Rumor Hollywood insiders say there's growing tension at Disney as CEO Bob Chapek chafes at Bob Iger's 'long goodbye'

[skypilot2922]

Pressler

Slaphead's prototype - famous for saying the only moving part in a Disney park should be a cash register drawer.

 

[Ponderer]

Pressler

Josh ain’t Pressler. I’ll agree that he’s kind of a tabula rasa at this point, most accounts, he likes interacting with cast members, he likes the parks, and Pressler couldn’t have given less of a damn about either.

Chapek is setting himself up to be Pressler much more than this dude, IMO.

 

[skypilot2922]

Think of it this way:

the creative gives the “vision” speeches and scares the **** out of the bankers…that’s their archetype…

…then the fixer goes around to each one and calms them down.

they end up meeting In the middle and that yields progress…no winners or losers.

if you reverse it…the CCO/is completely irrelevant as the #2…you end up with dunder mifflin…without the parties

You are describing Walt+Roy and Eisner+Wells MO here to a T.

 

[skypilot2922]

Josh ain’t Pressler. I’ll agree that he’s kind of a tabula rasa at this point, most accounts, he likes interacting with cast members, he likes the parks, and Pressler couldn’t have given less of a damn about either.

Chapek is setting himself up to be Pressler much more than this dude, IMO.

Um - Slaphead is Chapek

 

[Ponderer]

Um - Slaphead is Chapek

Yeah, I didn’t see anything about Slaphead until I was done typing.

 

[skypilot2922]

Yeah, I didn’t see anything about Slaphead until I was done typing.

No worries

 

[pdude81]

Imagine the joy Sir Walter would feel if the nickname Slaphead really stuck.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

Josh ain’t Pressler. I’ll agree that he’s kind of a tabula rasa at this point, most accounts, he likes interacting with cast members, he likes the parks, and Pressler couldn’t have given less of a damn about either.

Chapek is setting himself up to be Pressler much more than this dude, IMO.

You know that’s pointless…that’s corporate PR for Someone biding his time.

actually I see he and slappy as two halves of pressler:
1: the good looks assumption of pressler was he was ultimately harmless…which was wrong
2. The incessant crap peddler of chapek is very pressler…and they’ve never recovered from that. Fundamental shift/damage.

You are describing Walt+Roy and Eisner+Wells MO here to a T.

Of course I did.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

What is needed is someone like Joe Rohde as CCO with a equally powerful CFO who jointly exercise the CEO role, Joe can think in 3 dimensions and has an understanding of what it takes to convert an idea to steel and concrete, The other guys are film guys where 'anything is possible' on film but that leads to disaster in the real world

Honestly that would be awesome if Chapek hires Rhode back. But alas it will probably not happen.

That guy repeatedly failed to control costs and that hurt WDI as much as anything. Life’s a B…I know…but the more efficient they are, the more they get to build. Balance is something that eluded him and those parks have less today because of that.

Anyone on these forums who complained about iger being bad (which he wasn’t) is going to be in for a big wake up call

That book is far from closed…and you’re going to be surprised when it is…just stay tuned.

No, but keeping Kevin Feige happy probably is and losing him would be a huge financial blow.

I think he’s actually overrated. He’s a valuable piece…don’t get me wrong…but MCU has a lot of working parts that clicked…starting with 75 years of unused stories and characters to draw from. Not a small detail.

if he’s really that good…promote him to head of LFL and tell him to get that turned around and he can be VP/studio head of everything in 5 years…

…so simple it might just work?

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

Imagine the joy Sir Walter would feel if the nickname Slaphead really stuck.

I’d get $0.5 a use…

…mike Myers would get $0.10

 

[mikejs78]

Think of it this way:

the creative gives the “vision” speeches and scares the **** out of the bankers…that’s their archetype…

…then the fixer goes around to each one and calms them down.

they end up meeting In the middle and that yields progress…no winners or losers.

if you reverse it…the CCO/is completely irrelevant as the #2…you end up with dunder mifflin…without the parties

I was more thinking of Eisner/Wells…

Wells was a studio exec with a thorough dealings in the power/money structure of Hollywood

Eisner was the screwball that searched for scripts and came up with schoolhouse rock.

