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It looked like the good old days. Onetime superagent Michael Ovitz was working the room at a fund-raiser for the UCLA medical center, a longtime pet project of his, and the crowd was huge. Air Force One producer Armyan Bernstein came by to say hello, as did Brad Pitt. Seated at the table with Ovitz were actress Cameron Diaz and singer Garth Brooks, who would later bring many to tears when he stopped midsong to thank Ovitz for making sure Brooks's mother was admitted to the UCLA cancer center.
No one loves a comeback more than Hollywood. And these days, Ovitz is making one as flashy as any in recent Tinseltown history. Forgotten, it seems, are those 14 disastrous months as Disney president and the ill-fated investment in Broadway production company Livent. Today, Ovitz is a hot player: He runs a company that's one of Hollywood's leading TV studios, represents sports superstars Pete Sampras and Jason Kidd, and is putting together projects for Diaz, Leonardo DiCaprio, Robin Williams, and novelist Michael Creighton.
The operation is being run from a two-floor mahogany-lined office in Beverly Hills. Here, Ovitz' new Artist Management group teams with more than 200 employees. Dozens of twentysomethings scurry from cubicle to cubicle, determined looks on their fresh-scrubbed faces. Ovitz is cutting deals in everything from TV and movies to the Internet and sports, frequently doing so over lunch on the top floor of the nearby Barney's department store, where he has a private table in an alcove by the kitchen.
BIG DEALS.
So far, those deals are impressive. Last year, he lured two top TV-production executives from Sony Pictures' Columbia/Tri Star unit to work for him. Earlier this year, he linked up with rap music management company Violator, bringing him urban stars Busta Rhymes, Mobb Deep, and Q-Tip. A deal with former sports agents at International Management Group brought in Sampras and Kidd. More recently, Ovitz has added L.A. Clipper star Lamar Odom. Along with billionaire Ron Burkle, he also has made a big jump into the Internet, buying up stakes in a dozen companies, including music portal Dimension Music, higher-education site Campus Pipeline, and entertainment site CheckOut.com.
What's amazing is that Ovitz is doing any of this, let alone all of it. After his disastrous experience at Disney, he seemed to have sworn off entertainment. He got involved with a real-estate development company and even tried to bring professional football back to L.A. But for all of his troubles at Disney, Ovitz remains Hollywood's consummate dealmaker. With his soothing speech and seemingly limitless ability to make others feel at ease, he has managed to lure a younger generation of stars with a simple spiel: He'll make them owners of their own material, be it the movies or TV shows they star in or content on the Internet.
As a manager -- as opposed to the talent agent he previously was -- he simply doesn't skim off 10% of the take. He becomes a partner with his stars, and both sides take hefty revenues from their efforts, cutting into the amounts that studios traditionally earn. If it works, it could make Ovitz an even wealthier man than the guy who left Disney with an estimated $140 million severance agreement (on top of the millions in fees he collected from his previous company, Creative Artists Agency).
A DOZEN PILOTS.
And some signs indicate it could work. When the networks recently released the roster of TV pilots they had ordered for September, Ovitz' company had an even dozen on the list -- putting him on par with the biggest Hollywood studios. Client Ellen DeGeneres has a new comedy for CBS. Director Barry Levinson has a drama for Fox. Ovitz even entered into a joint partnership with Disney to make a comedy for ABC starring Gabriel Byrne.
Many in Hollywood would dearly love to see Ovitz fail. Rumors some months back had it that he had tried unsuccessfully to lure money from the likes of AT&T and Bertelsmann to help him finance a movie company. Others say he's bound to fail at making TV shows, a risky business where money can be lost in a hurry.
But right now, Ovitz is once again riding high. The guy who many feared years back for his ability to stop a movie dead in its tracks has found himself in the middle of the action once more. Real buzz is surging through those mahogany-paneled walls. And Garth, Cameron, Brad, and plenty others are once more flocking to his table.
Grover follows Hollywood's movers and shakers as Los Angeles bureau chief for Business Week EDITED BY THANE PETERSON
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