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Speaker 1: This is Alec Baldwin and you were listening to. Here's

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Speaker 1: the thing, My chance to talk with artists, policymakers, and performers,

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Speaker 1: to hear their stories, What inspires their creations, what decisions

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Speaker 1: change their careers, what relationships influenced their work? Happy Days

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Speaker 1: Barney Miller, Greece, Raiders of the Lost Arc. Michael Eisner,

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Speaker 1: my guest today, had a hand in bringing all of

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Speaker 1: these projects to life. At ABC. He helped turn the

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Speaker 1: network from number three to number one in prime time,

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Speaker 1: daytime and children's television. While he was president of Paramount Pictures,

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Speaker 1: the company moved from last place to first among the

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Speaker 1: six major studios. But Eisner is best known as the

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Speaker 1: former chairman and CEO of the Walt Disney Company, a

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Speaker 1: position that he held for over two decades. Michael Eisner

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Speaker 1: grew up and started his career in New York, but

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Speaker 1: an early trip out West changed that. I asked where

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Speaker 1: the people stayed that went to l A. Had never

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Speaker 1: been to l A. And they said the bel Air Hotel.

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Speaker 1: And I got to the bel Air Hotel and there

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Speaker 1: were swans, and there was flowers, and there were weddings

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Speaker 1: and all this stuff. I called my wife, and I said,

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Speaker 1: I think we should move to l A. And then

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Speaker 1: I it took me three years to manipulate it. That

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Speaker 1: to convince ABC that being in New York was not

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Speaker 1: going to be effective, that that I was always a

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Speaker 1: day late and getting casting, getting scripts. Uh, we were

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Speaker 1: fourth among three, and nobody cared about ABC. And they

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Speaker 1: paid us through the owned stations. They couldn't even pay

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Speaker 1: us through the network. They didn't have enough money. And

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Speaker 1: and I was lucky because the things that I was

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Speaker 1: in charge of just happened to turn to number one

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Speaker 1: when I got there, so it looked like I did it.

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Speaker 1: So when I said, you you have to move to

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Speaker 1: l A, we have to we have to do it

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Speaker 1: in l A. And in that era, l A was

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Speaker 1: very laid back. People came in at ten, they left

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Speaker 1: at eleven. They looked like they were gonna play golf.

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Speaker 1: And Barry Diller and I both moved to l A,

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Speaker 1: and we were wearing suits, and we had this New

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Speaker 1: York mentality, and we actually arrived earlier in the morning

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Speaker 1: and we stayed late, and we were Type a's and

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Speaker 1: all of a sudden, ABC became a Type A administration,

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Speaker 1: and we eventually became number one and even in prime

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Speaker 1: time with a movie that week and a lot of

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Speaker 1: other stuff. Spelling it was we convinced Aaron Spelling to

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Speaker 1: UH to make a direct deal with us, not to

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Speaker 1: go through his agent. That created a lot of unpleasantness

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Speaker 1: for me because I didn't realize the power of William Morris.

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Speaker 1: They went to the chairman of I forgot about this

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Speaker 1: for about thirty years. They went to the chairman of

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Speaker 1: of ABC and asked for both of us, Barry and

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Speaker 1: I to be fired because we were not we can

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Speaker 1: do and Norman, oh no, it was a last vogel.

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Speaker 1: It was even above Norman. And they and Leonard Goldenson

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Speaker 1: called us into his office. We thought, I thought it

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Speaker 1: were gonna be fired for for not dealing with the

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Speaker 1: system and the great of the agency, package commissions and

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Speaker 1: all that stuff. And he put his hand across the

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Speaker 1: table and gratulate us for trying to change the business.

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Speaker 1: So I know, But why when you got out of

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Speaker 1: college did you go to television in the first place?

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Speaker 1: What about it? No one in your family was in media, correct, No? Uh,

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Speaker 1: I graduated from college. I was a premed. I was

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Speaker 1: an English major, and then was a theater major. Because

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Speaker 1: there was a girl that wouldn't date me, so I

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Speaker 1: wrote a play for her, and then she still wouldn't

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Speaker 1: date me. But I became a theater major. I went

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Speaker 1: to Europe to become a writer for a year. I

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Speaker 1: stayed a week, came back and got a job as

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Speaker 1: an usher usher at NBC. I didn't know what I

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Speaker 1: was gonna do. I moved out of my parents apartment.

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Speaker 1: I found my own apartment. I thought that was pretty good.

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Speaker 1: I was liberated. Um and I became an usher and

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Speaker 1: I worked backstage with Jack Parr. I took telephone calls.

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Speaker 1: I gave tickets to the Tonight Show. And I loved it.

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Speaker 1: It was like fun. It was like it wasn't a job.

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Speaker 1: And and and I always like theater. And I grew

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Speaker 1: up in Manhattan, and every my kids always went to

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Speaker 1: check E Geese on their birthdays. But we when I

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Speaker 1: grew up in New York. He went to a show,

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Speaker 1: you went to see you know, Charlie's Aunt or Where's Charlie?

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Speaker 1: You went to Sea House Pacific in Oklahoma and Arthur

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Speaker 1: Miller and all this stuff. So I really had it

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Speaker 1: at the bug I did. And then and then I

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Speaker 1: just worked my way up at UH at ABC. I

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Speaker 1: really decided. Actually, my father was kind of a gentleman

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Speaker 1: farmer in Vermont, and he bought the apple orchard next

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Speaker 1: to him, and then he bought a lot of apple orchards.

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Speaker 1: And we've been in the apple business for fifty years,

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Speaker 1: my family, and we made a profit twice in fifty years.

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Speaker 1: And I decided that I was not going to be

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Speaker 1: a business in a business where God was my partner.

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Speaker 1: I just couldn't take the the frosts and the lack

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Speaker 1: of blossoms for the bees and the but but I

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Speaker 1: decided I was gonna do I actually know something I

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Speaker 1: wasn't really equipped to anything else. Described for me what

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Speaker 1: made Diller successful? Because he because he becomes a huge

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Speaker 1: figure in your life and and a big you know,

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Speaker 1: mentor in your life, and you follow him around for

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Speaker 1: quite a bit. He takes you with him and and

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Speaker 1: elevates you. What made Diller Diller? Well, first of all,

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Speaker 1: he's extremely smart, So let's start there. And and uh,

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Speaker 1: he came comes from Los Angeles, and he understood he

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Speaker 1: would in the William Morris office, and you know, like

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Speaker 1: I worked at the page, he worked in the mail room.

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Speaker 1: We're exactly the same age, although he looks much older

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Speaker 1: than the I know. Um. We started ABC within three

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Speaker 1: months of each other. He worked for a vice president

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Speaker 1: who actually had power. I worked for a vice presidents

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Speaker 1: being fired. I didn't know it, uh, And he was

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Speaker 1: brusque and he was dominating, but I could deal with him.

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Speaker 1: And then we all did different things. I mean I

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Speaker 1: did when I was doing daytime, he was doing this.

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Speaker 1: Eventually I went to California worked for him, and then

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Speaker 1: eventually he left ABC and went to Paramount, and then

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Speaker 1: I joined him. So you and he were running the

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Speaker 1: network in California. How long were you there in California

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Speaker 1: before he goes to Paramount? He went a year after

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Speaker 1: I came to California. I went three years later. I

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Speaker 1: was I was kind of too state at ABC while

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Speaker 1: he's at Paramount. For two years, I was very declass A.

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Speaker 1: I was TV and the movies were in and all

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Speaker 1: the important people in the movies at the Bob Evans

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Speaker 1: and the Sioux Angers and all those people. And I

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Speaker 1: was still doing TV, but the movies weren't doing so

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Speaker 1: well in that era. And so somebody came to me

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Speaker 1: from another company and Barry heard about it, and he

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Speaker 1: called me up and he brought me over there. Uh

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Speaker 1: he said, I was. I resolved my problems, one of

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Speaker 1: which is I wasn't beturing my phone calls quickly and

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Speaker 1: things like that. So I resolved that. And other than

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Speaker 1: the fact that I kept calling movies shows, which drove

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Speaker 1: him out of his mind. And until we had yes,

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Speaker 1: there was I was still talking, you know, Happy Days,

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Speaker 1: and he was talking, you know, Atlantic City. So uh.

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Speaker 1: But then when we hit was Saturday night Fever in

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Speaker 1: Greece and Heavington waited and foul playing all that, it

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Speaker 1: was okay that I called them shows, But but we

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Speaker 1: still describe I mean, this is a broad question to

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Speaker 1: described what was the movie business like you're a paramount

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Speaker 1: from nineteen seventy six to nineteen eighty four. You're thirty

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Speaker 1: four years old. I mean you're I mean, there are

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Speaker 1: there there are younger men that have keptained some of

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Speaker 1: these companies, but that's still pretty young. And you're over

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Speaker 1: there with him running the show from seventies eighty four.

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Speaker 1: What was the state of the movie business in seventy six, Well, uh,

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Speaker 1: it was, it was up and down. It wasn't as

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Speaker 1: bad as five years earlier or seven years earlier, an

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Speaker 1: easy rider kind of changed the whole nature of the business.

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Speaker 1: Paramount wasn't doing well, but we decided we would use

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Speaker 1: our like minor leagues to baseball, television and movies. We

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Speaker 1: would use our kind of creativity in a box. We

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Speaker 1: would create a financial box and then anything inside the

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Speaker 1: box was okay. You just had to be responsible. And

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Speaker 1: we over the next uh eight ten years, were number

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Speaker 1: one almost every year. Warner Brothers was number one when

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Speaker 1: we weren't those years, and Warner Brothers had a completely

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Speaker 1: differ philosophy. They dealt only with stars. They would send

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Speaker 1: Steven Spielberg's dog to Wide and meet him. They they

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Speaker 1: had Steve Steve Ross, Steve Ross, They had you know,

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Speaker 1: villas in Mexico, and we were like traveling coach and

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Speaker 1: uh half of ourn he he did, except for we

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Speaker 1: were number one financially and we were number one of

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Speaker 1: the box office, all on strong ideas young or talented directors,

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Speaker 1: new talent, old talent too. They accused us of waiting

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Speaker 1: outside of Betty Ford a rehab center and getting actors

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Speaker 1: at a discount. We did down and out in Beverly Hills,

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Speaker 1: I guess that was our first movie at Disney, but

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Speaker 1: we kept this philosophy going with that. Middle and Nick Nolty,

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Speaker 1: who both had graduated from there, who did a pretty

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Speaker 1: good movie for us. So our strategy, you was needed

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Speaker 1: a hit, and we needed a hit, and it worked well.