The Disneys too…

It works that way…the paradox insulated them
Both and gave them more autonomy from
“Market forces”

I don't disagree with any of this, and I think the creative/business combo is the ideal for Disney - I just was questioning the need for the creative to necessarily be the CEO, as in one of the two examples, (Walt and Roy), the creative was not the CEO. Although maybe that particular dynamic isn't repeatable because the familial relationship and Roy's own sense that this was Walt's company made it possible for him to be both CEO and happy to not be the public face of the company. With Eisener/Wells it absolutely worked, and on reflection, I think you're right (happens once in a while ) that the creative as CEO with a COO to calm Wall Street is the best approach.

That guy repeatedly failed to control costs and that hurt WDI as much as anything. Life’s a B…I know…but the more efficient they are, the more they get to build. Balance is something that eluded him and those parks have less today because of that.

That book is far from closed…and you’re going to be surprised when it is…just stay tuned.

I think he’s actually overrated. He’s a valuable piece…don’t get me wrong…but MCU has a lot of working parts that clicked…starting with 75 years of unused stories and characters to draw from. Not a small detail.

if he’s really that good…promote him to head of LFL and tell him to get that turned around and he can be VP/studio head of everything in 5 years…

…so simple it might just work?

Credit has to be given to Feige. *Many* people and studios tried to build universes and franchises around the Marvel characters. Just look at how Fox botched the X-Men after producing a couple of good films. Look at the Marvel movies of the early 2000s - the Incredible Hulk, Daredevil, etc.

For Feige to pull off what he did with the MCU is nothing short of brilliant. And, regardless if you think he's overrated or not, the key point to remember is that he is perceived as being the force behind the MCU, which is currently Disney's most valuable studio. If Wall Street even gets the sense that he might bail, there goes the stock.

 

[Sir_Cliff]

You don’t need a creative in charge, you just need someone who respects the creatives and their medium. Marvel Studios has largely flourished because it has held off meddling. Parks though went 20+ years being run by people with cursory experience, placed there specifically because they were not parks people.

To me, that's really the issue when it comes to evaluating Iger overall. On the one hand, I think it was a plus that he didn't consider himself creative in the way Eisner did as Iger seemed to value bringing creative people into the company and allowing them to run their divisions without hovering over their shoulders. It worked very well with Marvel and WDFA really picked up after a miserable period. If results with Star Wars are mixed, my impression is that it's not due to Iger meddling with Lucasfilm and is probably the risk you run when you give significant freedom to different divisions to make their own decisions.

The parks are another issue altogether. I wonder whether it has to do with what @Robbiem described regarding the draining away of old school Disney people who understood the parks since the 1980s. The mentality really seemed to shift within the company during the 1990s toward what often appears as seeing the parks as almost a problem to be solved regarding cutting operating costs and raising profits in a way that doesn't seem to have happened with other divisions. The idea that you didn't need or perhaps even want someone with experience in the parks running the division also seems to have held into the Iger era. So, too, the emphasis on running the division in an operational sense rather than considering the parks and resorts as an entertainment product in the way that, say, Marvel or Pixar have been.

Even here, though, I think it's mixed. Iger has the franchise mandate which stifled creativity, whereas Eisner had the "if it's good enough for Six Flags" approach to theming that really lowered quality. Who knows, though, maybe by the time Iger became CEO there was no-one in the company with significant status who had much sense of how the park's ran in the pre-strategic planning days who could credibly articulate a different vision that relied less heavily on IP integration.

 

[LaughingGravy]

It was often garish and absurd, but it was at least fun to live through and see the hype played out in real life and on TV.

Now we've swung in the opposite direction and everything is minimalist and boring.

You mean like the World of Disney store?

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

Around the same time Paramount bought Taft's parks, right?

The 90s were truly the peak of themed entertainment. Not in terms of quality, but sheer quantity.

Everybody had to get into the theme park business. Every restaurant had to have a theme or gimmick. Retail was go big or go home.

It was often garish and absurd, but it was at least fun to live through and see the hype played out in real life and on TV.

Now we've swung in the opposite direction and everything is minimalist and boring.

