Word: eisner
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...Disney touch could become even more apparent by next fall. The network is planning to launch a two-hour Disney family movie on Saturday nights, with Disney chairman Michael Eisner as the probable host. Six of the 29 pilots that ABC is considering for next season come from the Disney studio--a not uncommon bit of corporate synergy now that networks are allowed to own their own programs (and now that studios like Warner Bros. and 20th Century Fox own their own networks), but one that has nevertheless raised fears among other Hollywood studios that they will eventually be shut...
...Chairman Eisner and his No. 2 executive, former Creative Artists Agency chief and legendary dealmaker Michael Ovitz, have so far kept a low public profile and declined all interviews. But their hands have been evident in a number of major moves since the merger. One of Ovitz's former colleagues at CAA, Michael Rosenfeld, has been hired as an entertainment-division senior vice president, and more personnel shake-ups are expected, particularly after a disappointing season in which ABC fell to a weak No. 2 in the ratings--and third in the important February sweeps, the same month the merger...
...course, if Diller wanted to do things the easy or obvious way he could have; he reputedly turned down offers in the past year from both Edgar Bronfman Jr. (to run MCA Universal) and Michael Eisner (to join him as No. 2 man at Disney). "Barry has had these unbelievable silver trays offered to him, and he's always said no," says his best friend, designer Diane Von Furstenberg. Why no? "He's not a pig," she explains. "It's not about greed with him. It's ambition, it's vision, and that makes him different and makes...
...vituperative argument with Leonard Goldberg, then a vice president at ABC. The older man, impressed with Diller's "willfulness"--Diller's word (again)--eventually offered him a job at the network. There he helped invent the mini-series, popularized TV movies and had the perspicacity to hire young Michael Eisner away from his job as a CBS children's programmer...
...Diller was named CEO of Paramount Pictures. With Eisner, whom he installed as president, Diller made it the most profitable Hollywood studio, year in and year out. He was considered a lock for the chairmanship of Gulf & Western, Paramount's parent company. Then he lost a power struggle and jumped ship for 20th Century Fox in 1984. His reason for subsequently leaving Fox in 1992 was straightforward: "It's not mine," he said at the time. "I'm both young enough and old enough to want to own my own store ... It's the one thing I haven't done...