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Speaker 1: And I've done a lot of movies of them. It

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Speaker 1: all worked, not all, but most. I think the idea

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Speaker 1: of we were always twenty or more times less than

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Speaker 1: the industry average and movies, and we always were number

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Speaker 1: one or two, by the way, for thirty years, twenty

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Speaker 1: six of those years, I was number one or number two,

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Speaker 1: always being economically thoughtful, but going with instinct good material,

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Speaker 1: interesting material, different material as best we could. But so

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Speaker 1: that that leads to a question that's a really important

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Speaker 1: one for me, which is um, and I'm not saying

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Speaker 1: this in a critical way, but you never spent a

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Speaker 1: moment as a salary and salaried employee on the set

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Speaker 1: of a film in any of the crafts you know,

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Speaker 1: you were in a sound mixer, or you didn't direct films,

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Speaker 1: you didn't do costumes, you didn't do any editing. What

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Speaker 1: have you? You've been on the set of films, your

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Speaker 1: entire career as an executive described for people what that

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Speaker 1: creative processes like, meaning, for example, in Paramount in the

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Speaker 1: Slate seventies and early eighties, what number of creative staff

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Speaker 1: did you have that advice you want, what films you

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Speaker 1: should be making and should not be making? How many

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Speaker 1: people did you listen to? Well, I was kind of

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Speaker 1: in the weeds. I did a lot of it myself.

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Speaker 1: There was a guy by the name of Don Simpson

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Speaker 1: who was in the story department. And he was the

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Speaker 1: only person that I found when I arrived other than Barry,

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Speaker 1: that I trusted. So what about him? Did your trust?

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Speaker 1: He just seemed smart, he worked, he was came from Alaska.

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Speaker 1: I would he was single. I was married with a

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Speaker 1: bunch of kids. We would go on we would go

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Speaker 1: on film testing and all sorts of different states around

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Speaker 1: the country. I love being with him. He told me

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Speaker 1: all these great stories that I couldn't participate in, that

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Speaker 1: that it was a different breed he was. He was

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Speaker 1: just he finally had a problem with drugs. But but

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Speaker 1: that's somebody I listened to. But but mainly I was

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Speaker 1: an English major mostly uh, I was a theater goer

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Speaker 1: mostly all my life and I love the written word.

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Speaker 1: I can't tell you how a movie has made. My

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Speaker 1: son is a director. I can't even talk to him

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Speaker 1: about I don't understand even where the film goes. What

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Speaker 1: I'm think I'm good at is recognizing good ideas, really

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Speaker 1: good with the written word, And I'm good in the

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Speaker 1: post production area. I can see a film and and

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Speaker 1: and work with it. As far as how I just

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Speaker 1: read about Angle making this movie. They just got a

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Speaker 1: tremendous reception technically and in Las Vegas. If somebody said

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Speaker 1: to me you had to do that would be like

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Speaker 1: saying to me, you had to operate on somebody's brain.

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Speaker 1: My strength is so limited two the idea, the script,

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Speaker 1: the casting, the director, the putting it together and bringing

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Speaker 1: the most talented people ago you can and try and

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Speaker 1: in find somebody that nobody else's those is talented, defining

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Speaker 1: the people that are talented that have yet been not discovered.

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Speaker 1: I always say that we know, I said we I said,

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Speaker 1: we were working on this film. I was doing an

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Speaker 1: Alden Erin Reich, who actually played my son, he played

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Speaker 1: Kate Planchett's son, and Blue Jasmine that I did with Woody,

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Speaker 1: and we were saying No, we don't just want alden

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Speaker 1: Aran Reich. We want cheap alden erin Reich before he

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Speaker 1: really hits it big and becomes too expensive for us.

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Speaker 1: But so so essentially you let me. Let me say

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Speaker 1: this because because I'm always accused of trying to find

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Speaker 1: the new inexpensive. There are many actors who are worth

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Speaker 1: everything they get paid. Give me an example, Well, you're

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Speaker 1: an example that's very I mean like Hanks Crews. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: There there are actors who, by very nature of being

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Speaker 1: in the movies, you get two things. One, they're actually

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Speaker 1: very good. When you sit and talk to Dustin Hoffman,

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Speaker 1: it is not an accident that he's been so good.

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Speaker 1: He really is good. So you get what you paid

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Speaker 1: for Set and Lee. There are actors who actually appeal

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Speaker 1: to people. The movie would not perform as well without

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Speaker 1: those actors. So for that, in the business of the movies,

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Speaker 1: it is totally worth paying up whatever it takes. Who's

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Speaker 1: a filmmaker you loved working with back then in the

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Speaker 1: earlier Who's someone you said, God, this is a great experience,

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Speaker 1: scor said, he's the same with people that that that

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Speaker 1: you would name Alan Parker, Uh, what'd you do with

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Speaker 1: Alan he made a small movie. I'm trying to make

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Speaker 1: a name of it in the in the seventies. I

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Speaker 1: cannot after fame or before fame, before fame really early. Um,

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Speaker 1: it just was a you know, there's something about dealing

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Speaker 1: with any in any field. It could be my son

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Speaker 1: is in the in the cottage cheese business, and my

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Speaker 1: young son uh and and I'm serious. He didn't want

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Speaker 1: to be in the entertainment business. My other two sons

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Speaker 1: in the entertainment business. He went, he's kind of an entrepreneur.

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Speaker 1: He went to the grocery stores. He looked at what

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Speaker 1: hadn't been innovated. You know, yogurt had been innovated. Everything

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Speaker 1: else to be had innovation. Cottage cheese had not. I said,

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Speaker 1: are you crazy? He did example he he is in

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Speaker 1: every whole foods now with his good culture cottage cheese.

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Speaker 1: And meeting the young people that he has in cottage

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Speaker 1: cheese is like meeting a new young actress, a new

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Speaker 1: young actor, a new young doc age. She's the way

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Speaker 1: you felt about TV back there. And maybe maybe, but

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Speaker 1: the fact is, I really like I like my children's

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Speaker 1: friends that all went to film school. I talked to

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Speaker 1: all of them. I keep saying to my wife and

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Speaker 1: mother talked to them and talked to our friends, and

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Speaker 1: she gets very upset about that. But no, I like

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Speaker 1: I like the new But so at Paramount, you're there

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Speaker 1: and Dealer is the head guy, and you're with Dialer

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Speaker 1: and explain to people who don't know how Dealer acquiescence

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Speaker 1: to you, and you say to him, these are the

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Speaker 1: movies that we're gonna make. Did he have did you

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Speaker 1: confer with him? Did he ever say to you know,

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Speaker 1: I don't like this. Were you completely on your own?

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Speaker 1: You were self determining by and how many releases on

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Speaker 1: average were you doing back then? We were probably doing

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Speaker 1: fourteen and twenty releases. Um, he, we were a team.

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Speaker 1: I did not do any of my own. He did

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Speaker 1: not do any of his own. I mean we talked

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Speaker 1: twenty times a day. Uh. Mostly he would say I

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Speaker 1: hate it, and I would say, well, then, Barry, we

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Speaker 1: have no films. And then we would argue about the film.

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Speaker 1: Or he would call me up and say we talked

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Speaker 1: about Warren Baby for a Warren has a film that

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Speaker 1: is a problem at Warners. Uh, let's read it in

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Speaker 1: the next hour, and if we say yes, Warren will

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Speaker 1: do it paramount, so that took an hour. Some films

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Speaker 1: American Jigglow or or other films. Officer and a gentleman

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Speaker 1: in terms of a German took longer. But we discussed.

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Speaker 1: We argued always in private. In public we were one team,

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Speaker 1: a team, and uh, it just weren't he was. He's

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Speaker 1: a very good critic. Uh, And we we discussed it

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Speaker 1: a lot. What's the movie you bet on and you

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Speaker 1: were wrong? What's the movie? You really went to the

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Speaker 1: mattresses before he said we got to make this movie

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Speaker 1: us his name one. I never had to go to

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Speaker 1: the mattress. We always came to an agreement. But we

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Speaker 1: made a movie called White Dog, which I still think

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Speaker 1: was misunderstood. I hated that movie White Dog, my guy.

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Speaker 1: I couldn't stand White Dog. Well, you were not alone,

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Speaker 1: so I can't believe you could confessing you made because

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Speaker 1: I always wondered, I wonder if I ever meet the guy,

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Speaker 1: the greenlit White Dog man, I am not going to

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Speaker 1: give him a piece of my mind. I want my

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Speaker 1: money back. You want to hear what the idea was posted,

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Speaker 1: because a lot of times you go from the script

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Speaker 1: to the stage to the screen and it's not what

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Speaker 1: you thought it was. Many times it's been the opposite.

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Speaker 1: It's it's it's turned out so much better than I

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Speaker 1: thought it would be. With our Lion King or whatever was.

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Speaker 1: There's an actress and she's a young actress and she's

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Speaker 1: driving to Beka commercial and she's she hits a dog,

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Speaker 1: a white dog, right German chef, and she is so beset.

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Speaker 1: She goes, she thinks the dog to the vet. She

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Speaker 1: brings the dog home. So the first act is her

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Speaker 1: love affair with this dog and they're inseparable. And then

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Speaker 1: she brings the dog to a a set to make

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Speaker 1: a commercial. And sometimes how in the set the dog

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Speaker 1: sees somebody walk across and goes after him. To make

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Speaker 1: a longer story short, the whole second act is the

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Speaker 1: dog is somehow a racist. This dog is a racist.