Well…I often (too often) say that Disney parks peaked in 1999 (particularly in the swamp)…and a lot of that opinion is based on the roaring 80s/90s drive to one up people in the pre-digital world

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

Hopefully Chapek will have the spine that Iger didn't and stop with the woke BS and toxic environment BTS at Disney that keeps leaking out. Go back to entertaining, stop with the catering to the fragile leftists on Twitter that have such easy lives that they have nothing better to do than look for things to be offended about, fire Kathleen Kennedy and replace her with Favreau to save Star Wars, among other things.

…so you’re gonna be “that guy”?…even if I may agree on this one point

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

Then add in Eisner/Wells devaluing expertise within business segments, especially Parks, in favor of StratPlanners, who were primarily investment bankers before coming to Disney.

They had a tough job on this…because the “family” operation had a lot of dead weight and that wasn’t gonna work moving forward.

they took it too far…but were better at the game…

imagine if the current yutz arrived in 1984? Dear lord…Disney Would be having a combined company picnic with Kodak now

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

I don't disagree with any of this, and I think the creative/business combo is the ideal for Disney - I just was questioning the need for the creative to necessarily be the CEO, as in one of the two examples, (Walt and Roy), the creative was not the CEO. Although maybe that particular dynamic isn't repeatable because the familial relationship and Roy's own sense that this was Walt's company made it possible for him to be both CEO and happy to not be the public face of the company. With Eisener/Wells it absolutely worked, and on reflection, I think you're right (happens once in a while ) that the creative as CEO with a COO to calm Wall Street is the best approach.



Credit has to be given to Feige. *Many* people and studios tried to build universes and franchises around the Marvel characters. Just look at how Fox botched the X-Men after producing a couple of good films. Look at the Marvel movies of the early 2000s - the Incredible Hulk, Daredevil, etc.

For Feige to pull off what he did with the MCU is nothing short of brilliant. And, regardless if you think he's overrated or not, the key point to remember is that he is perceived as being the force behind the MCU, which is currently Disney's most valuable studio. If Wall Street even gets the sense that he might bail, there goes the stock.

Let me clarify…

1. if an accountant is at the top…the subject never progresses past accounting. That’s why you put them at 2 behind the creative
2. Feige is very valuable…but Disney fans always have sacred cows they walk to the River Indus…

feige maybe gets a
Little of that? It’s possible.

but as you said…perception is important regardless

and Wall Street makes money off stocks being speculative/overvalued. They don’t penalize anymore cause it penalizes them. Disney is “too comfortable” in that environment to be creative.

the best thing for Disney would be to be leveraged/taken private.
They make boatloads and rich “fans” at the helm could do things…

 

[skypilot2922]

They had a tough job on this…because the “family” operation had a lot of dead weight and that wasn’t gonna work moving forward.

they took it too far…but were better at the game…

imagine if the current yutz arrived in 1984? Dead lord…Disney Would be having a combined company picnic with Kodak now

Kodak the exemplar of a creative company destroyed by accountants and short term thinking, Short version accountants did not want to harm their cash cow so deprioritized digital even though Kodak INVENTED digital photography. Then to 'streamline' they cut low volume high profit professional imaging products and supplies (story beginning to sound familiar) then they cut popular consumer/prosumer films to boost stock price. Sold off profitable divisions and now are basically an IP holding company whilst one time ankle biter fuji owns the professional market.


Fundamentally Kodak was

1 - precision coatings
2 - specialty chemicals
3 - silver based photo materials
4 - first and foremost a R&D powerhouse who invented all of modern imaging technology
5 - precision machinery company for industrial and personal use.

 

[UNCgolf]

That guy repeatedly failed to control costs and that hurt WDI as much as anything. Life’s a B…I know…but the more efficient they are, the more they get to build. Balance is something that eluded him and those parks have less today because of that.

I'm not sure it's possible to blame this on Rohde anymore -- WDI is spending even more money now than they were when he was doing things, and what they're building is nowhere as impressive as the work he did. It's clearly an institutional issue with the way Disney operates and not something you can really blame on any individual at WDI. For all we know, Rohde actually kept costs down; aren't they spending more money on an unthemed box for Guardians as they did on all of Pandora?

 

[CaptainAmerica]

if he’s really that good…promote him to head of LFL and tell him to get that turned around and he can be VP/studio head of everything in 5 years…

I think that role is John Favreau's if he wants it, whenever the Alans retire.