Chapter 645 (1/2)
At the end of the morning, Simon had lunch with Amy Pascal, mark Belford and other group executives in the management canteen.
The topic we talked about at the dinner table was about the recent turmoil of Disney.
The story still starts with the ”behind the scenes lie” directed by Robert Redford last year. Simon deliberately pushed the project to Disney by a small means at the beginning. The film eventually cost 40 million dollars, but the final effect was not satisfactory. As a result, Disney not only gave up the high-quality schedule at the end of last year, but also almost lost it to the schedule cemetery in January and February of the new year.
Finally, with Radford's insistence and mediation, ”behind the scenes lies” was released on April 1 at the same time as ”Ninja Turtle 3”.
Unfortunately, compared with Ninja tortoise 3 and the subsequent blockbuster detective airplane head, the box office of behind the scenes was only $6.19 million in the first week.
Moreover, under the impact of the two blockbuster films in the same period, when they were sketched four weeks after the release, the total box office of ”behind the scenes lie” in North America was only 16.35 million US dollars, and the box office share only barely offset the publicity expenses of Disney. Considering the bleak prospects of overseas and surrounding distribution caused by the failure of domestic box office, ”behind the scenes lie” will bring Disney at least 30 million US dollars Net loss of.
The failure of behind the scenes lies is a microcosm of Disney's increasingly bleak situation in the past two years, and it has also become a fuse for the outbreak of internal contradictions among the management of the old film studio.
Since taking over Disney in 1984, Michael Eisner and Jeffrey carsenberg, who used to be subordinates of Barry Diller, have cooperated closely in their early days. Through inheriting Barry Diller's high concept film mode and tapping the commercial potential of Disney's classic animation, Diller has been thriving in the second half of the 1980s, and once launched ”Three Dads and one cartoon” The remakes of Disney's classic animated films and the release of video tapes have repeatedly brought huge profits to Disney.
Michael Eisner and Jeffrey carsenberg, one is the CEO of Disney Company, and the other is the general director of several Disney Studios. Because of the differences in business management and personal compensation, they have unconsciously accumulated a deep spear and shield.
For example, in 1988, after Disney had a good harvest prospect, Michael Eisner received a $6.8 million bonus. However, due to the special accounting rules of the big film company's studios that deliberately made losses in order to avoid taxes, Jeffrey carsenberg's bonus number was pitifully ”zero”, and the contradiction between the two sides has been made public once.
According to the original agreement, in 1994, that is, this year, when the contract of Frank wells, the current president of Disney, expired, carsenberg would become the successor of the president of Disney. However, Michael Eisner didn't mean to let carsenberg take over the president. Instead, he recently quietly discussed with CAA president Michael owitz, who is also his neighbor and good friend, about joining Disney.
The Hollywood circle is very small, and the news spreads unexpectedly. Carsenberg directly confronts Eisner.
It happened that the box office failure of ”behind the scenes lies” happened again. Michael Eisner did not hesitate to blame Jeffrey carsenberg for ”behind the scenes lies” and Disney's poor film performance in the past two years. As a result, the executive who has worked for Disney for ten years angrily announced his resignation.
In the past, the conflict between Eisner and carsenberg also broke out this year. However, Frank Wells died in a helicopter crash during Easter in 1994. At that time, Disney was far better than this time and space, but Eisner still didn't want to let carsenberg take over as the president, which eventually led to the departure of carsenberg. Disney lost carsenberg. In the second half of the 1990s, the film business went down all the way, and finally Michael Eisner was forced to step down.
Now, because of Simon's big butterfly, Frank wells has not suffered a helicopter accident, but the Disney president's contract will still expire in August this year. Moreover, wells, 62 years old, has no intention to renew his contract and plans to retire early to enjoy life. Disney still needs to choose a new president.
Then came the recent changes.
Disney's management turmoil is largely due to the rise of Denise entertainment.
Today's danilisi entertainment is similar to Disney in Simon's memory 20 years later. At that time, Debao shared half of the top ten box office tickets in North America almost every year through Marvel movie universe, Disney animation, fairy tale adaptation and Star Wars series, and suppressed other major Hollywood film companies to the end of the seven The second tier film companies, such as lion gate and pinnacle, which seem to be rising rapidly, are short-lived.
Simon has achieved this by relying on his own advantages as a prophet. Moreover, by careful comparison, Denise entertainment is more powerful than Disney, the most prosperous stage in Simon's memory. As a result, the living space of other major Hollywood studios and second - and third tier film companies is constantly compressed, and a series of domino effects are triggered.Disney, once in the early 1990s, has been in the limelight in Hollywood, relying on popular animations such as beauty and the beast and the lion king, as well as popular films such as pretty girl and the supreme detective.
Because of Simon's appearance, many of Disney's box office projects were collected by Denise entertainment. In addition, the commercial performance of other films developed by Disney is not good. As a result, Disney, which had a rapid rise in the late 1980s, has gone down in the past two years.
Disney is obviously not the only Hollywood company with the same experience.
At this stage, the seven giants of Hollywood can be described as dynamic. One is Denise entertainment, the other is Time Warner Group. Even MGM, which is supported by Simon himself, is still in the recovery stage. As for Disney, paramount, Columbia and fox, the remaining four companies have found that the Hollywood film market has recovered rapidly in recent years In the case of sue, business is getting worse.
As for Miramax and the new line, which should have flourished in recent years in the original time and space, they have completely disappeared in the vision of Hollywood circles.
Hollywood's several old brand studios have existed for more than half a century, so it is very difficult to completely eliminate them.
Simon's short-term goal is to bring Disney down to the actual position of second tier film companies. Hollywood only needs Denise and Time Warner to stand side by side for the time being.
Tolerance for Time Warner to stand side by side with itself, on the one hand, is due to the DC movie universe, on the other hand, it is also due to antitrust considerations. After all, if there is a super strong pattern in Hollywood, then the other few will only point all the blame at Denise Entertainment. Now, with one more time warner, we can share some of the firepower.
However, this is only temporary.
Simon's ultimate goal is still the tripartite confrontation that he once considered. Two of them are still danielis and Time Warner. The last one is either MGM, which Simon personally fosters, or Blockbuster Entertainment, which has quietly planted seeds. The rest of them will be reduced to the second tier and even disappear completely.
It's in the management cafeteria of Daniels studios.
Nancy Brill's question interrupted Simon's thought: ”boss, do you think Michael owitz will choose to join Disney?”
Simon nodded: ”it should be, but maybe it's not good news for Disney.”