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Speaker 1: She goes to the supermarket and the dogs in the

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Speaker 1: car and African American family walks by, and this dog

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Speaker 1: goes nuts. The bottom line is you it really is

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Speaker 1: a white dog. It's white on many levels, no question

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Speaker 1: about it. Then the third act you find out that

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Speaker 1: this white dog was trained in a southern state to

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Speaker 1: be a attack dog, and so she takes the dog

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Speaker 1: to another trainer to untrained the dog in this thing,

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Speaker 1: and eventually the trainer that D programmed D program And

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Speaker 1: the whole idea of the film was supposed to be

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Speaker 1: that prejudice is learned. You aren't born with prejudice. It's

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Speaker 1: part of your environment, as part of your parents, as

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Speaker 1: part of your community, and you can if you're trained

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Speaker 1: to be a racist, you can be maybe trained to

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Speaker 1: get to not well. We picked the director who was

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Speaker 1: an action or end director, who was a mistake. He

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Speaker 1: made a film that basically we got killed for her.

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Speaker 1: So that was a film that I really felt was

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Speaker 1: an interesting idea with an interesting character that just never

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Speaker 1: achieved what I wanted to. So I hope that the

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Speaker 1: lesson for you was that you and Barry stopped bringing

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Speaker 1: your park Avenue in Beverly Hills, lefty consciousness to the

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Speaker 1: film slater and let's just make money and let's forget

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Speaker 1: about de programming racist dogs. Was that the lesson for you?

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Speaker 1: Or I never really was ever trying to make political films.

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Speaker 1: I mean, we did make reds, we made we made

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Speaker 1: any film that sounded interesting. It just happened. I thought

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Speaker 1: this idea of this white dog and many people have

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Speaker 1: made animal films. Was an interesting twist. I was completely wrong. Now,

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Speaker 1: obviously the business is littered with there's a lot of

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Speaker 1: twisted wreckage on the runway here of people in your

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Speaker 1: position who the opposite is true. There's movies that you

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Speaker 1: say goodbye to that you don't want to make, and

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Speaker 1: they go off and become Because what's an example of

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Speaker 1: that for you, of somebody who took a movie from

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Speaker 1: you and they jampen into the hoop. Well, I had

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Speaker 1: we made a movie, uh, with Goldie on called foul Play,

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Speaker 1: and I'm very friendly with Goalie from that movie. And

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Speaker 1: somebody presented a movie to us and I said, to

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Speaker 1: her her William Mars agent. But I saw a picture

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Speaker 1: of her. She's kind of heavy. Uh. He said, Oh,

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Speaker 1: you ought to sit down with her. So I said, okay.

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Speaker 1: So she came to the office and she said, so

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Speaker 1: you think I'm fat? She said, you know, I just

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Speaker 1: had a baby. I said I didn't know. Oh, I

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Speaker 1: just said I'm sorry. So then she pitched uh and correctly,

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Speaker 1: So uh, Private Benjamin one of my favorites. Right. So

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Speaker 1: I met with her and I said and and and

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Speaker 1: others uh, And I said, I don't think that's the

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Speaker 1: third act. The first act is great when you have

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Speaker 1: the guy died at the wedding and called Albert Brooks

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Speaker 1: actually died away and Yale and right, and I thought

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00:20:29,720 --> 00:20:33,239
Speaker 1: Goldie Hans in the army. But you don't have a

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Speaker 1: third act. So between not saying you're a third act

382
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Speaker 1: and the next day they went and sold at the

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Speaker 1: Columbia and the movie came out was a giant hit.

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Speaker 1: It still didn't have a third act. It didn't matter.

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Speaker 1: It was this unbelievable hit. And it was kind of

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Speaker 1: a lesson for me because I knew this from television,

387
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Speaker 1: from the movie of the Week, from Barry and I

388
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Speaker 1: and all that stuff. That a really unbelievable concept. Unbelievable concept.

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Speaker 1: It's kind of hard to kill, especially in TV where

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Speaker 1: it's all about the promotion for the one time only

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Speaker 1: it's not like word of mouth, and this concept of

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Speaker 1: Goldie Horn playing Private Benjamin, you couldn't kill it. And

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Speaker 1: I just was shortsighted about that because I just wanted

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Speaker 1: a third act and it was stupid. The eventually, I

395
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Speaker 1: guess it's what year does not that we would remember

396
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Speaker 1: this eventually? Uh Diller leaves Paramount, and you're hoping you're

397
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Speaker 1: going to get that job. Correct. Not really what happened

398
00:21:35,400 --> 00:21:39,040
Speaker 1: was um Charlie Bluehorn, who was the CEO of Golfing Western,

399
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Speaker 1: which owned Paramount. Jeffrey would always do his impersonations for me.

400
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Speaker 1: That's good. So with Bob Evans. Bob Evans was good

401
00:21:47,480 --> 00:21:50,720
Speaker 1: at it. So he was a great guy. He died

402
00:21:52,080 --> 00:21:55,960
Speaker 1: very prematurely. And the guy that took over, Marty Davis,

403
00:21:56,920 --> 00:21:58,879
Speaker 1: lay put this way. When I heard in the radio

404
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Speaker 1: he died, I called Barry up and I said, Barry,

405
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Speaker 1: you know Marty died, And Barry said, I hope it

406
00:22:04,160 --> 00:22:07,160
Speaker 1: was painful. That's that's what we thought about this guy.

407
00:22:07,280 --> 00:22:13,520
Speaker 1: He he was soft and so unpleasant and so nasty.

408
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Speaker 1: And we worked for him for about a year and

409
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Speaker 1: a half and we both decided this is not the

410
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Speaker 1: place to be. And Barry got involved with Fox, and

411
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Speaker 1: I was thinking about going with him to Fox, and

412
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Speaker 1: then the Disney thing came up out of the blue,

413
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Speaker 1: and we both how did the Disney thing come up?

414
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Speaker 1: Because describe the shape the company was in at that time, Well,

415
00:22:36,520 --> 00:22:40,080
Speaker 1: the company was in terrible shape. The company was being

416
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Speaker 1: broken apart. It had a lot of investors trying to

417
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Speaker 1: break it apart. I know Karan was trying to get

418
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Speaker 1: the film library, and Mary it was trying to get

419
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Speaker 1: the hotels. And it was over and I was at

420
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Speaker 1: camp but the mid season with my kid, and I

421
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Speaker 1: got a call saying to you have a contract to Paramount.

422
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Speaker 1: And this was exactly at the time that I was

423
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Speaker 1: not happy, as Barry wasn't happening. I said no, And

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Speaker 1: two weeks later it was the CEO and chairman of

425
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Speaker 1: Disney the board, Uh Frank Wells, who came as a president.

426
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Speaker 1: I came as a chairman. Frank Wells kind of had

427
00:23:15,240 --> 00:23:18,080
Speaker 1: been playing in this field for a year and Frank

428
00:23:18,119 --> 00:23:22,280
Speaker 1: Wells knew what they needed was a CEO who was

429
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Speaker 1: creatively oriented. They could get CEOs who needed to make

430
00:23:26,600 --> 00:23:30,320
Speaker 1: better movies, yes, and they needed a whole vitality and

431
00:23:30,320 --> 00:23:35,240
Speaker 1: and and Chaman aggressively not he had. He had taken

432
00:23:35,280 --> 00:23:39,280
Speaker 1: over UH Warners at one point as the head guy,

433
00:23:39,760 --> 00:23:42,520
Speaker 1: and then they did Exorcist to the next year, and

434
00:23:42,560 --> 00:23:45,000
Speaker 1: then he didn't like having to make those decisions and

435
00:23:45,040 --> 00:23:48,399
Speaker 1: he wanted He was the most selfless person I've ever met.

436
00:23:48,440 --> 00:23:52,119
Speaker 1: I mean, they wanted us to be co chairman, And

437
00:23:52,200 --> 00:23:54,359
Speaker 1: I said, I can't believe I said it, because I

438
00:23:54,359 --> 00:23:58,240
Speaker 1: had hated Paramount at that point. I said, no, these

439
00:23:58,280 --> 00:24:00,840
Speaker 1: companies have to be run. I one person has to

440
00:24:00,840 --> 00:24:05,119
Speaker 1: be So when when Barry leaves, you're not pining for

441
00:24:05,160 --> 00:24:07,320
Speaker 1: the job his job at Paramount, you want out of there,

442
00:24:07,400 --> 00:24:09,840
Speaker 1: You don't really don't want to stay. Yeah, within a

443
00:24:09,840 --> 00:24:12,760
Speaker 1: week I was going. And when then did anybody with

444
00:24:12,880 --> 00:24:15,159
Speaker 1: the name Disney? I mean, there's a small list here.

445
00:24:15,440 --> 00:24:18,560
Speaker 1: Didn done anybody with the last name Disney? Were they

446
00:24:19,240 --> 00:24:21,520
Speaker 1: pivotal and getting you to get that job as well? Roy?

447
00:24:21,680 --> 00:24:24,000
Speaker 1: What was going on with us? But the family? Yeah,

448
00:24:24,040 --> 00:24:27,080
Speaker 1: the well, the family was dysfunctional, as has been written

449
00:24:27,080 --> 00:24:31,720
Speaker 1: about a lot. And and Walt is the considered his

450
00:24:31,720 --> 00:24:37,120
Speaker 1: his nephew Roy not up to anything on the other day,

451
00:24:37,160 --> 00:24:39,879
Speaker 1: and Roy looked like Walt. And Roy was still there

452
00:24:39,920 --> 00:24:43,359
Speaker 1: on the board, and Walter had died twenty two years earlier,

453
00:24:44,119 --> 00:24:48,680
Speaker 1: and they treated Roy badly and they didn't let him

454
00:24:48,680 --> 00:24:52,560
Speaker 1: do anything. And he was part of this takeover to

455
00:24:52,560 --> 00:24:55,600
Speaker 1: to to bring Disney to its knees. And he's the

456
00:24:55,600 --> 00:24:58,000
Speaker 1: one that called me up because I sat on a

457
00:24:58,080 --> 00:25:01,200
Speaker 1: board for California's Through the Arts next to him. That's

458
00:25:01,240 --> 00:25:04,920
Speaker 1: how I knew him. And he wanted this change, and

459
00:25:05,000 --> 00:25:10,359
Speaker 1: he wanted, as he described, a out of control creative force.

