Word: diller
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Barry Diller is sitting at his regular booth at the heart of the Four Seasons grillroom, basking in attention. Even in the headiest of Manhattan's power lunchrooms, Diller, with his bullethead and designer-mogul aura, manages to draw a crowd. Henry Kissinger nuzzles onto his banquette for a brief chat; other members of the business and media elite stop to pay homage. To each, Diller offers a greeting or a quip, then gets back to his enthusiasm of the moment. He is talking about home shopping...
Home shopping? Is this Barry Diller, the manic madman who has fascinated and frightened Hollywood for more than two decades? The charismatic celebrity addicted to power and partying with people who appear boldfaced in Women's Wear Daily social columns? And why is he spending three days a week in a sprawling office park in the exurbs of Philadelphia, surrounded by wildlife photos and a bank of nine video screens? "Home shopping is the very beginning of a whole new world," he says, as he bounds around his second-floor office while assistants teach him about things like product markups...
...Barry Diller inspecting hubcaps: it's a sight strange enough to cause a pileup of rubberneckers on the Santa Monica Freeway. Last February he resigned from one of Hollywood's most powerful posts -- chairman of 20th Century Fox and mastermind of the Fox network -- because he wanted to run his own company rather than continue as a hired hand in Rupert Murdoch's media empire. Hollywood assumed he would return as the head of another studio or perhaps a network, and he did have some exploratory discussions about buying NBC. But when he announced his new venture in early December...
When BARRY DILLER quit last fall as chairman of Fox, where he ran the film studio as well as the television network, he said he wanted to own something. Something sizable. Apparently he has been trying to buy the NBC television network from GE. The deal fizzled this summer, but Diller has told friends that "a window of opportunity" remains for the revised proposal he is preparing...
SHOW BUSINESS Mogul Barry Diller quits while he's ahead...