Word: eisner
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This is not a contract dispute so much as a workplace divorce. Katzenberg and Eisner go back years, first at Paramount Pictures and then at Disney, where they presided over one of the most spectacular turnarounds in Hollywood history. But after 10 very good years, bad things started to happen. Frank Wells, Disney's charismatic No. 2 man, was killed in an April 1994 helicopter crash. Four months later, Eisner required emergency bypass surgery. To Katzenberg this seemed a logical time for his own advancement. He lobbied strenuously for the Wells...
...Eisner had other plans. One August morning, he handed Katzenberg a press release that was about to be distributed. It mentioned, in passing, that Katzenberg would be leaving the company. Katzenberg went on to launch DreamWorks in partnership with Steven Spielberg and music mogul David Geffen. Katzenberg was the only one who had to mortgage himself to put up the $33 million seed money. In these circumstances, the lawsuit--for which his attorneys had logged 9,000 expensive hours as of September--has proved to be an especially big pain in the wallet...
Though the parties are bound by a gag order, the fight has raged in the press for months. Katzenberg's side went after a draft of Eisner's autobiography, which Eisner had intended to publish this fall but postponed because of the trial. The Katzenberg camp let it be known that there were potentially embarrassing tidbits in the book. The Katzenbergers also hinted that Disney had conducted some sort of conspiracy to shortchange their man. And in one of those unaccountable leaks, it was reported that Katzenberg had prevailed in a couple of mock trials. An insider maintains that...
Meanwhile Eisner's team says that if juries are not predisposed to dislike Katzenberg, it is only because they don't know him well enough. The Disney side threatened to make the introductions. A Disney source suggested that Katzenberg would suffer when the company highlights his poor record in live-action movies--a $56 million loss on Billy Bathgate, for instance. The company has also suggested that Katzenberg grabbed too much credit for animation successes...
Given the stakes, a settlement makes sense, though it would be awkward for Eisner to pay Katzenberg a vast sum in the wake of shareholder anger over the $130 million or so that Disney dealt to Michael Ovitz after firing him as president last December. Conversely, the Ovitz settlement ensures that Katzenberg's sights are set high: Why should Katzenberg take less for 10 successful years than Ovitz got for 14 unimpressive months? If a deal is made, three things seem certain. One: the terms will be sealed. Two: the amount will be leaked to the press--by both sides...