Word: diller
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...media minds of his generation, a man who built the Fox Network, mentored both Michael Eisner and Jeffrey Katzenberg, and brought the world Saturday Night Fever and The Simpsons--for a man who has accomplished all that and made himself hundreds of millions of dollars in the process, Barry Diller sure acts as if he has something left to prove...
...perplexed the entertainment industry by voluntarily resigning the chairmanship of 20th Century Fox, he could today be running any number of media conglomerates or resting on his laurels with a fat production deal somewhere--the traditional way in which Hollywood takes care of its own. Instead, at 54, Diller has chosen to put his credibility on the line and build his very own empire more or less from scratch. "This is either a worthwhile or worthless proving ground," he says, though it is not quite self-evident, of his efforts to cobble together a new broadcast TV network from...
...Internet Shopping Network, an online retailer. He claims to despise hype and yet is manifestly adept at its use. He thinks Beavis and Butt-head are, as he once told Rolling Stone, "breathtakingly horrible. But great. No, not great. Good." One might be tempted to say that Diller embraces contradiction with Zen-like equanimity, although equanimity is probably not a strong suit in someone famous for screaming at underlings and hurling bric-a-brac during meetings. One might also be tempted to say that Diller doesn't like to have things just one way when he can have them more...
During an interview at the midtown apartment that serves as his Manhattan pied-a-terre, Diller is restless even in repose. His is a singular physical presence, his fine-boned body at odds with his rock of a head and a gap-toothed grin that is both wary and omnivorous (actually, he looks a lot like David Letterman minus the hair). As Diller talks, he twists himself into ligament-straining positions on the couch. He fidgets with his socks, gets up again and again to fiddle with the thermostat--it's as if he can't help exuding nervous energy...
...Diller almost owned Paramount, but in 1994 it slipped away. He nearly won control of CBS, but he lost that too in an abortive bid later that same year. This is what he does own, bought in quick succession last summer and fall: 1) Silver King Communications, whose main assets are 12 TV stations that comparatively few people want to watch; 2) Savoy Pictures, an independent film studio known for producing movies (Last of the Dogmen, for example) that comparatively few people went to see but a studio that owns considerable cash and a quartet of television stations...