Everybody in the business world has been following the Disney saga with great interest. There's Roy Disney's Save Disney campaign, which helped spark the shareholder revolt last year that prompted Michael Eisner to agree to board changes and a deadline for his retirement. Eisner's world also was rocked by the massive shareholder suit against Disney over the firing of Michael Ovitz. James Stewart's book Disney War isn't helping much, as it paints Eisner as an out- of-control autocrat. Now, however, according to Drudge, Eisner is being "defended" by famed Hollywood producer Robert Evans:
Evans argues that a well- orchestrated PR campaign to overthrow Eisner by Walt Disney nephew Roy Disney is 'reminiscent of Goebels [sic] propagating the heroics of Adolf Hitler.'
Wow. Aren't people getting way too comfortable throwing around the Hitler analogy? In any event, with friends like Evans, Eisner certainly doesn't need enemies.
What's interesting about this from a corporate governance perspective is that during the run-up to Disney's 2004 annual shareholder meeting, Roy Disney waged an active campaign to persuade Disney shareholders to withhold their votes from Eisner and several other Disney directors. That campaign was notably successful. Although Eisner was reelected, he was badly embarrassed by the fact that the holders of 43% of the shares present at the 2004 meeting withheld authority for their shares to be voted in favor of Eisner.
During the run up to the 2005 annual meeting, Roy Disney announced that he personally would withhold his shares from Eisner, but he did not conduct a campaign to persuade other shareholders so to do. Query whether Evans little tirade will tweak Roy Disney into some response. At the very least, it seems reasonable to expect Roy Disney to be even more aggressive in holding Eisner's feet to the fire.
Which will just make Eisner's day, eh?