460
00:25:11,440 --> 00:25:14,159
Speaker 1: Uh that was like his uncle, That's the way he

461
00:25:14,200 --> 00:25:16,520
Speaker 1: described it. I said, I'm not gonna give you that.

462
00:25:16,760 --> 00:25:19,560
Speaker 1: I'm not your uncle, but I am maybe out of

463
00:25:19,600 --> 00:25:23,840
Speaker 1: control and and and and ambitious. And well I was

464
00:25:23,960 --> 00:25:28,119
Speaker 1: less ambitious than I was. I just liked, you know,

465
00:25:28,200 --> 00:25:30,520
Speaker 1: the party I was going to. I liked I'd never

466
00:25:30,880 --> 00:25:33,800
Speaker 1: had been to Disneyland twice with my kids. I liked

467
00:25:33,800 --> 00:25:36,080
Speaker 1: that idea of building parts. I liked the idea of

468
00:25:36,119 --> 00:25:39,000
Speaker 1: the real estate. I liked the idea of that you

469
00:25:39,000 --> 00:25:40,760
Speaker 1: can put it all back together again the right way,

470
00:25:40,800 --> 00:25:43,960
Speaker 1: or would be thrilling right. And they and what happened

471
00:25:44,040 --> 00:25:46,960
Speaker 1: was this, this family in Texas by the name of

472
00:25:47,040 --> 00:25:52,320
Speaker 1: the Best, said Bass, and his brothers recognized the opportunity.

473
00:25:52,560 --> 00:25:56,720
Speaker 1: And it was really interesting because they the day before

474
00:25:56,760 --> 00:26:01,120
Speaker 1: the last board meeting, they kind intacted us and they

475
00:26:01,119 --> 00:26:05,600
Speaker 1: said they wanted Frank Wells, not me, because Frank had

476
00:26:05,640 --> 00:26:12,600
Speaker 1: this Rhodes scholar legal, beautiful person, you know, very waspy,

477
00:26:12,640 --> 00:26:16,680
Speaker 1: and I was this, uh different, let's put that way.

478
00:26:17,040 --> 00:26:22,520
Speaker 1: And so Frank came over on a Saturday, and I thought, well,

479
00:26:22,640 --> 00:26:24,720
Speaker 1: maybe he's manipulating it because I didn't know him. And

480
00:26:24,760 --> 00:26:29,000
Speaker 1: I said, well, let's call them in Texas. And we

481
00:26:29,119 --> 00:26:31,280
Speaker 1: called them and I had one speaker phone in my house.

482
00:26:31,359 --> 00:26:33,879
Speaker 1: Frank ran over because he was a runner, so he

483
00:26:33,960 --> 00:26:37,000
Speaker 1: was soaking wet, dripping on our floor and he and

484
00:26:37,040 --> 00:26:38,840
Speaker 1: I called them who were in the office. There are

485
00:26:38,840 --> 00:26:41,679
Speaker 1: about six of them the office in Fort Worth. And

486
00:26:41,760 --> 00:26:45,280
Speaker 1: I gave a kind of a Jimmy Stewart, you know,

487
00:26:45,800 --> 00:26:49,960
Speaker 1: uh speech in front of Congress about how the Disney

488
00:26:50,000 --> 00:26:52,920
Speaker 1: Company how to be run from a creative point of view.

489
00:26:52,960 --> 00:26:54,520
Speaker 1: It had to be about what is the movie? What

490
00:26:54,680 --> 00:26:56,399
Speaker 1: is the theme park? What is television? How do you

491
00:26:56,400 --> 00:26:58,480
Speaker 1: get back into television? How do you get the video?

492
00:26:59,200 --> 00:27:01,959
Speaker 1: And I went on for maybe I don't know, a minute.

493
00:27:02,560 --> 00:27:06,120
Speaker 1: There was a pause of five seconds and said they said,

494
00:27:06,640 --> 00:27:10,720
Speaker 1: you're a guy. You should be chairman. And it was

495
00:27:10,960 --> 00:27:14,919
Speaker 1: under Eisner's direction that Disney transformed from a film and

496
00:27:14,960 --> 00:27:23,000
Speaker 1: theme park company into a global media empire. Explore the

497
00:27:23,119 --> 00:27:26,840
Speaker 1: Here's the Thing Archives. I talked with Lorne Michael's, the

498
00:27:26,920 --> 00:27:30,240
Speaker 1: creator and producer of Saturday Night Live, about what he

499
00:27:30,359 --> 00:27:34,119
Speaker 1: felt after the very first episode wrapped. I was the

500
00:27:34,160 --> 00:27:36,240
Speaker 1: same way then that I am now. I only see

501
00:27:36,280 --> 00:27:39,359
Speaker 1: the mistakes, and I tend to wear that up until

502
00:27:40,600 --> 00:27:43,960
Speaker 1: about the second drink at the party. Even last week's

503
00:27:44,000 --> 00:27:47,840
Speaker 1: show takes me really through midway through Sunday. You just

504
00:27:47,960 --> 00:27:49,520
Speaker 1: take me a couple of days. I'm gonna get over

505
00:27:49,520 --> 00:27:52,280
Speaker 1: it now in a day. Because you're always hoping that

506
00:27:52,320 --> 00:27:54,840
Speaker 1: everything's gonna work the way you were hoping it's gonna work.

507
00:27:56,720 --> 00:28:15,800
Speaker 1: Take a listen that Here's the thing, Dot Org. This

508
00:28:15,880 --> 00:28:18,840
Speaker 1: is Alec Baldwin, and you're listening to Here's the Thing.

509
00:28:20,720 --> 00:28:23,760
Speaker 1: My guest today is Michael Eisner, who is, among many

510
00:28:23,800 --> 00:28:27,520
Speaker 1: other things, the former CEO of the Walt Disney Company.

511
00:28:28,040 --> 00:28:32,040
Speaker 1: Eisener is shrewd and hardly risk averse that he explains

512
00:28:32,160 --> 00:28:35,199
Speaker 1: the rapid and astronomical growth of the company during his

513
00:28:35,320 --> 00:28:39,640
Speaker 1: tenure in more magical terms. It just happened. I mean

514
00:28:39,840 --> 00:28:45,400
Speaker 1: the first day, on the way to the office, I

515
00:28:45,480 --> 00:28:49,840
Speaker 1: got a call from Cia asked me whether we be

516
00:28:49,920 --> 00:28:56,000
Speaker 1: interested in in Golden Girls, which I said yes. That

517
00:28:56,080 --> 00:29:00,240
Speaker 1: was the first day. The second day was palmser Ski,

518
00:29:01,240 --> 00:29:03,640
Speaker 1: who was having a bad relationship at Fox. Would we

519
00:29:03,680 --> 00:29:05,840
Speaker 1: want to make down and out in Beverly Hills with

520
00:29:06,360 --> 00:29:08,800
Speaker 1: you know, turned out to be Bette Midler and Nicknosy.

521
00:29:08,880 --> 00:29:12,520
Speaker 1: So it was like going to a Chinese restaurant and

522
00:29:12,560 --> 00:29:16,800
Speaker 1: picking the best choices there were. There are always, which

523
00:29:16,840 --> 00:29:19,200
Speaker 1: is what amazes me about the entertainments which I love.

524
00:29:19,840 --> 00:29:22,360
Speaker 1: There are a lot of choices. There are a lot

525
00:29:22,360 --> 00:29:27,440
Speaker 1: of great things. The key is having an instinct seeing

526
00:29:27,440 --> 00:29:31,960
Speaker 1: what it is, seeing who's doing it, enthusiasm for it. Uh,

527
00:29:32,200 --> 00:29:36,360
Speaker 1: willing to fail because you know, if you if you

528
00:29:36,400 --> 00:29:40,440
Speaker 1: want to accelerate your your your potential for success, you've

529
00:29:40,440 --> 00:29:42,080
Speaker 1: got to double your failure rate. I mean that's kind

530
00:29:42,120 --> 00:29:45,640
Speaker 1: of a Watson IBM theory and it's true. And then

531
00:29:45,680 --> 00:29:48,080
Speaker 1: you have to you just go. You just do it now.

532
00:29:48,400 --> 00:29:50,520
Speaker 1: Did you think, though, that not that the live action

533
00:29:50,760 --> 00:29:53,680
Speaker 1: division was underperforming or that they weren't earning as many awards,

534
00:29:53,720 --> 00:29:57,480
Speaker 1: but was there a craving for more quality and more

535
00:29:57,520 --> 00:30:00,040
Speaker 1: rewards and things when you purchased Mirramax? What was in

536
00:30:00,120 --> 00:30:02,480
Speaker 1: the Mirramax purchase? Did you think you're gonna buy some

537
00:30:02,520 --> 00:30:06,160
Speaker 1: oscars when you brought Mirramax? No? Uh. When I was

538
00:30:06,200 --> 00:30:08,520
Speaker 1: at Paramount, Charlie blue Edoor call up and say I

539
00:30:08,520 --> 00:30:10,040
Speaker 1: don't care about oscars. I want you to win the

540
00:30:10,040 --> 00:30:12,280
Speaker 1: Back of America Award. I mean that was what that

541
00:30:12,360 --> 00:30:14,920
Speaker 1: was what he was Jones. I can't do the accent,

542
00:30:15,000 --> 00:30:17,320
Speaker 1: but that you could do it. That's what he did

543
00:30:17,440 --> 00:30:23,160
Speaker 1: and I never thought about. Honestly, I don't like research.

