Michael Eisner
[4][5][6] Prior to Disney, Eisner was president of rival film studio Paramount Pictures from 1976 to 1984,[7] and had brief stints at the major television networks NBC, CBS, and ABC.As a result of the pressure from the campaign, Eisner announced in March 2005 that he would step down as CEO prematurely, handing day-to-day duties to Bob Iger before formally leaving the company in September 2005.His mother, Margaret (née Dammann), whose family founded the American Safety Razor Company, was the president of the Irvington Institute, a hospital that treated children with rheumatic fever.During his tenure at Paramount, the studio produced films such as Saturday Night Fever, Grease, the Star Trek film franchise, Ordinary People, Raiders of the Lost Ark, An Officer and a Gentleman, Flashdance, Terms of Endearment, Beverly Hills Cop, and Footloose, and TV shows such as Happy Days, Laverne & Shirley, Cheers and Family Ties.Its shareholders Sid Bass and Roy E. Disney brought in Eisner (as CEO and chairman of the board) and former Warner Bros. chief Frank Wells (as president) to replace Ron W. Miller in 1984 and strengthen the company.A couple of years after becoming chairman and CEO, Eisner became the host of The Wonderful World of Disney, making him the public face of the company as well as its top executive.Beginning with the films Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988) which was brought to Disney by Jeffrey Katzenberg and The Little Mermaid (1989) a Ron Clements idea that Eisner originally panned,[20] its flagship animation studio enjoyed a series of commercial and critical successes.Under Eisner, Disney acquired many other media sources, including ABC, most of ESPN, Fox Family Channel (now known as Freeform) and The Muppets franchise.'"[7] Eisner then recruited his friend Michael Ovitz, one of the founders of Creative Artists Agency, to be President with minimal involvement from Disney's board of directors (which at the time included Oscar-winning actor Sidney Poitier, the CEO of Hilton Hotels Corporation Stephen Bollenbach, former U.S.[33] On March 13, 2005, Eisner announced that he would step down as CEO one year before his contract expired, and handed off day-to-day duties to Bob Iger, who had been serving as Disney's President and Chief Operating Officer and had just been selected by the directors as the CEO-designate.This is even before considering the exit of Jeffery Katzenberg, the failure to honour his contract, and the hiring and firing of Michael Ovitz, personnel and judgment errors, which, in the cost to Disney and the vitriol and publicity they generated, are without parallel in American business history.... Eisner controlled and manipulated the board by keeping members isolated, preferring to communicate one-on-one; selectively doling out information, access and benefits ... and ruthlessly dispatching anyone who dared challenge him.[41] In March 2007, Eisner's investment firm, The Tornante Company, launched a studio, Vuguru, that produces and distributes videos for the Internet, portable media devices and cell phones.[46] In March 2017, came the revelation that Eisner was interested in a takeover of Portsmouth F.C., a football club in the south of England that had fallen on hard times after years of poor ownership, before being taken over by its fans.