the art from the artist becomes even more pressing when we consider Leonard Cohen’s attempts to manipulate those closest to him. His public narrative and the stories he told not only served to enhance his image but also to deflect from the more troubling aspects of his behavior. Behind the poetic lyrics and soulful melodies was a man who left a wake of personal destruction—betraying friends, exploiting associates, and damaging lives.
It wasn't just Kelley Lynch who suffered. Ann Diamond, who once considered Cohen a mentor, endured years of professional setbacks due to Cohen's influence. Steven Machat, too, was financially impacted and saw his father defamed, possibly as a means for Cohen to divert attention from ongoing issues related to offshore accounts and financial misconduct. As Diamond noted:
"His persuasive gifts and charm are well-known and can be hard to resist... Once he has decided you are too 'mutinous' and a potential future threat, he becomes ruthless and will go to great lengths to see you neutralized and destroyed."
A Complicated Legacy
Leonard Cohen's body of work will likely continue to resonate with audiences for generations to come. His songs are profound, often deeply moving, and speak to the human condition in a way few others can. But we must also look at the destruction Cohen caused to people's lives and careers—including Kelley Lynch, Ann Diamond, and even Steven Machat—financially and through defamation.
Cohen worked closely with a bevy of journalists, authors, and biographers who essentially served as awe-inspired groupies who sanitized and shaped his image while assisting Cohen in crafting a narrative that would destroy Kelley Lynch's reputation and career. Many of these individuals, following Cohen's death, continued their libelous conduct towards Lynch—as well as Ann Diamond, Steven Machat, and, strangely enough, even his daughter Lorca (who was referred to disgracefully as a “disgruntled woman”). These figures, who helped sanitize and reinforce Cohen's public image, have now benefitted from their association with him by selling books and launching other projects for profit.
The myth of Leonard Cohen as a humble, spiritual figure has been significantly tarnished by the accounts of those who knew him behind the scenes. These testimonies reveal a man capable of manipulation, dishonesty, and calculated cruelty—traits that stand in stark contrast to his public persona. It leaves us with the uncomfortable truth that the man behind the art was far more complex—and far less benevolent—than the legend we were given. The reality of Cohen's nature is a reminder that the image crafted for public consumption often conceals a much darker truth beneath the surface. His story exemplifies how misconduct by Hollywood figures often goes unchecked, aided by armies of lawyers, accountants, advisers, and publicity firms who enable such behavior. In Kelley Lynch's case, Cohen was even shielded by local government actors, including the Los Angeles City Attorney, the Los Angeles District Attorney, and the LAPD's Threat Management Unit dedicated to celebrities.
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