544
00:30:23,200 --> 00:30:25,240
Speaker 1: I don't mind exit poll. You know, you do a

545
00:30:25,280 --> 00:30:27,040
Speaker 1: movie and you see what the audience liked after they

546
00:30:27,080 --> 00:30:29,400
Speaker 1: see it. I've never believed in asking an audience what

547
00:30:29,440 --> 00:30:33,160
Speaker 1: they want. We never did research. We simply made movies

548
00:30:33,240 --> 00:30:35,880
Speaker 1: and television that we thought was fun to make and

549
00:30:36,000 --> 00:30:38,840
Speaker 1: interesting to make. We never thought about awards or any

550
00:30:38,880 --> 00:30:41,560
Speaker 1: of that. You just did it day in and day out.

551
00:30:42,120 --> 00:30:47,440
Speaker 1: So live action was easier because it's quicker, and Disney

552
00:30:47,440 --> 00:30:50,480
Speaker 1: needed stuff we needed to get going. We had. We

553
00:30:50,480 --> 00:30:52,840
Speaker 1: didn't have a distribution company. We put out three movies

554
00:30:52,880 --> 00:30:57,720
Speaker 1: a year. It was nothing. We had no international. Um

555
00:30:57,760 --> 00:30:59,400
Speaker 1: you know what. I don't know how it worked, I

556
00:30:59,440 --> 00:31:03,320
Speaker 1: really don't. It just did, and it's worked for me

557
00:31:03,640 --> 00:31:06,640
Speaker 1: in this one little area, which is what maybe I'm

558
00:31:06,680 --> 00:31:09,120
Speaker 1: like an idiot savant in this one little area, which

559
00:31:09,200 --> 00:31:16,440
Speaker 1: is uh being attracted to new ideas. Just it's not

560
00:31:16,520 --> 00:31:18,920
Speaker 1: a job. I never thought it was a job I

561
00:31:19,000 --> 00:31:20,719
Speaker 1: never asked, you know, there was all this, a lot

562
00:31:20,760 --> 00:31:23,520
Speaker 1: of publicity about it, how well I did financially, which

563
00:31:23,600 --> 00:31:28,000
Speaker 1: I'd never I'd never asked for anything. Anybody said I

564
00:31:28,040 --> 00:31:30,320
Speaker 1: didn't even as anything, and so so complaints to you

565
00:31:30,360 --> 00:31:34,680
Speaker 1: about your compensation. I just rolled off your back. No,

566
00:31:35,240 --> 00:31:38,720
Speaker 1: because I believe everything I read in the New York

567
00:31:38,720 --> 00:31:41,200
Speaker 1: Times or anywhere except for it's about me. And then

568
00:31:41,240 --> 00:31:43,880
Speaker 1: as I don't believe any of it, so I you know,

569
00:31:43,920 --> 00:31:46,920
Speaker 1: you never like to people say they don't care about criticism,

570
00:31:46,960 --> 00:31:49,640
Speaker 1: you don't like to see it. I find the executives

571
00:31:49,680 --> 00:31:52,600
Speaker 1: care more than the actress. Sometimes about the criticis axtly,

572
00:31:52,720 --> 00:31:56,040
Speaker 1: that's for sure. No, as I'm going in a car

573
00:31:56,600 --> 00:31:59,959
Speaker 1: to Disney to meet the board the first day, somebody

574
00:32:00,080 --> 00:32:03,920
Speaker 1: says to me, what deal do you want? And I said,

575
00:32:03,920 --> 00:32:06,080
Speaker 1: We'll just I'll just take whatever my paramount deal was.

576
00:32:06,240 --> 00:32:08,560
Speaker 1: And that was the last negotiation I had for seven years.

577
00:32:09,640 --> 00:32:15,600
Speaker 1: We did so well. The company went from billion five

578
00:32:15,960 --> 00:32:19,640
Speaker 1: to eight billion dollars in value, and I benefited from that.

579
00:32:20,480 --> 00:32:23,920
Speaker 1: You know. We we we bought the Los Angeles Angels

580
00:32:23,920 --> 00:32:28,120
Speaker 1: and we started the Anaheim Ducks. And people talk about

581
00:32:28,400 --> 00:32:32,080
Speaker 1: salaries of players. You know, to find somebody that can

582
00:32:32,080 --> 00:32:35,480
Speaker 1: throw a hundred mile an pitch. If that person exists,

583
00:32:36,440 --> 00:32:39,120
Speaker 1: that's a competitive environment. Now, the fact of the matter

584
00:32:39,240 --> 00:32:41,680
Speaker 1: is he can only do it for about six years.

585
00:32:41,760 --> 00:32:44,280
Speaker 1: And many actors who get paid well don't get paid

586
00:32:44,320 --> 00:32:47,080
Speaker 1: well for fourty or fifty years. They they have they

587
00:32:47,120 --> 00:32:52,840
Speaker 1: have a high point. I do not have a problem

588
00:32:53,000 --> 00:32:56,560
Speaker 1: with salaries. I don't even have problems with executive salaries

589
00:32:56,600 --> 00:32:59,960
Speaker 1: as long as executive salaries are tied to performers. When

590
00:33:00,040 --> 00:33:03,800
Speaker 1: there when executives get paid when the performance is bad

591
00:33:03,840 --> 00:33:08,120
Speaker 1: and they manipulate the SYS, that to me is atrocious.

592
00:33:08,160 --> 00:33:11,080
Speaker 1: But but our system is what it is. And by

593
00:33:11,080 --> 00:33:13,600
Speaker 1: the way, when I was making seventy a week as

594
00:33:13,600 --> 00:33:16,680
Speaker 1: an usher and I would read about the chairman of

595
00:33:17,040 --> 00:33:19,680
Speaker 1: that point, it was our c A or NBC making

596
00:33:19,720 --> 00:33:23,400
Speaker 1: all this money. I thought that was great. That was like, oh, someday,

597
00:33:23,520 --> 00:33:27,000
Speaker 1: maybe I can get to that level. And almost everybody

598
00:33:27,080 --> 00:33:32,200
Speaker 1: I deal with in the entertainment business, almost everybody comes

599
00:33:32,240 --> 00:33:36,080
Speaker 1: from very modest backgrounds and they've worked there. There's no

600
00:33:36,240 --> 00:33:40,760
Speaker 1: cast system. You know, when you read a writer script,

601
00:33:40,920 --> 00:33:43,640
Speaker 1: you don't care who that writer is, what that writer

602
00:33:43,720 --> 00:33:47,320
Speaker 1: looks like if it's good, it's good. It's just, it's just,

603
00:33:47,840 --> 00:33:51,320
Speaker 1: it's based on merit. You stay at Disney until two

604
00:33:51,400 --> 00:33:56,200
Speaker 1: thousand five, you stay longer, and then eventually you leave.

605
00:33:56,960 --> 00:33:58,760
Speaker 1: Why did you want to leave in two thousand five?

606
00:34:00,520 --> 00:34:06,280
Speaker 1: Well it was a different era. Describe how different? Well

607
00:34:06,960 --> 00:34:10,160
Speaker 1: it was different, and that we had gone from nothing

608
00:34:10,200 --> 00:34:13,560
Speaker 1: to this giant company. Uh. I was. I had had

609
00:34:13,600 --> 00:34:17,439
Speaker 1: a heart issue twenty years earlier. I was still had

610
00:34:17,760 --> 00:34:22,560
Speaker 1: ten scripts sitting in my bedstand unread every night. I

611
00:34:22,600 --> 00:34:25,319
Speaker 1: was still traveling all over the world. There was a

612
00:34:25,360 --> 00:34:29,160
Speaker 1: lot of dissension I was. I was in conflict with

613
00:34:29,360 --> 00:34:32,759
Speaker 1: the Weinstein's. I was in conflict a little bit with

614
00:34:33,000 --> 00:34:37,920
Speaker 1: Steve Jobs. I was in conflict with Roy Disney, and

615
00:34:39,280 --> 00:34:42,840
Speaker 1: my point of view was and in hindsight, I wasn't

616
00:34:43,080 --> 00:34:47,120
Speaker 1: political enough. Now I read all about politics and Marine

617
00:34:47,160 --> 00:34:50,480
Speaker 1: Dowd the other day about running doing what's right as

618
00:34:50,520 --> 00:34:53,960
Speaker 1: opposed to doing what's political. I was doing towards the

619
00:34:54,080 --> 00:34:58,760
Speaker 1: end of my UH career of Disney, through my arrogance

620
00:34:58,840 --> 00:35:02,279
Speaker 1: and success, always where I thought was right and never

621
00:35:02,320 --> 00:35:05,799
Speaker 1: where I thought was political. So even though the Weinstein's

622
00:35:05,840 --> 00:35:09,279
Speaker 1: were the darling of New York and the media. We

623
00:35:09,280 --> 00:35:14,279
Speaker 1: were losing a fortune because Harvey wanted to be more

624
00:35:14,320 --> 00:35:18,160
Speaker 1: than what he's great at, which is a kind of

625
00:35:18,200 --> 00:35:21,239
Speaker 1: independent filmmaker. He wanted to make very expensive films. He

626
00:35:21,280 --> 00:35:22,840
Speaker 1: wanted to be in all these other businesses. So I

627
00:35:22,880 --> 00:35:26,359
Speaker 1: was in conflict with him, books, all the stuff, and

628
00:35:26,520 --> 00:35:31,680
Speaker 1: so we had a difficult time. Steve Jobs was very difficult.

629
00:35:32,320 --> 00:35:37,240
Speaker 1: Uh no, right, And I was the point man on

630
00:35:37,239 --> 00:35:40,799
Speaker 1: on that, and you know, we made before he really

631
00:35:40,880 --> 00:35:43,280
Speaker 1: knew about it, toy story, and then he got involved

632
00:35:43,320 --> 00:35:46,000
Speaker 1: and we did we did, you know well, but we

633
00:35:46,000 --> 00:35:53,680
Speaker 1: were in conflict. And Roy Disney, who was not of talent,

634
00:35:54,800 --> 00:35:57,040
Speaker 1: was trying to do a lot of things that I

635
00:35:57,080 --> 00:36:00,360
Speaker 1: felt were wrong creatively and had a style them. So

636
00:36:00,440 --> 00:36:03,760
Speaker 1: I was in conflict. So the combination of that conflict,

637
00:36:03,800 --> 00:36:07,279
Speaker 1: even though we would performed fantastically for twenty years, we

638
00:36:07,280 --> 00:36:10,360
Speaker 1: were everything was it was, and which Bob Eiker has

639
00:36:10,400 --> 00:36:14,560
Speaker 1: then taken and done great jobs with. Um, it was time.

