0:00
[MUSIC] [APPLAUSE] >> Hey. >> Hi, Jeffrey. >> Hi, how are you?
Search this video
0:16
>> We're doing good, everybody's excited.
0:20
>> [LAUGH] >> Thank you so much for coming all the way up from LA. We appreciate the visit. >> Excited to be here.
0:26
>> We're very excited to have you.
0:28
That was an incredible list of accomplishments, and you started off without getting a degree. Can you tell us why?
0:37
>> I will, but I actually.
0:38
I've always found in speaking in front of any groups, it's actually valuable for me to know a little bit about the audience.
0:49
And so, if I could just do a really quick survey of how many forms are there here that are headed to Vegas tonight, could I see a show of hands? >> [LAUGH] >> Boy.
1:01
>> [LAUGH] >> So, I would just want to give you sort of two things that I might be able to help you out on the first is likely probably not a lot of people in this room that could give you wardrobe advice as to how to dress for the 1970s.
1:20
>> [LAUGH] >> I actually can do that, I have knowledge and experience there.
1:26
And probably more importantly than that.
1:31
You should know that right around the corner from the marquee club at the cosmopolitan, is the best pizza in Las Vegas.
1:47
It's called Secret Pizza.
1:49
It is a secret, but now there are couple of hundred of view that know the secret.
1:55
It's open till 5:00 AM, which is I'm sure right around the time and which you'll be wanting and on some pizza.
2:03
>> [LAUGH] >> So, I did not go to college.
2:06
[LAUGH] >> [LAUGH] >> [APPLAUSE] >> The interesting thing that I partnered in 1994 with Steven Spielberg and David Gavin, the three of us do, actually do not have a college degree, so whatever that's worth for [LAUGH].
2:29
I didn't go to college, because I actually started working.
2:33
Very young as a teenager I had volunteered for a man who ran for mayor of New York City, John Lindsay, who had been a Congressman on the Upper East Side.
2:45
And Lindsay was really an incredibly charismatic, very forward thinking, very, I think engaging and thoughtful, unique liberal politician.
3:06
And came in a time and an era where participating, and giving, and being involved in.
3:14
Civic, you know was pretty powerful, you know, the late sixties were, you know, a time of a lot of civil rights movements changing moments in our culture and our society, and being there in politics, in government was a very exciting thing.
3:38
And I started very young as a teenager, and continued to work, and when that moment, I actually did go to college for a moment.
3:46
I registered at NYU, because it was the closest college to City Hall.
3:53
And in that era you only had to hand your class card in, and then show up for exams, so it was pretty easy for me to go to college.
4:06
>> [LAUGH] >> I think the first, in 1970, the first mid term exam overlapped with the first police strike in a modern city in America.
4:18
[LAUGH] The police went on strike in New York City, which had never happened before.
4:23
And I thought, I could do better there than in a college classroom, and that was the end of my college career.
4:30
>> [LAUGH] What did you learn from those years that you've taken interior career later?
4:36
>> Everything, I mean, it was just, it was a lessons in life.
4:40
And about people, and values, and seen the harsh realities of the streets of New York, and the goods, and bads, and the uglies.
4:52
And honestly there's not in those five, or six, seven years that I worked for the mayor, I actually saw everything.
5:00
I was a advance man for the mayor and who loved to be on the streets of New York, felt that he should be there whenever, wherever anything exceptional, or extraordinary was happening, and it required the resources of government to be there and respond.
5:21
So, every time and anytime anything bad happened, he wanted to show up and make sure the government was there doing its job.
5:28
So, whether it's a tenement would burn down, or subway accident, or a police officer shot in the line of duty, or you know what a main breaker.
5:37
Anything that was at all disruptive, he felt as the leader of the city, he should be there front and center to see that the city did it's job.
5:46
And so, for me as an advance man, it pretty much put me in the wrong place at the wrong time, pretty much everyday.
5:54
So, you'll learn about amazing, amazing things about life and death, and moments of happiness, and sacrifice and just everything.
6:07
It's just the entire rainbow of colors of everything around life reflected in those experiences.
6:14
And I think, they that's served me very well and they matured me in a way, and they gave me a confidence about of myself.
6:23
I think which was unique and for somebody so young.
6:28
I had these life experiences at an extremely early age.
6:32
>> And a sense of responsibility as a leader that would [CROSSTALK].
6:36
>> Yeah, you could make a difference.
6:37
This idea that you know, you can't change the course of things.
6:42
I don't buy that of anything, but particularly, I think that, and even today I think about it, people feel like, well, if you don't like something, what do you do about it?
6:53
And I would say, well, you have two things.
