Bob Chapek Latest Celebrity News & Gossip

EXCLUSIVE: As Disney cuts 4K staffers across the conglomerate in a goal to reach $5.5 billion in savings, Deadline has learned that on the feature side, those being laid off were largely comprised of mid-level and coordinator staffers.

If the feud between Disney and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was going to be escalated yet again, parks chief Josh D’Amaro didn’t seem like he would be the one to do it.

If you figured the war between Disney and Gov. Ron DeSantis was going to take a breather for the weekend, think again.

Just over a week ago, Bob Iger rhetorically asked the adversarial  Gov. Ron DeSantis if Florida really wanted Disney’s considerable business and tax revenue, or not. Now, without mentioning the would-be presidential contender nor his attacks on the company, the Mouse House has pulled some of that business and taxes revenues from the Sunshine State.

Bob Chapek, Former CEO 2022 Chapek compensation: $24.2M/ -25.5% Bob Iger, CEO 2022Iger compensation: $15M/ -67.3% Median employee compensation: $54,256 Chapek pay ratio to median employee: 446 So long, Mr. Chapek! It was a rocky time atop the Magic Kingdom for the Disney chief, who was booted from his post in November just months after the company’s board renewed his contract. During Chapek’s tenure Wall Street soured on Disney’s spending on its streaming service, to say nothing of a near employee revolt over his stumbling response to Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” law.

Rita Ferro, Disney’s ad sales and partnerships chief, urged media buyers at the company’s New York upfront Tuesday to “lean into all aspects of diversity” with their marketing commitments.

J. Kim Murphy Bob Chapek, the former Disney CEO who was abruptly ousted from the company last November, is among a group of executives facing a lawsuit claiming violations of securities law for allegedly providing misleading statements and omissions about Disney+ and its subscriber growth. The case, filed by Local 272 Labor Management Pension Fund on May 12 in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, also names former Disney executive Kareem Daniel and current CFO Christine McCarthy, as well as the Walt Disney Co. itself, as defendants. The document states that the case seeks a lead plaintiff and judicial determination for a class action suit representing Disney shareholders from Dec. 10, 2020 to Nov. 8, 2022.

To paraphrase Neil Young, Bob Chapek is gone from Disney but not forgotten.

The gloves are off, when it comes to the ongoing brouhaha between Disney CEO Bob Iger and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, which has reached a crescendo with Disney suing the governor last month and the governor suing back. “This is about one thing and one thing only and that’s retaliating against us for taking a position about pending legislation. And we believe that in as taking that position, we are merely exercising our right to free speech.

unable to reach a deal in contract negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.The guild has shared an infographic that outlines the $773 million in combined salary that eight major Hollywood studio CEOs made in 2021. They include Endeavor CEO Ari Emanuel ($308.2 million), Warner Bros.

Disney’s seemingly successful efforts to outfox Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ power grab to control the area around Disney World are “not even worth the paper they were printed on,” according to a countersuit filed Monday by the GOP presidential aspirant’s replacement board.

introduced in February by CEO Bob Iger, indicating that a third and final round of the layoffs is expected to bring them to that mark before the summer. “These are hard decisions and not ones we take lightly — but every decision has been made with considerable thought,” Walden and Bergman said in the memo.

Disney is initiating the second and largest round of its planned layoffs Monday and expects to reach 4,000 of its projected 7,000 staff cuts by Thursday.

Kristina Schake, who joined Disney a little more than a year ago as EVP and Chief Communications Officer, is getting a pay raise and a contract extension.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis insisted again today that he and the state legislature can and will overturn any Disney development deal and retake control of the acreage that’s home to Walt Disney World and was administered by the company in what’s called the Reedy Creek Improvement District.

Disney has a new streaming boss.

For the first time, Bob Iger is speaking out and addressing the ongoing battle between the company and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. He also answered a frankly bizarre question about the company’s so-called “woke agenda,” both with the kind of poise and composure that made him such a favorite of his employees as well as the shareholders, during the Disney Shareholders meeting.“Let me if you don’t mind let me address this issue which I haven’t really done much publicly. But I’d love the opportunity just to put it all in perspective.

Bob Iger is back, debonaire, relaxed, articulate and talking up Disney IP via video in front of Walt Disney Word, where the company appears to have outmaneuvered Ron DeSantis for control. He also fianlly spoke his mind on the simmering feud, telling the company’s virtual annual shareholder meeting today that the governor’s apparent “retaliation” against Disney for exercising a right to free speech “is not only anti-business, but anti-Florida,” given the jobs, taxes, resources and revenue Disney provides the state.

Governor Ron DeSantis promised more to come on the state’s increasingly convoluted fight with Disney to wrest back the company’s control of a swath of central Florida that is home to Walt Disney World.

Disney has let go SVP and Chief Compliance Officer Alicia Schwarz, Deadline has learned, amid a major retrenchment at the company.

