will not conveniently disappear like the wannabe moguls of the past. Zaslav this week moves into his new offices at Warners; Bezos has committed to focus attention on his Hollywood forays once he has established himself as the nation’s premier rocket man.At this moment, however, both might benefit from a glimpse of the problems encountered by those merger mavens of the past who were bent on reinventing Hollywood. Their missteps illuminate both the power and the peril intrinsic in their missions.
While this rogues gallery of takeover artists bumped into legal roadblocks, a subsequent succession of corporate players also hit a wall. Coca-Cola brought a swagger when it invaded an ailing Columbia Pictures, but its dealmaking style didn’t pay off in profitable product or successful diversification. Neither did General Electric succeed with its rigid structures when it tried to apply them to a confused Universal.
Hollywood insiders by no means expect that either Bezos or Zaslav are destined for this graveyard of takeover artists. On the contrary, both are expected to have a transformative impact through both their visions and their resources. By contrast, Zaslav, 61, has meticulously constructed an extraordinary media career, first building Discovery into a major force before closing his $43 billion merger with AT&T. While CNN and HBO now become important strategic elements, he is known to be especially enamored of the role thatwill play in his new edifice.