Michael Ovitz

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Michael S. Ovitz (born December 14, 1946 in Chicago ) is an American entrepreneur in the film industry.

Life

Michael Ovitz grew up as the son of a beverage wholesaler in Encino , California . He attended Birmingham High School in Van Nuys , a classmate there was Sally Field . He practiced martial arts with Steven Seagal , Ovitz later promoted the film careers of Field and Seagal. In 1969 Ovitz married Judy Reich and they have three children (including the fashion designer Kimberly Ovitz, * 1983).

Ovitz studied theater, film and television at the University of California, Los Angeles and graduated in 1968. Ovitz worked as an artist intermediary for television and founded the Creative Artists Agency (CAA) in 1975 with Ron Meyer , Bill Haber, Rowland Perkins and Mike Rosenfeld , which was under his leadership until 1995. His colleague at CAA Ron Meyer later became his chief operating officer (COO) at Universal Studios instead . The business model developed by Ovitz at CAA strengthened the negotiating position of actors, directors and scriptwriters vis-à-vis the film studios. This changed the contract models and fees in the film industry. The actors represented by the CAA included Tom Cruise , Dustin Hoffman , Kevin Costner , John Belushi , Michael Douglas , Bill Murray , Sylvester Stallone , and among the directors Steven Spielberg and Martin Scorsese .

In October 1995, Ovitz became Chief Operating Officer (COO) of the Walt Disney Company . Since he met the opposition of Michael Eisner there and was unsuccessful, he left the company in January 1997. Ovitz had negotiated payments of $ 140 million (38 million in cash and a good 100 million in stock or stock options) with Disney when he joined. Shareholders sued Eisner and the board of directors after Ovitz 'resignation because they had contractually promised him so much money ( compensation package ); the competent court in Delaware ruled that they were entitled to do so.

He worked as a management consultant with the acquisition of MCA Universal by Matsushita and Sony's purchase of Columbia Pictures involved.

Ovitz advised David Letterman in 1993 on his move from NBC to television station CBS . Ovitz Treat Williams was portrayed in the 1996 film The Late Shift .

Ovitz created the company CKE in 1999 from the four companies Artist Management Group (AMG), Artist Production Group (APG), Artist Television Group (ATG) and Lynx Technology Group (LTG); later he sold AMG to The Firm Inc. (former CEO: Jeff Kwatinetz). Ovitz has served on the boards of directors at companies such as J. Crew, Gulfstream Aviation, and Opsware . In 2010 Ovitz was involved in founding Broad Beach Ventures, a venture capital company made up of over 30 companies. He has advised venture capital companies in Silicon Valley and temporarily sat on the advisory board of the venture capital company Andreessen Horowitz ('a16z'), founded in 2009 .

Ovitz was or is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations . He appears as a patron, so he was on the board of directors of UCLA Hospital and Medical Center and organized the fundraising campaign for its new hospital building, which was designed by Ieoh Ming Pei . He is a paying member of various charities, AIDS relief organizations, and child advancement programs.

Ovitz has a seat on the Board of Trustees of the Museum of Modern Art . He owns an important collection of modern art.

Autobiography

literature

  • Stephen Singular: Power to burn: Michael Ovitz and the new business . Secaucus, NJ: Carol Publ. Group, 1996
  • Robert Slater: Ovitz: the inside story of Hollywood's most controversial power broker . New York: McGraw Hill, 1997

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ cf. Brigitte Haar : Executive compensation under German corporate law in: Research Handbook on Executive Pay (2012), edited by John S. Beasley, p. 486.
  2. ↑ Janice Castro: In A Rare Interview, Ovitz Defends His Power , Time, April 19, 1993
  3. ^ Bill Carter: Behind the Headlines in the Leno - Letterman War , in: The New York Times , January 30, 1994
  4. ↑ www.moma.org/about/trustees , accessed June 9, 2020.
  5. ↑ John Gapper: LA confidental . Review, in: Financial Times, October 6, 2018, p. L&A 9
personal data
SURNAME Ovitz, Michael
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Ovitz, Michael S.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American entrepreneur in the film industry
DATE OF BIRTH December 14, 1946
PLACE OF BIRTH Chicago