Rating: 
Summary: I'd Rather Be Lucky Than Good
Review: Michael Eisner is routinely credited (and has been handsomely rewarded) with the great Disney turnaround. Was it genius or luck? Kim Master's Key's to the Kingdom-How Michael Eisner Lost His Grip is a well researched and thoroughly entertaining look into the Hollywood scene and the Walt Disney Company in particular from 1984 to 1999. We are given a rare unfiltered peek over the burm and into the inner sanctum of the Magic Kingdom. In the end, one comes away with the intended impression that Bravado, Ego and Greed are the three horseman of Hollywood. We are left with an unflattering portrait of Michael Eisner as a parsimonious and deeply flawed leader clearly out of touch with the world around him. So how did such a flawed leader turn a Two Billion Dollar company into a Sixty Billion Dollar juggernaut of American industry? Frank Well's summed up the situation best when shortly after the Eisner/Wells team ascended to the leadership of Disney, Well's noted "Every time I open a door at this company, there's money behind it." What is glossed over and unappreciated in Kim Master's book is the fact that when Walt Disney died in 1966 he left the Disney organization without a well groomed leader. From 1966 to 1984 Walt literally ruled Disney from the grave and no one in the incestuous leadership of the company dared peek into the cupboard or look behind any door. The two to sixty billion dollar story, weaved by Kim Masters leaves the reader with the clear impression that it was Michael Eisner's luck rather than his talent which was at the core of this success. Michael's early failure to appreciate the value of animation, his obsession with paying the minimum for talent, the lost movie opportunities, the personal vendetta against Jeffrey Katzenberg, the hiring and firing of Michael Ovitz, the yet to pay off acquisition of ABC/CapitalCities are all fascinating vignette's in a passion play which could easily be called "As the Mouse Turns." Despite the negative tone of the book in general, Master's paints a flattering picture of Frank Well's insightful decision making and tactful backroom smoothing of feathers, leaving the reader to conclude that it was perhaps Well's talents and not Eisner's that were in fact were the real Keys to the Kingdom. With fewer doors to look behind and all the cupboards bare, it is interesting to note that since Well's death in 1994 Disney stock has grown only at about the same rate as the S&P 500. While insisting that most talent work for the minimum, we are told that Eisner in 1996 signed a long term employment contract with Disney which provided in addition to a $750,000 base salary, annual bonus participation and options for an additional 24,000,000 shares of Disney stock. In fairness to Michael Eisner the shareholders of Disney have profited handsomely during his tenure at the Company. Nevertheless even as Eisner himself might say "Yes, but could we have made the deal without giving up so much money?"
Rating:
Summary: Prescient Book
Review: Oh Lord, this book is so unbelievably frustrating....more than any book I've ever read. Eisner, his life and his actions are so completely fascinating and Masters somehow manages to take all this great material and make it mind-numbingly boring...what was she thinking? That you could write a "nuanced" portrait of someone by throwing in hot gossip, sound bites, bits of articles from Time and Newsweek, as well as a bunch of stories that don't remotely relate to the main subject but are "dishy"? There was so much I wanted to know as I read this book, so many questions I had and she didn't answer any of them. Masters discusses Eisner's charm vs. his ruthlessness, she brings up provacative examples of his relationship to his family, his friends and his colleagues, and then steamrolls all of them by emphasizing how "aloof" he is and "imperial." Doesn't she know that when sketching a complicated portrait of someone, you can't just throw a bunch of facts around but you have to maintain interest by putting them TOGETHER to form a PERSPECTIVE, a CONTEXT. Much more time should have been spent on Eisner's days at Disney (rather than the completely gratuitous tales of his time at Paramount, and Star Trek, and Nimoy, and Gene Roddenberry, and Don Simpson, and Barry Diller, and...well you get the picture). I liked the parts about his childhood and his relationship to his parents, they should have been given much more space...but the biggest flaw of this book is the lack of info on the Eisner-Katzenberg relationship. Sure, Masters give plenty of space to financial issues about Katzenberg's bonus, but aside from Wall Street enthusiasts, who the hell cares? She COMPLETELY glosses over the roots of the Eisner-Katzenberg bond, and we never get an idea of WHY IN THE WORLD DID THESE TWO PEOPLE REMAIN TOGETHER FOR 19 YEARS IF THEY WERE SUCH ENEMIES? What held them together? How exactly did they meet? She talks about how Katzenberg was won over, like others, by Eisner's self-deprecating charm and his (Eisner's) confidence in him, about Katzenberg's not-so-great childhood and his problems with his own parents (very vague descriptions there as well) and how Katzenberg constantly "sought Eisner's approval". Why? What did Eisner offer him that no one else did? Why did Katzenberg follow Eisner from Paramount to Disney? She spends a whole lot of time talking (in a dry, Variety-kind-of-way) about the break-up, but the real question she (and other writers) have often missed is NOT why this relationship crashed and burned but why it was born in the first place. Why did Eisner need Katzenberg? Why did Katzenberg become so enamoured with animation, with his role at Disney, with a potential role as Eisner's number 2? These people are not carbon cut-outs, they are people. They are fascinating, complex characters and Masters gives them with about as much focus as subjects of an obituary. She seems more interested in how much money Captain EO lost, how much money Eisner allegedly cheated certain people out of, how much money Eisner paid Michael Ovitz, how much money Katzenberg wanted, how pissed Leonard Nimoy was at Paramount, what a disaster Star Trek: The Motion Picture was to produce. I don't know about you, but I didn't pick that book up to learn about this stuff. It's SO DIFFICULT to really learn about these people (Eisner and Katzenberg) despite their famous "relationship" or "feud" extremely little is really written about their interactions together as people...you have to research a ton of articles to even find out anything...this is such an interesting subject but whatever Master's knows that the rest of us don't, she isn't sharing. Her book (like many articles) unfortunately is pervaded with the "Everyone knows this" kind of tone that drives me nuts...well, I'm not a Hollywood producer, or director, or actor. I've never met either of these people, but that's why I'm interested! People buy books on Spielberg because they're interested, why the hypocricy? Masters book is slanted, glib, gossipy, disorganized, unfocused,and worst of all, insulting to the reader.
Rating: 
Summary: Not a full view of the man -- which proves the point!
Review: Some may say that Masters' book is biased against Eisner, but she does nothing except reiterate the feelings about him that have been voiced by many others in other forums. Maybe you want to give him the benefit of the doubt, but the duplicity, wishy-washiness, undercutting, second-guessing, micro-management and all around malevolence that is evidenced shows that's pretty much impossible. What we can't figure out is just why he is the way he is? Why does he casually cast aside decades-long friendships? Why doesn't he cultivate relationships with valuable talent instead of alienating them? What is most important to him that would cause him to make some the decisions he does? Eisner seems to be capable of cutting off his nose to spite his face--he fails to do things that would be beneficial to the company's bottom line which is what he claims to be most interested in. It doesn't add up. Still, it is fun reading about the Paramount years, the Katzenberg trial, etc. At this point in time (summer of 2002) when many believe Eisner is in danger of losing his job, this book gives us as much insight as possible as to the inner workings of Eisner's brain.
instead of burning
Rating:
Summary: Michael Eisner (a.k.a. Meglomaniac) Unveiled
Review: This book is a wonderfully engrossing read - almost as good a ride as any at Disneyland. It takes you through detailed accounts of the inner workings of Hollywood and most especially the inner workings of one self-centered meglomaniac with a startling lack of conscience (for someone in charge of a studio touting its appeal to children) who rules the Disney roost and will undoubtedly be its unmaking if he is left to rule as he does now... Photos.
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