6:55
And they are invaluable, and I think, we tend not to understand how important and how valuable they are.
7:03
It's your voice and your vote.
7:06
And so, right now, today, we're sort of going sideways here.
7:10
For me in politics today, I don't think there's ever been a more important time in which we have to exercise our voice and our vote.
7:17
And we have elections that are coming up later this year.
7:20
We have elections that are coming up in a little more than two and a half years.
7:25
And for me in terms of what I'm more focus on it than anything else today is I would love to see this next election cycle, these next two election cycles particularly 2020.
7:39
I would like to see a participation and a turnout in our democracy, the lives of which our country has never experienced before, because the stakes have never been higher.
7:50
And so, through this one in particular, there's nothing more important than voter registration and voter participation. It is the foundation.
8:00
Of our democracy, and it is a choice.
8:02
It is a moment in time in which we actually get to determine the course of our country and our leaders.
8:09
And we only have ourselves to thank or blame for where we are. Go vote.
8:19
>> [APPLAUSE] >> So that call to foster expression and to hear voices, is that what brought you into Hollywood?
8:34
>> No, I wanted [LAUGH] >> [LAUGH] >> No, I was 22-years-old.
8:39
And so Lindsay ran for president in 1972.
8:41
I worked in Wisconsin and Florida, which were the two primaries.
8:48
When he lost in those primaries and went back to city government, I did not want to go back to city government.
8:56
because I felt like I had done everything that I could do, and I wanted a new challenge.
9:01
At 22-years-old, I really had sort of risen as far as was practical in government.
9:10
I don't think I was going to get made police commissioner or fire commissioner.
9:15
>> [LAUGH] >> And so I wanted to go find a career in an industry where at least age would not pull me back.
9:22
And many people said go look at entertainment.
9:26
Look at the movie business because it is a place in which youth is actually a valued asset not a liability.
9:38
And so that that is actually sort of the the big idea of why.
9:42
And I got a couple little opportunities.
9:46
But then I had the really great fortune of meeting this amazing, amazing person, Barry Diller, who invented something called Movies of the Week, which we don't have anymore in TV.
10:01
But he was real both creative and an entrepreneur.
10:04
And he had just been made the chairman Paramount Pictures at the age of 34-years-old, which was rather extraordinary.
10:12
And Barry hired me as his gofer, which I think when I went to work for him I was 23.
10:22
And then over the course of the next 11 years that I worked at Paramount and I worked for Barry, he did one of the most amazing things, which is he really genuinely mentored me. He invested in me. He believed in me.
10:40
And he in a very, really sort of almost thoughtful, methodical way.
10:46
I didn't understand it at the time, but he had me work in every area of the company.
10:51
And so by the time I was 29-years-old, and I'd worked for six years.
10:56
I was in marketing, and distribution, and international, and negative pickups, and TV.
11:00
I had all these experiences where I would work for a year or so in one of these, and then he'd move me into something else.
11:06
And I didn't see any grand plan here in this.
11:09
I was just getting moved around a bit [LAUGH].
11:12
But when I was 29-years-old, 30-years-old, he made me president of the studio.
11:17
And I actually could do the job.
11:22
And the only reason I could do the job is because he had taken the time to actually train me and give me the resources to function in the job.
11:32
>> Can you tell us a little bit about a day in the life as the head of a studio?
11:37
>> Well, yeah, I'll focus just maybe narrowly on movies because that was what I was doing at Paramount.
11:46
When I went to Disney, it was sort of a broader job because it involved television, and animation, and much wider responsibilities.
11:56
But at Paramount, running a studio really is about finding great ideas and finding great talent.
12:06
Creating a great environment for people to be able to pursue and realize dreams, even though those dreams, in many cases, are anywhere between improbable and impossible.
12:23
And to create an environment where people have the ability to fail and to take risk.
12:36
And the reason for that is that great stories, great movie telling, is at its best when its original and unique.
12:48
And if you sort of think about it almost as a mathematical equation, original and unique equals risky, right.
12:59
It's not a proven formula.
13:04
And risky equals, at least to some degree, failure.
13:08
So if you don't allow some failure in the equation, you're not going to have people do things that are risky and unique, that are unique and original.
13:18
And if you don't have unique and original, everything becomes derivative and I think uninspired, and you won't have success.
13:24
So creating a great environment for people to take that appropriate amount of risk and to actually be able to have the ambition to do things that sometimes aren't going to work.
13:37
Now, very specifically, I don't, maybe it came from those years.
13:45
I have an insane work ethic and habit, and I get up very early in the morning.
13:56
As some people may have heard, I have multiple breakfasts, multiple lunches, multiple dinners.
14:02
And how about that, right.