640
00:36:15,080 --> 00:36:16,800
Speaker 1: I was, you know, like sixty five, and it was

641
00:36:16,880 --> 00:36:20,640
Speaker 1: time to go do other things, and which I have done. Um.

642
00:36:20,880 --> 00:36:22,880
Speaker 1: I have a show on Netflix called bow Jack Horseman,

643
00:36:22,920 --> 00:36:24,200
Speaker 1: which I think is we want to talk to you

644
00:36:24,200 --> 00:36:27,600
Speaker 1: about that about right, which is which is great fun

645
00:36:27,680 --> 00:36:30,200
Speaker 1: and doing great and uh, I'm doing a lot of

646
00:36:30,239 --> 00:36:35,480
Speaker 1: other things. And I now I'm able to exercise from

647
00:36:35,520 --> 00:36:36,920
Speaker 1: eight to nine in the morning. I don't have to

648
00:36:36,920 --> 00:36:40,280
Speaker 1: be the opposite seven thirty. And maybe I'm still alive

649
00:36:40,360 --> 00:36:44,319
Speaker 1: because of that. The just just just to touch on

650
00:36:44,360 --> 00:36:45,960
Speaker 1: this because and this is the last thing I want

651
00:36:45,960 --> 00:36:47,799
Speaker 1: to talk about about that past. There's so much more

652
00:36:47,800 --> 00:36:50,640
Speaker 1: we could cover, but I'm just so intrigued by having

653
00:36:50,680 --> 00:36:53,920
Speaker 1: someone who has had the incredible success when you talk

654
00:36:54,040 --> 00:36:55,759
Speaker 1: about to say this to flatter you, but as you said,

655
00:36:55,760 --> 00:36:59,120
Speaker 1: to go from however many billion to eighty billion, and

656
00:36:59,200 --> 00:37:01,080
Speaker 1: the roy Disneys the world, I'm going to assume that

657
00:37:01,080 --> 00:37:03,040
Speaker 1: they were major stockholders. You put a lot of money

658
00:37:03,080 --> 00:37:05,200
Speaker 1: in their pocket when you inflated the value of that company,

659
00:37:05,200 --> 00:37:07,560
Speaker 1: no doubt. And you know, you're considered one of the

660
00:37:07,560 --> 00:37:11,680
Speaker 1: most successful motion picture executives in history. You know, you

661
00:37:11,840 --> 00:37:15,160
Speaker 1: and Ross and Daily and Samuel had that great run

662
00:37:15,160 --> 00:37:18,319
Speaker 1: at Warner Brothers and just printed money with Batman and

663
00:37:18,320 --> 00:37:20,239
Speaker 1: all these Mail Gibson movies, and you know, what you

664
00:37:20,280 --> 00:37:23,040
Speaker 1: did at Disney is just unparalleled. And then the time

665
00:37:23,040 --> 00:37:26,239
Speaker 1: comes for you to end and you don't make Catsenburg

666
00:37:26,719 --> 00:37:29,280
Speaker 1: your replacement when you leave. Was it a tough decision

667
00:37:29,320 --> 00:37:32,319
Speaker 1: for you? Well, that was ten years earlier. That was

668
00:37:32,400 --> 00:37:38,040
Speaker 1: when Frank Wells died. Frank died in correct, and the

669
00:37:38,120 --> 00:37:41,759
Speaker 1: board came to me, particularly Roy, and said, if you

670
00:37:41,840 --> 00:37:45,319
Speaker 1: make Jeffrey Cansenburg anything, we will sort of proxy fight.

671
00:37:45,520 --> 00:37:49,120
Speaker 1: Why do you think that they said that? Honestly, I

672
00:37:49,160 --> 00:37:52,280
Speaker 1: think jeff wasn't that material to be the head guy.

673
00:37:52,680 --> 00:37:57,160
Speaker 1: It was well with Roy, it was emotional. Jeffrey Cassenberg

674
00:37:57,400 --> 00:38:01,160
Speaker 1: is great at being charming and rate at dealing with

675
00:38:01,360 --> 00:38:03,960
Speaker 1: important people, and they great at all of those things.

676
00:38:05,280 --> 00:38:10,080
Speaker 1: He was Roy was was made titular head of animation.

677
00:38:10,719 --> 00:38:13,840
Speaker 1: He really didn't have anything to do. Jeffrey was in charge,

678
00:38:14,640 --> 00:38:18,439
Speaker 1: and Jeffrey ignored him because his ideas were terrible. And

679
00:38:18,840 --> 00:38:21,319
Speaker 1: I would say to Jeffrey off and Jeffrey, just treat

680
00:38:21,400 --> 00:38:23,359
Speaker 1: him like he would treat an agent. Treat him well,

681
00:38:24,239 --> 00:38:27,640
Speaker 1: just be nice to him. And Jeffrey and I understand

682
00:38:27,640 --> 00:38:30,360
Speaker 1: it didn't have the time. Jeffrey was on a treadmill

683
00:38:30,680 --> 00:38:33,440
Speaker 1: going on thousand miles an hour, and he didn't have

684
00:38:33,520 --> 00:38:38,120
Speaker 1: a time to be politic with Roy. And when Frank died.

685
00:38:38,920 --> 00:38:41,640
Speaker 1: Roy made it clear that this guy was not going

686
00:38:41,680 --> 00:38:44,920
Speaker 1: to be promoted. That and the fact I personally thought

687
00:38:44,920 --> 00:38:50,239
Speaker 1: he wasn't ready. The combination of those two things led

688
00:38:50,320 --> 00:38:52,200
Speaker 1: him to leave and start dream Work. So he leaves

689
00:38:52,200 --> 00:38:53,879
Speaker 1: and starts DreamWorks. And then you get into the whole

690
00:38:53,880 --> 00:38:57,640
Speaker 1: situation with Ovin's. Well, now it's about a year later, um,

691
00:38:57,719 --> 00:39:03,040
Speaker 1: and we buy Capital Cities ABC, right, and UM, now

692
00:39:03,080 --> 00:39:07,400
Speaker 1: I am. I had had heart surgery. J Scripps in

693
00:39:07,400 --> 00:39:13,920
Speaker 1: the bin next to the bed. Jeffrey's gone, and my

694
00:39:14,000 --> 00:39:18,680
Speaker 1: wife is saying, you need help. And Michael, whom I've

695
00:39:18,680 --> 00:39:23,239
Speaker 1: known since he was in his young twenties, seemed like

696
00:39:23,520 --> 00:39:27,000
Speaker 1: he could be a solution. And I was very ambivalent

697
00:39:27,239 --> 00:39:30,160
Speaker 1: about that because I knew him well. My wife was

698
00:39:30,239 --> 00:39:33,719
Speaker 1: very much in favor of it. My middle son told

699
00:39:33,719 --> 00:39:37,680
Speaker 1: me I was crazy, and I did it and it

700
00:39:37,760 --> 00:39:43,200
Speaker 1: was a terrible mistake. He was, he he had well,

701
00:39:43,200 --> 00:39:45,800
Speaker 1: he was. He always ran a company where he didn't

702
00:39:46,400 --> 00:39:50,160
Speaker 1: smell them, he sold them. He didn't care about what what,

703
00:39:50,440 --> 00:39:53,440
Speaker 1: He didn't care that you were in exit movie. He

704
00:39:53,520 --> 00:39:55,520
Speaker 1: cared how much money you were getting an ex movie.

705
00:39:55,560 --> 00:39:58,640
Speaker 1: He was all about. He was an agent. He was

706
00:39:58,680 --> 00:40:02,239
Speaker 1: an investment banker type I mean, and he did a

707
00:40:02,400 --> 00:40:04,880
Speaker 1: very good job for his parents and he and by

708
00:40:04,920 --> 00:40:07,960
Speaker 1: the way, I was the key person when the five

709
00:40:08,040 --> 00:40:11,080
Speaker 1: of them left William Morris. I brought all five of

710
00:40:11,120 --> 00:40:14,359
Speaker 1: them in the second week they left at ABC, had

711
00:40:14,400 --> 00:40:17,200
Speaker 1: every I had a special daytime movies, everybody in the

712
00:40:17,239 --> 00:40:19,319
Speaker 1: room and they weren't allowed to leave the room until

713
00:40:19,360 --> 00:40:23,359
Speaker 1: they gave each one of those guys a deal. And

714
00:40:23,400 --> 00:40:25,920
Speaker 1: he had good talent, but not what he used what

715
00:40:25,960 --> 00:40:28,799
Speaker 1: he had later. And my motivation was he told me

716
00:40:28,880 --> 00:40:32,200
Speaker 1: he wasn't going to charge timpercent commission package commission like

717
00:40:32,239 --> 00:40:35,640
Speaker 1: William Morris, which of course they still they did quite

718
00:40:35,640 --> 00:40:39,200
Speaker 1: soon there after. So my idea was I needed help.

719
00:40:39,480 --> 00:40:42,520
Speaker 1: He would be a good successor. And it lasted a year.

720
00:40:42,560 --> 00:40:45,560
Speaker 1: It was a disaster, and he had a as everybody knows,

721
00:40:45,719 --> 00:40:49,960
Speaker 1: the whopping compensation package, which was adjudicated deep in a

722
00:40:50,040 --> 00:40:52,239
Speaker 1: year after you left it. This wasn't resolved in two

723
00:40:52,239 --> 00:40:55,919
Speaker 1: thousand and six apparently in Delaware. Correct again completely, which

724
00:40:55,920 --> 00:41:00,759
Speaker 1: would not surprise you. Misrepresented in the media. The fact

725
00:41:00,800 --> 00:41:03,239
Speaker 1: of the matter is, even I've been at forty million

726
00:41:03,280 --> 00:41:06,280
Speaker 1: dollars in a company the size of Disney, which it wasn't.

