Word: diller
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Some would say he was also a very good predator. Stories of Diller's temper and hauteur still raise hackles around many a Hollywood campfire. It's said that Diller, furious at Fox programmer Stephen Chao, threw a videotape past Chao, making a dent in the wall; Chao framed the dent. Thus does Diller, whose stare can go through you like a power drill, inspire passions and animosities. Says a studio executive: "People who have worked for Barry and then escaped have a secret handshake. They consider themselves lucky survivors, like the Schindler Jews...
That harsh phrase has been used before about Diller, and all it does is add the glamour of menace to his mystique. No question that this hard-driving entrepreneur has an intimidating manner and visage ("He looks like his head is meant only to cover his brain," says one former Fox executive). But he $ wouldn't have succeeded just by being a slick shark among the entertainment industry's countless barracudas. He made his reputation by making movies and TV shows, by making things happen, by making money for men with more money...
...after moving from broadcast TV to cable, Diller never quite answered one question posed by the ordinary viewers: Can you turn QVC's programming into something approaching mainstream entertainment? After two years -- about the time it took for Diller to start up Fox's first night of network programming -- QVC was still an electronic flea market, selling flashy bracelets one moment and beanbag chairs the next. Clearly, most of Diller's creative energies were directed elsewhere. "When Barry went to QVC," says a business colleague, "he saw this mainly as the platform to do a big, transforming acquisition...
...Diller is close to it, and that could create some rancor among QVC shareholders. As the business colleague notes, "They could say, 'Hey, you worked on this for a year and a half, and all you did was get me five bucks over what it was worth when you came in, and this half of what it was worth a year...
Whatever the obstacles, the CBS-QVC merger could be a quick, happy fix for two media barons under pressure. Diller gets to make a network grow into a giant of cable, broadcasting and only he knows what else (theatrical movies? video games? TV serials for home shoppers?). And CBS gets Diller. In essence, to secure an heir, Tisch bought a company. And a legacy. "Larry gets to walk out," says the TV-industry executive, "not as a failure, but as someone who took the company and turned it around. Now he's a winner: he's probably $400 million ahead...