<![CDATA[Disney War]]>

false <![CDATA[Disney War]]> http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174526945m/414096.jpg 414096 11 James Stewart has done it again. The author of the mega-bestselling Den of Thieves, about the 1980s insider-trading scandals on Wall Street, and Bloodsport, the 1990s tale of the Clintons' Whitewater affair, now gives us another epic story, this one culminating in late 2004. With DisneyWar, Stewart turns his investigative and storytelling lens on Michael Eisner and the corporate intrigue which has overtaken the Walt Disney Company in the last decade. He explains how this once-proud institution, long one of America's most admired and well-known businesses, has stumbled in recent years amid a disastrous swirl of egos, personalities, and bad business decisions. Like one of the roller coasters at DisneyLand, Stewart's epic book takes readers through a wild up-and-down ride as it describes Eisner's regime as CEO. The tale begins with Eisner's early successes rejuvenating Disney's live-action movie franchise and theme parks, the kickoff of the modern animation era with blockbuster hits like The Lion King and Beauty and the Beast, and the cultivation of a highly talented cadre of lieutenants, which reads like a Who's Who of executive talent now dispersed across the Fortune 500: Stephen Bollenbach (Hilton Hotels), Steve Burke (Comcast), Geraldine Laybourne (Oxygen Media), Richard Nanula (Amgen), Joe Roth (Revolution Studios), and so on. Stewart makes clear that Eisner has had a major eye for strong creative content himself, both as a young executive in his pre-Disney years at ABC and at Paramount Pictures and more recently in building partnerships like Disney's extremely lucrative one with Pixar. Just as he credits Eisner for various Disney successes, though, Stewart assigns blame for the failures, too. The thoroughly researched 534 pages of DisneyWar make clear that his overall verdict on the CEO is negative. Much of the book describes detailed and specific interactions between Eisner and his rivals. Readers interested in the entertainment industry or in the personalities which drive it will not be disappointed. The blow-by-blow accounts of Eisner's feuds with Dreamworks SKG founder Jeffrey Katzenberg, who was his chief aide for nearly two decades, and Michael Ovitz, the superagent from CAA who had been friends with Eisner for even longer than that, are amazingly detailed. They show Eisner to be creative, funny, and charming when he wants to be--and devious, dishonest, and horribly Machiavellian when he doesn't. Though dispassionate in his writing, Stewart assembles a withering portrait of Eisner as a grasping, self-centered, manipulative, and ultimately self-destructive executive. He shows how the Disney CEO has consistently undercut his potential successors within the company, in many cases drawing on Eisner's own writings and conversations with board members. He shows how Eisner's erratic attitude towards paying severance to former employees--in some cases being overly stubborn (as with Katzenberg, to whom he had a chance to close out for $90 million, but whom Disney ended up paying $280 million) and in others being shockingly lenient (as with Ovitz, who received a $140 million golden parachute after one relatively ineffective year at the company). He shows the overreach of grandiose projects like Euro Disney, and the missed opportunities like Lord of the Rings, Sopranos, and Survivor, on all of which Disney passed. In the end, Stewart has returned with DisneyWar to what he does best: drilling into a murky and complex subject, capturing an enormous amount of detail through personal interviews, emails, memos, court records, and other data sources, and then weaving together a rich tapestry of people and events to bring others to the same conclusions he has clearly reached himself. Though some readers might tire of the reams of detail Stewart offers--at certain points, the book reads like a gossip rag, with intricate he-said, she-said accounts of individual meetings--most will enjoy it. Beyond the entertainment value, this book also has serious value to students of corporate governance, as it presents a scathing portrait of Disney's captive board of directors and shows what happens with the lack of proper CEO oversight. --Peter Han 1936202 11 2 2005 Disney War total:298|5:84|4:134|3:66|2:12|1:2| 298 1180 450 53 0 0 false false Thu Feb 05 09:31:03 -0800 2009 Thu Feb 05 09:31:03 -0800 2009 Pulitzer Prize-winning Stewart, author of Den of Thieves (1991) about Wall Street insider-trading scandals, and Blood Sport (1996) about the Clintons' Whitewater caper, offers an "often brilliant" business history and character study with DisneyWar (Washington Post). Stewart, who couldn't ...

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"What Michael likes is to put six pit bulls together and see which five die." --anonymous executive describing Michael Ei...more...]]> 3 0 false false Fri Feb 01 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Fri Apr 04 15:52:25 -0700 2008 Fri Apr 04 15:59:24 -0700 2008 more...]]> 4 0 false false Sat May 09 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Mon May 11 16:41:21 -0700 2009 Mon May 11 16:44:28 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Sun Apr 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Thu Jun 28 09:23:34 -0700 2007 Thu Jun 28 09:34:49 -0700 2007 more...]]> 4 0 false false Sat Jan 24 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Sat Jan 17 11:57:13 -0800 2009 Sat Jan 24 23:51:01 -0800 2009
WOW! Such cutthroats these businessmen are...such a good book, though! Not the quickest read, but worth it!]]> 5 0 false false Wed Jun 10 15:03:27 -0700 2009 Wed Jun 10 15:04:53 -0700 2009 3 0 false false Thu Oct 29 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Fri Oct 23 14:14:34 -0700 2009 Mon Nov 02 05:36:10 -0800 2009 4 0 false false Sun Jul 05 19:42:45 -0700 2009 Sun Jul 05 19:44:12 -0700 2009 5 0 false false Sat Jan 17 23:54:55 -0800 2009 Sun Jan 18 00:12:00 -0800 2009 4 0 false false Sun Dec 02 00:00:00 -0800 2007 Wed Nov 28 14:15:57 -0800 2007 Wed Jan 30 08:38:44 -0800 2008 more...]]> 4 0 false false Mon Sep 07 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Thu Aug 13 16:38:15 -0700 2009 Mon Sep 07 01:12:57 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Thu Dec 04 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Thu Dec 04 18:40:25 -0800 2008 Thu Dec 04 18:41:18 -0800 2008 3 0 false false Wed Apr 09 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Fri Apr 11 09:19:26 -0700 2008 Fri Apr 11 09:23:52 -0700 2008 more...]]> http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=414096