727
00:41:06,920 --> 00:41:10,080
Speaker 1: It just wasn't working. We couldn't bring the company down

728
00:41:10,080 --> 00:41:13,560
Speaker 1: by a mistake. It was my mistake, it was. And

729
00:41:13,600 --> 00:41:17,239
Speaker 1: by the way, just so you know, every newspaper, all

730
00:41:17,280 --> 00:41:20,480
Speaker 1: our shareholders, including Warren and everybody else, when I made

731
00:41:20,480 --> 00:41:22,200
Speaker 1: the announcement called me to say it was the most

732
00:41:22,239 --> 00:41:25,000
Speaker 1: brilliant thing I'd ever done at Disney, that I brought

733
00:41:25,000 --> 00:41:28,200
Speaker 1: in the guy who wouldn't say that. There's as far

734
00:41:28,200 --> 00:41:30,840
Speaker 1: as as far as executive tough business a decision that

735
00:41:31,000 --> 00:41:33,440
Speaker 1: this was. I was bringing in the person news of

736
00:41:33,480 --> 00:41:35,960
Speaker 1: the cover of Newsweek is the most powerful man in Hollywood,

737
00:41:35,960 --> 00:41:38,759
Speaker 1: who made the miss Schuster deal to buy Universal and

738
00:41:38,800 --> 00:41:42,280
Speaker 1: all this stuff. I was bringing in a real leader

739
00:41:43,040 --> 00:41:45,520
Speaker 1: and it didn't work. What kind of stuff are you

740
00:41:45,520 --> 00:41:48,360
Speaker 1: working on now? Bow Jack Horseman is with Netflix now?

741
00:41:48,400 --> 00:41:50,480
Speaker 1: People always complained to me and say that, you know,

742
00:41:50,560 --> 00:41:52,600
Speaker 1: Netflix is great at once, but then no back end

743
00:41:52,640 --> 00:41:56,520
Speaker 1: and Netflix, I mean, television has changed exponentially since you

744
00:41:56,600 --> 00:41:59,160
Speaker 1: were running ABC and then when you bought ABC. I mean,

745
00:41:59,200 --> 00:42:01,680
Speaker 1: one minute, you're fetching I don't know who you're fetching

746
00:42:01,680 --> 00:42:04,000
Speaker 1: coffee for. Over there in the beginning in the seventies,

747
00:42:04,000 --> 00:42:06,120
Speaker 1: when you're working there as a as a as an

748
00:42:06,160 --> 00:42:09,239
Speaker 1: usher or whatever your first job. Anybody right, anyway that

749
00:42:09,360 --> 00:42:11,880
Speaker 1: anybody that told you listen, kids a lot of longer

750
00:42:13,440 --> 00:42:16,400
Speaker 1: with this type pressed and light starts in those shirts.

751
00:42:16,440 --> 00:42:19,359
Speaker 1: But the UH. And then of course you have this

752
00:42:19,560 --> 00:42:23,280
Speaker 1: fabled career and you buy ABC your company. What's changed

753
00:42:23,280 --> 00:42:25,160
Speaker 1: for you? What what amazes you the most of the

754
00:42:25,200 --> 00:42:27,240
Speaker 1: way it is now? Well, first of all, the secret

755
00:42:27,239 --> 00:42:31,080
Speaker 1: on Netflix just answer that is it's fantastic. As a producer,

756
00:42:31,840 --> 00:42:35,560
Speaker 1: I have in the first season, I have sent profit

757
00:42:35,760 --> 00:42:40,160
Speaker 1: checks to the UH, to the talent. I did the

758
00:42:40,160 --> 00:42:43,000
Speaker 1: same thing with the show I did on Nickelodeam. I

759
00:42:43,040 --> 00:42:47,759
Speaker 1: don't believe in this idea of producing for so much

760
00:42:47,800 --> 00:42:49,719
Speaker 1: more money than you get in. So we've had a

761
00:42:49,800 --> 00:42:52,600
Speaker 1: very good relationship with Netflix and everybody that works on

762
00:42:52,640 --> 00:42:57,040
Speaker 1: this show, Raphael Bob Waxburg, who's a genius. It's an

763
00:42:57,040 --> 00:43:01,040
Speaker 1: animated adult type of show. Um loves it. So I'm

764
00:43:01,040 --> 00:43:04,400
Speaker 1: doing a lot of that kind of stuff. I am.

765
00:43:04,440 --> 00:43:06,840
Speaker 1: I own a company called Tops, which you may remember

766
00:43:06,920 --> 00:43:10,560
Speaker 1: to baseball cards, and we are the governant with the Governant,

767
00:43:10,719 --> 00:43:13,319
Speaker 1: but we are now a global company. We're very big

768
00:43:13,320 --> 00:43:19,800
Speaker 1: in international football, Premier League bundes League, Champions League soccer. Right, Um,

769
00:43:19,840 --> 00:43:24,080
Speaker 1: I am. I got about twenty investments and new ideas,

770
00:43:24,200 --> 00:43:28,600
Speaker 1: new new digital companies. I'm an advisor to my three

771
00:43:28,680 --> 00:43:31,080
Speaker 1: children who don't listen, but I still an advisor to

772
00:43:31,160 --> 00:43:35,520
Speaker 1: him and doing exercising from eight tw nine o'clock in

773
00:43:35,560 --> 00:43:39,040
Speaker 1: the morning. I have time to exercise. Uh, Like right now,

774
00:43:39,080 --> 00:43:41,760
Speaker 1: I don't have thirty phone calls to return because something

775
00:43:41,880 --> 00:43:43,600
Speaker 1: is how you do but them I can return them

776
00:43:43,600 --> 00:43:46,319
Speaker 1: from now. Now. Your son, what's something you wanted him

777
00:43:46,360 --> 00:43:47,920
Speaker 1: to know? Is he was coming up in the business.

778
00:43:47,960 --> 00:43:51,080
Speaker 1: You said you knew nothing about directing and putting movies together,

779
00:43:51,120 --> 00:43:52,200
Speaker 1: but you know a hell of a lot about the

780
00:43:52,200 --> 00:43:55,440
Speaker 1: movie business. What did you want him to know? Well,

781
00:43:55,480 --> 00:43:58,760
Speaker 1: the one thing that I'm proud of my three sons

782
00:43:58,760 --> 00:44:02,359
Speaker 1: and they all have great spouses and tons of grandchildren

783
00:44:02,360 --> 00:44:08,279
Speaker 1: and all that is that there decent and I think

784
00:44:08,280 --> 00:44:13,839
Speaker 1: it's probably hard to follow a successful father. Um, they

785
00:44:13,880 --> 00:44:16,120
Speaker 1: don't seem to think that. J. J. Abrams dad was

786
00:44:16,160 --> 00:44:19,800
Speaker 1: a successful TV producer and he has certainly eclipsed his father, Jerry.

787
00:44:19,960 --> 00:44:23,640
Speaker 1: I made many movies with Jerry, with Jerry and Jerry Eisenberg,

788
00:44:23,719 --> 00:44:25,120
Speaker 1: the two of them that were a team and we

789
00:44:25,200 --> 00:44:26,680
Speaker 1: made a lot of movies of the Week with them.

790
00:44:28,200 --> 00:44:30,840
Speaker 1: By the way, the people who ruin the entertainment business

791
00:44:30,960 --> 00:44:34,080
Speaker 1: are all my children's age. They are all A lot

792
00:44:34,120 --> 00:44:36,480
Speaker 1: of them are sons of friends of mine. I can't

793
00:44:36,520 --> 00:44:38,239
Speaker 1: get them on the phone, but they're still friends of

794
00:44:38,560 --> 00:44:40,680
Speaker 1: sons of friends of mine. You're not the Eisener that

795
00:44:40,680 --> 00:44:42,520
Speaker 1: they want to call back anymore. There's another eis where

796
00:44:42,520 --> 00:44:44,080
Speaker 1: they want to call, you know. I remember going to

797
00:44:44,160 --> 00:44:47,520
Speaker 1: soccer fields with a y s osccer with my sons

798
00:44:47,560 --> 00:44:50,799
Speaker 1: growing up, and somebody are going to a hockey games.

799
00:44:50,800 --> 00:44:52,920
Speaker 1: Two of my sons made hockey and they would tell Eisner,

800
00:44:53,800 --> 00:44:56,000
Speaker 1: like get on the field, and I was halfway on

801
00:44:56,040 --> 00:45:00,239
Speaker 1: the field. No, I'm I'm Eisner. Now, I don't even move.

802
00:45:00,680 --> 00:45:04,600
Speaker 1: I went a while back, a while back. I don't

803
00:45:04,600 --> 00:45:06,920
Speaker 1: really I don't really see that many things. But a

804
00:45:06,920 --> 00:45:09,960
Speaker 1: while back when the Last Batman came out, that Christian

805
00:45:10,000 --> 00:45:12,920
Speaker 1: Bale was in and the trailers came on in advanced,

806
00:45:13,160 --> 00:45:15,279
Speaker 1: and I must say, I'm not a squeamish person. I mean,

807
00:45:15,320 --> 00:45:16,919
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm not a I mean I'm somebody who's

808
00:45:17,000 --> 00:45:20,080
Speaker 1: liked action films and if they have a violent component

809
00:45:20,160 --> 00:45:23,879
Speaker 1: that serves the story. That's okay, But um my god,

810
00:45:23,920 --> 00:45:26,839
Speaker 1: I couldn't believe how violent these movies were. They had

811
00:45:26,880 --> 00:45:31,239
Speaker 1: to have eight or ten trailers, and everyone someone was

812
00:45:31,360 --> 00:45:35,400
Speaker 1: by with their physical hands. In some martial arts, uh,

813
00:45:35,840 --> 00:45:40,239
Speaker 1: ballet was just taking someone apart, or guns and some

814
00:45:40,320 --> 00:45:43,480
Speaker 1: other advanced weaponry. Is that something that you've seen change

815
00:45:43,480 --> 00:45:45,440
Speaker 1: in terms of the content of the movie business over

816
00:45:45,440 --> 00:45:48,239
Speaker 1: the last several years. It's disturbed or you know, I

817
00:45:48,320 --> 00:45:50,960
Speaker 1: feel that way. Well. At Paramount we must have made

818
00:45:50,960 --> 00:45:53,840
Speaker 1: two hundred films and we only made two action films

819
00:45:53,840 --> 00:45:56,719
Speaker 1: in that entire time, and we were still very successful.

