news Bob Iger, the sequel: this time it’s personal

The secret to Hollywood, explains one of America's most prominent media executives, is to understand it like an “old money town” run by half a dozen people, friends so close

they often meet for dinner on a Sunday night.With a wave of his hand and some cinematic sweep, the executive evokes a typical get-together of these Hollywood royals, with the CAA

super agent Bryan Lourd present, perhaps sitting beside the legendary film-maker Steven Spielberg. The guest list would chop and change, the executive says, but the head of the

table would be reserved for one man: Bob Iger, a leader who fused creative flair with business acumen and made The Walt Disney Company the biggest name in media. Even in

semi-retirement after stepping down from Disney in late 2021, Iger remained a towering presence in Hollywood. “If he questions you,” the executive says, “then you're in

trouble”.Such was the fate of Bob Chapek, the chief executive of Disney who was unceremoniously ejected this week after just 33 months in the job. With a plot twist worthy of

Hitchcock, his replacement was Iger, now 71, the man who chose Chapek as his heir in 2020 but quickly found him wanting. Chapek's downfall followed a bad financial run for Disney

in its centenary year — and a bleak spell for the whole media industry. Shares in Disney had more than halved from their March 2021 peak, wiping about $210bn from its market

value. A big miss on quarterly earnings last week, including a $1.5bn loss on streaming services, rattled Wall Street even further. An internal uprising followed. By the weekend,

Chapek was out. But for old colleagues, and many in Hollywood, Chapek's defining mistake was not missing numbers but something more intangible. His public spats over pay with stars

such as Scarlett Johansson were a symptom of a deeper problem. Chapek had lost the confidence of the creative community, as well as the support of the one man who could give him

the keys to Hollywood. “It is tough to run a media business in America because eventually it becomes a Hollywood business,” says one former Disney executive who worked with

both Bobs. “It is a hierarchical place, almost caste-like. They do not accept an outsider. Chapek had no luck without Iger. When they fell out, it was over.”Iger's return was

greeted with near euphoria within Disney's ranks. During his 15-years at the helm, Iger had embodied the swagger of Hollywood in bloom. His acquisitions of Lucasfilm, Marvel and

Pixar were creative bets that had paid off handsomely; Disney accounted for almost 40 per cent of the US box office in 2019, according to Comscore. Even his expensive streaming