Word: ovitz
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1990-1999
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...interested in business while he was playing ball. "I don't know everything, but I get caught up on what I don't know." He's got some fancy tutoring too. Among those who help him brush up on balance-sheet analysis is former Walt Disney Co. president Michael Ovitz, a close friend. Adds Lombard: "Earvin is a tremendous businessman. He has the same level of vision that he had on the court and the same control in knowing when to pull the trigger and when...
...While Ovitz is unlikely to settle for a mere job, investment banker Herbert Allen, head of Allen and Co., has told inquiring moguls that he thinks Ovitz would have no trouble raising money to acquire a midsize company--and Allen's clearly a guy who would know--though no obvious candidate springs to mind. And Gordon Crawford of the Capital Group, which controls major stakes in Disney and Time Warner, says he would consider investing in an Ovitz venture. After all, he observes, "the guy was very successful in one career." He's referring, of course, to Ovitz's work...
Meanwhile, Ovitz has been upgrading his real estate portfolio. Even as the ax was poised at Disney, he sewed up the purchase of the Dancing Bear Ranch in Aspen for $5.5 million. The 500-plus acres are near Disney chairman Michael Eisner's home, although presumably they won't be vacationing together as they have in the past. In Malibu, California, Ovitz is buying a few acres of property on a seaside bluff, a $5 million parcel belonging to Motown mogul Berry Gordy. Malibu property has a distressing habit of sliding into the sea or turning into charcoal, yet this...
...Ovitz isn't being profligate, as is clear from a story that Seagram's scion Edgar Bronfman Jr. has told friends. Years ago, Ovitz, then an agent, called Bronfman to ask him to prevent the forced retirement of Ovitz's father, who worked for a Southern California liquor distributor affiliated with Seagram. Bronfman complied. In 1995 the two had a much publicized encounter when Bronfman nearly hired Ovitz to run Universal but balked at his extravagant compensation demands. They hadn't really talked since--until Bronfman called Ovitz recently to ask whether he could drop the elder Ovitz from...
...Some of Ovitz's former friends in Hollywood are surprised by this story, observing that Ovitz might have done better than just thanking Bronfman for taking care of his old man--and then asking for more. But then again, Ovitz is out of a job, and he can't be too careful. He has to make every million count...