820
00:45:56,800 --> 00:46:00,839
Speaker 1: At Disney, we didn't make Star Trek Paramount, and at

821
00:46:00,840 --> 00:46:05,640
Speaker 1: Disney most of our action stuff was modest. I am

822
00:46:05,680 --> 00:46:09,960
Speaker 1: hoping that this live action films that you described is

823
00:46:10,040 --> 00:46:13,320
Speaker 1: like car are like cartoons, that people in the audience

824
00:46:13,480 --> 00:46:18,799
Speaker 1: realize its fiction, realize it's all bubble gum activity, right,

825
00:46:19,040 --> 00:46:25,759
Speaker 1: because if it begot violence in a susceptible male audience,

826
00:46:26,120 --> 00:46:29,200
Speaker 1: that would be bad. I've studied a lot about this

827
00:46:29,239 --> 00:46:32,720
Speaker 1: because I ran children's program at ABC. I put on Batman,

828
00:46:32,920 --> 00:46:36,440
Speaker 1: Wonder Woman, Aquaman, and one other In one show from

829
00:46:36,440 --> 00:46:39,960
Speaker 1: wonders when I was there, and I am convinced that

830
00:46:40,640 --> 00:46:43,960
Speaker 1: kids do not think they can get on kitchen tables

831
00:46:44,520 --> 00:46:48,000
Speaker 1: and fly off of it. And I am convinced that

832
00:46:48,040 --> 00:46:50,360
Speaker 1: when you see Batman or Superman or the all of

833
00:46:50,480 --> 00:46:54,000
Speaker 1: Marvels stuff, they don't really think that they can emulate that.

834
00:46:54,719 --> 00:46:59,080
Speaker 1: To me, the other kind of violence, the more realistic violence,

835
00:46:59,760 --> 00:47:04,160
Speaker 1: this street violence, is more disturbing the bubble gun violence

836
00:47:04,360 --> 00:47:07,160
Speaker 1: is like a cartoon, So I don't know how it's

837
00:47:07,160 --> 00:47:14,480
Speaker 1: affecting uh are our civilization. I'm much more nervous about

838
00:47:14,520 --> 00:47:16,919
Speaker 1: the ability to leave the theater and get a gun,

839
00:47:17,480 --> 00:47:19,200
Speaker 1: which is so easy. I think that people who watch

840
00:47:19,280 --> 00:47:22,200
Speaker 1: violent content and it motivates them to commit an act

841
00:47:22,200 --> 00:47:25,200
Speaker 1: of violence as a whole other psychopathology before they enter

842
00:47:25,239 --> 00:47:27,280
Speaker 1: the theater. I don't think the film business is responsible

843
00:47:27,320 --> 00:47:31,080
Speaker 1: for that. Um, you're a man who's seen as as

844
00:47:31,120 --> 00:47:34,400
Speaker 1: a consequence of the business shom You've seen hundreds and

845
00:47:34,640 --> 00:47:37,800
Speaker 1: hundreds and hundreds of movies. When you go to the movies. Now,

846
00:47:38,520 --> 00:47:41,480
Speaker 1: describe when Michael Eisner, the famous Michael Eisner, goes to

847
00:47:41,480 --> 00:47:42,840
Speaker 1: the movies. What does he do? Is it a bucket

848
00:47:42,840 --> 00:47:45,759
Speaker 1: of popcorn? Is it raised and that's what are you?

849
00:47:46,080 --> 00:47:47,480
Speaker 1: Is in a screening room, moving in your own home?

850
00:47:47,560 --> 00:47:49,759
Speaker 1: Or do you go to the theater. I almost only

851
00:47:49,800 --> 00:47:53,640
Speaker 1: go to the theater. I go at least twice a week.

852
00:47:53,719 --> 00:47:56,439
Speaker 1: And what do you doing? I often go at ten

853
00:47:56,440 --> 00:48:01,000
Speaker 1: o'clock or midnight. Uh, can't drag my wife out. Usually

854
00:48:01,719 --> 00:48:05,400
Speaker 1: I'll go in the afternoon. Uh. I can remember even

855
00:48:05,480 --> 00:48:07,839
Speaker 1: being at ABC when I was twenty seven years old

856
00:48:07,840 --> 00:48:09,799
Speaker 1: and having a fight with somebody and saying, you know what,

857
00:48:10,400 --> 00:48:12,360
Speaker 1: I'm getting out of here and go to Broadway and

858
00:48:12,400 --> 00:48:15,440
Speaker 1: go to a movie. So I do see a lot

859
00:48:15,480 --> 00:48:19,440
Speaker 1: of movies. Um, I like maybe it's age related. I

860
00:48:19,520 --> 00:48:23,360
Speaker 1: like the dramas. I like, uh, the comedies. I'm a

861
00:48:23,480 --> 00:48:28,600
Speaker 1: little little I admire the technology and the action films.

862
00:48:28,680 --> 00:48:31,359
Speaker 1: The action films, but my wife likes those one than

863
00:48:31,400 --> 00:48:33,160
Speaker 1: I do. What's a movie that when you were in

864
00:48:33,280 --> 00:48:35,520
Speaker 1: charge of these movie companies you made. Guess there must

865
00:48:35,560 --> 00:48:37,560
Speaker 1: have been obviously countless examples. Give me, but give me

866
00:48:37,600 --> 00:48:40,480
Speaker 1: one example where you're and I'm being very Hollywood myself

867
00:48:40,560 --> 00:48:42,560
Speaker 1: right now, you're in a screening room alone or with

868
00:48:42,600 --> 00:48:44,640
Speaker 1: your associates. You sit there and you go, man, I'm

869
00:48:44,680 --> 00:48:46,279
Speaker 1: proud of that movie. That we made. What's one that

870
00:48:46,360 --> 00:48:48,440
Speaker 1: really really you think, God, I'm proud of that movie.

871
00:48:48,680 --> 00:48:50,919
Speaker 1: I love that movie. Well, the problem is the first

872
00:48:51,000 --> 00:48:54,640
Speaker 1: time you see it and it's really good, you keep

873
00:48:54,719 --> 00:48:57,320
Speaker 1: hoping it's going to end quickly. It's like going to

874
00:48:57,400 --> 00:49:00,120
Speaker 1: a hockey game where your son is the goalie and

875
00:49:00,200 --> 00:49:02,720
Speaker 1: you and they're leading one nothing, and you just wanted

876
00:49:02,800 --> 00:49:06,640
Speaker 1: to end because you keep being fearful that it's going

877
00:49:06,719 --> 00:49:09,520
Speaker 1: to fall apart. Sometimes they fall apart in the first

878
00:49:09,560 --> 00:49:12,520
Speaker 1: scene and then you then then then it's agony. I mean,

879
00:49:13,000 --> 00:49:17,840
Speaker 1: but you sit there and if it actually ends and

880
00:49:17,920 --> 00:49:21,880
Speaker 1: you still are related like you are from the beginning, Uh,

881
00:49:21,960 --> 00:49:24,040
Speaker 1: it's a great field. What's one you're very proud of?

882
00:49:25,719 --> 00:49:27,799
Speaker 1: What's one that moved you? You said they're gonna God, damn,

883
00:49:27,800 --> 00:49:33,080
Speaker 1: I'm glad I made that movie. Well, you know, I

884
00:49:33,120 --> 00:49:36,239
Speaker 1: don't know, because there's there were so many guys. If

885
00:49:36,239 --> 00:49:40,040
Speaker 1: I fake back, I think when you know, John Travolta

886
00:49:41,520 --> 00:49:43,120
Speaker 1: and I've had a lot of success together, and we

887
00:49:43,160 --> 00:49:45,600
Speaker 1: started with Connor and then Boys in the Plastic Bubble

888
00:49:46,239 --> 00:49:49,759
Speaker 1: and then he went into Saturday Night Fever and that

889
00:49:49,880 --> 00:49:53,560
Speaker 1: was a leap for us Paramount. It was very early

890
00:49:55,000 --> 00:49:58,280
Speaker 1: for him. I didn't know that it was a musical.

891
00:49:58,840 --> 00:50:02,040
Speaker 1: I didn't know the b g were still alive. I

892
00:50:02,080 --> 00:50:05,719
Speaker 1: didn't know that Robert Stick was the entrepreneur manager of

893
00:50:05,760 --> 00:50:09,640
Speaker 1: the BGS was still alive. Uh. And when you sat

894
00:50:09,680 --> 00:50:12,680
Speaker 1: down and you saw the main title and the feet

895
00:50:12,719 --> 00:50:17,960
Speaker 1: walking down the street, you just knew instantly you're onto something.

896
00:50:17,960 --> 00:50:24,000
Speaker 1: It was on something. Michael Eisner is still onto something

897
00:50:24,120 --> 00:50:28,880
Speaker 1: right now. Netflix releases the third season of bow Jack Horseman,

898
00:50:29,000 --> 00:50:33,200
Speaker 1: his animated series about a former sitcom star horse trying

899
00:50:33,200 --> 00:50:37,200
Speaker 1: to make a comeback. This summer. And these days, Michael

900
00:50:37,200 --> 00:50:40,520
Speaker 1: Eisner is making his mark outside the entertainment industry. To

901
00:50:41,239 --> 00:50:44,719
Speaker 1: The Eisner Foundation supports programs that bring young people and

902
00:50:44,800 --> 00:50:49,880
Speaker 1: the elderly together to solve problems. This is Alec Baldwin,

903
00:50:50,120 --> 00:51:01,279
Speaker 1: and you were listening to Here's the Thing or