Disney has eliminated a small business unit focused on exploring the metaverse, part of its initial efforts to reduce its workforce by about 7,000 employees.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor As part of a companywide cost-cutting effort, Disney has axed its cross-divisional Next Generation Storytelling & Consumer Experiences group, which encompassed the Mouse House’s metaverse ambitions. The elimination of Disney’s Next Generation Storytelling & Consumer Experiences group, led by company veteran Mike White, affects about 50 employees, Variety confirmed. The news was first reported by the Wall Street Journal. A Disney rep declined to comment. The shutdown of Disney’s metaverse group came Monday with the first wave of the company’s move to slash 7,000 jobs under interim CEO Bob Iger, which is part of its attempt to reduce $5.5 billion in costs. Following this week’s layoffs, there will be a larger second round of cuts next month, Iger told employees in a memo Monday. A final round of layoffs will hit “before the beginning of summer,” according to Iger.

the Wall Street Journal reported Monday.The metaverse team, per WSJ, was tasked with “fiinding ways to tell interactive stories in new technological formats using Disney’s extensive library of intellectual property.” It employed approximately 50 people, all of whom have been let go, according to WSJ. However, the division’s boss, former Disney consumer products executive Mike White, remains with the company in an undetermined capacity.Representatives for Disney didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment from TheWrap.The move comes just over a year after Disney created the division under former CEO Bob Chapek.

Disney CEO Bob Iger has confirmed the first of three rounds of layoffs is starting this week as the company looks to reduce its workforce by about 7,000 employees.

Returned Disney CEO Bob Iger acknowledged that fans had a right to be irked as theme park ticket prices crept higher under the previous regime, and said it wasn’t the best way to manage the brand.

Disney CEO Bob Iger called succession top priority as he moves to turn the company around and, with the board, name a new chief executive before the end of his two-year contract.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Bob Iger, just over three months back as CEO of Disney, discussed major organizational changes he’s made at the company — and his optimism about making streaming, particularly Disney+, a profitable piece of the empire. “I’m generally bullish on streaming as a great consumer proposition, as a really robust platform to deliver high-quality content,” Iger said, speaking Thursday at the 2023 Morgan Stanley Technology, Media and Telecom Conference in San Francisco. But “we have to better rationalize our costs” and “obviously we have to attract more subs.” In addition, he said, “In our zeal to grow global subs, I think we were off in terms of our pricing strategy, and we’re starting to learn more about it.” Iger also said Disney overall had a “disconnect” between what it was spending on content and how it was monetizing that — and that the company needs to become “more judicious” about content investment.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’ new book — a possible prelude to a 2024 presidential run — includes a chapter highlighting his efforts last year to pass a parental rights bill, dubbed the “don’t say gay” law by detractors, amid opposition from The Walt Disney Co.

Tatiana Siegel On Nov. 20, Disney shocked Hollywood when it announced that Bob Iger would return as CEO after less than a year away. Two days later, Disney’s “Avatar: The Way of Water” landed a coveted China release. Then, the sci-fi film received a rare release extension in China that allowed it to run through Feb. 14, enabling it to gross more than $240 million in the country.  Though Disney insiders say China’s embrace of “Avatar” was unrelated to Iger’s return, its success and a string of good fortune for the company has raised eyebrows at rival studios. That’s because after seeing its Marvel releases denied entry to China for nearly four years, Disney recently announced that “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” and “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” were being waved into the country. (“Avengers: Endgame” in 2019 was the last Disney Marvel movie to secure a release in the Middle Kingdom, earning $632 million there.) And if things seem cozier between Disney and China, there’s no missing that a recent “Simpsons” episode that took a shot at the country’s human rights record never appeared on Disney+ in Hong Kong. The episode’s infraction involved a bit where a virtual tour guide tells Marge: “Behold the wonders of China. Bitcoin mines, forced labor camps where children make smartphones.” That joke was enough for the episode to receive the boot. The “Simpsons” move represents a stark difference from Disney’s recent approach elsewhere in Asia, where it chose to forego the release of titles including “Thor” and “Lightyear” rather than cave to pressure from censors over those films’ LGBTQ characters.

Disney Entertainment, the new division run by Dana Walden and Alan Bergman, will oversee the company’s main streaming services including Disney+ as details of the company strategic restructuring emerge.

Activist investor Nelson Peltz said this morning that he’s ending his proxy fight againt Disney after CEO Bob Iger announced sweeping restructuring and cost cutting plans yesterday alongside the company’s latest quarterly earnings.

Disney CEO Bob Iger said the company has asked its board to reinstate the dividend by the end of the calendar year. The payouts, beloved by investors, especially Disney’s legion of retail shareholders, was stopped abruptly during Covid to conserve cash.

The Walt Disney Company will be laying off thousands of employees as a part of a new round of cost cutting measures, CEO Bob Iger revealed today.

Disney is reorganizing its sprawling businesses under three core segments — Entertainment, ESPN and Parks, Experiences & Products — as CEO Bob Iger moves to restructure the company.

Disney is moving back closer to how things used to be run on the content side with the creation of a new Disney Entertainment unit that will encompass TV and film.

As Disney reported better-than-expected financials for the fiscal first quarter, CEO Bob Iger said the company is “embarking on a significant transformation” that will reshape the company he rejoined last November.