March 4-10, 2004

city beat

Gale Warning

by Daryl Gale

The Unhappiest Place on Earth

It’s war.

The gauntlet has been officially thrown down in the middle of Market Street, and it looks an awful lot like Mickey Mouse’s white glove.

In preparation for the March 3 meeting of Disney shareholders at the Pennsylvania Convention Center, former Disney board members Stanley Gold and Roy Disney called their own meeting Tuesday afternoon at the Loews Hotel, exhorting those same shareholders to vote no on the re-election of the board. And, just as importantly, to run Disney CEO Michael Eisner out of town on a rail.

By 4:30 Tuesday afternoon, the room reserved for the Save Disney rally was filled to capacity, with hundreds more waiting outside. The line of people waiting to get inside stretched around the corner and south on 12th Street by the time Save Disney volunteers wearing red T-shirts emblazoned with the phrase "Goodbye Michael -- Restore the Magic" came out to tell the crowd that the fire marshal wouldn't let anyone else in.

Instead of expressing disappointment, many of the folks in line seemed genuinely happy that there were so many kindred spirits in attendance.

Inside, the room was filled with shareholders and interested Disneyphiles, some decked out in full regalia. Disney character shirts, jackets and even mouse ears were the uniform of the day as the faithful awaited the arrival of Roy Disney to the podium.

Disney, nephew of Walt and the last Disney to serve on the board, resigned in a huff last November and started a Web site, savedisney.com. He's determined to oust Eisner and restore the Disney name to its former glory.

While patiently waiting, the crowd was treated to a slide show by Disneyland historian Charles Phoenix, who apparently has been chronicling the life of the Anaheim, Calif., theme park in painstaking detail since it opened in July 1955.

When Roy Disney emerged from the wings, the crowd went wild, cheering and waving in a standing ovation that lasted several minutes.

"We need to do this because it's the right thing to do," Disney told the enthusiastic flock. "There are a lot of memories tied up in the Disney name, for children and adults all over the world. It was a company whose engine was the ideas and creativity of its people. It was about hope and happiness. Now, the board has turned us into just another entertainment company."

Clearly -- for Roy Disney and his followers, anyway -- the company has lost its vision.

Gone, they say, is the Disney of old, where the only thing more important than putting a smile on kids' faces was sparking their imagination and creativity. The new Disney, they complain, cares about kids only as a means to get their parents to buy the products.

"We need to improve the cleanliness and customer relations at our theme parks," Disney shouted over applause, "and bring the smiles back to our cast and our customers. We need to start making better movies and TV shows. We need to drag ABC out of fourth place. We need to be Disney again!"

Two weeks ago, Disney and his minions were buoyed by the company's rejection of a takeover bid by cable giant Comcast. While the deal is dead for the time being, it's still possible for the Philadelphia-based cable firm to submit a higher bid at a later date. Meanwhile, Roy and the Save Disney folks vow to keep the pressure on until Eisner is gone and the board is replaced.

"We need new leadership and a new vision," said Disney, "whose guiding principle is to inspire the creative voice and soul of Disney. The board must represent the shareholders, not senior management, and they must provide full and timely information to the public, without the politics and public relations spin."

By way of example, Disney said he was appalled by the fact that the company's five top executives earned $40 million dollars in 2002, a year in which Disney's stock fell 16 percent. In fact, Roy Disney insists, it was just such incompetence and mismanagement that led to Comcast's takeover bid in the first place.

"The board was unwilling to listen, and unwilling to hold management accountable for it's failures," said Disney. "They were happy to keep their heads buried in the sand and ignore what the rest of us clearly saw."

That this titanic struggle for power and control of one of the world's largest, most easily recognizable companies should take place in our back yard offers Philadelphians a rare glimpse into the dark world of boardroom machinations where backs are stabbed, throats are cut and lives are ruined on a daily basis.

Come to think of it, maybe it's not such a rare glimpse.

In that respect, it's actually a lot like Philadelphia politics -- but without the FBI bugs.

Daryl Gale’s weekly radio show, Dialogues, with co-hosts Rotan Lee and Bill Miller, is burning up the airwaves Fridays 7-10 a.m. on WURD (900 AM) in Philadelphia.