14:03
>> [LAUGH] >> So that's genetic, I can thank my parents for that.
14:08
I sleep five hours a night, I thank my parents for that.
14:11
I don't get jet lag, I thank my parents for that.
14:13
This is all in the gene pool.
14:14
I have nothing to do with it.
14:16
If you only sleep five hours a night, which I have done since I was 15-years-old.
14:21
The Beatles actually wrote a song for me.
14:22
It's called Eight Days a Week, >> [LAUGH] >> That was for me, anyway.
14:26
>> [LAUGH] >> So I got an extra day, and I manage my time, I invest my time.
14:33
Nobody's ever actually asked me, so why do you have all these breakfasts, lunches and dinners?
14:37
I'm going to tell you, including some of my partners who are sitting here in front of me.
14:42
I have found, as a head of a studio, there's a very great distance between you and talent and artists.
14:54
And, again, there's a little bit of fear.
14:57
And as you grow, both in the job that you have, but also reputationally, and they create mythology around you.
15:05
And coming to see me over the years, it started to get to the point where it's like going to see Oz. It scares you to death.
15:12
And I found that the way to take that out of the equation was across a table with a meal.
15:22
And that suddenly, just the relaxed nature of sitting at a table with somebody coming and bringing food, and eating, just gave me an ability to connect with people way, way, way better than I could across a desk in an office or sitting on the other side of a couch.
15:43
And so I just found that I'm way more productive.
15:45
And so I would get up and I would have breakfast at six, seven, eight in the morning.
15:50
All three of those by the way, [LAUGH].
15:56
So in the studio, a typical Monday morning, we would, the first thing we would do, is have a weekend read.
16:05
So probably, maybe the most important valuable thing as an executive that you have to do is read.
16:15
And I think that all great movies start with a great idea.
16:20
All great ideas must have a great story.
16:23
And so reading is essential.
16:27
And I will tell you just how demanding it was as a typical week for me when I was at Paramount is I would actually read ten or 12 screenplays a week, and I'm not a superfast reader.
16:41
I'm dyslexic, and so I actually have to read a little slow.
16:46
And so it would take me almost two hours to read a screenplay.
16:53
And I used to actually come start at 6 o'clock on Saturday morning and read till 5, 6 o'clock in the afternoon and then comeback probably do about half of that on a Sunday for years.
17:05
I mean years and years, and years I have read thousands of screenplays literally.
17:10
And so then on Monday morning, we all would come in and we would actually talk about what we read and what were the good ideas, and who were the great writers.
17:19
And then you would move through the day and there would be things about meeting with filmmakers, and hearing what their take on their story was, why they wanted to do it.
17:30
And then kind of through the process of a movie of everything from assembling the team around it, the producers, the directors, the casts, pretty much every element of it.
17:45
Where was it going to be done, the budget, the marketing.
17:48
So these are all elements of movie making.
17:52
And they're still kind of relevant today and it's probably organize a little bit differently today.
17:58
But, certainly back then, that was what a day was for me.
18:02
And we have previews of our movies, we always found a great collaboration with our audience when we'd have a movie that was a work in progress.
18:12
Having that moment where a filmmaker or a storyteller could actually hear an audience in that sort of just natural involuntary response to a film and to see was it going too fast, was it going too slow, was it confusing?
18:29
That's just just sitting in the back of an audience, it's not about sort of testing, it's not about sort of filling out preview cards which I'm sure everybody is done, that stuff kind of nonsense.
18:39
But just sitting in an audience you can tell so much about things that are working and things that are not working.
18:46
>> You've described your work ethic and giving all Saturday, part of Sunday, making work your life.
18:54
Have you seen that have a really strong impact on the teams around you?
18:57
How has that evolved for you?
18:59
>> Well, it's fortunate of all, because I started off sort of I guess neanderthal, because I actually once said a number of years ago, if you don't come to work on Saturday, don't bother coming on Sunday.
19:12
>> [LAUGH] >> Now, here's the problem with that.
19:19
When I said it I meant it.
19:22
>> [LAUGH] >> And the lessons that I learned, I think, anybody learns is that you learn that working smarter sometimes has as much value as working harder And you also learn that having what is sort of popularly referred to as sort of work-life balance is not just a nice theoretical thought.
19:55
I think it's actually true.
19:57
And so I can kid all I want about it, but the fact is I have a wonderful family, I have been married for 45 years to an amazing, amazing partner, have 2 kids, 3 grandkids.
20:16
Very proud of how my kids grew up and how they became people, and found their own identity and their own careers.
20:25
And that became an important part of it, and so in my 20s, that was probably fine.
20:32
It's probably fine for all of you.
20:34
But there's a moment in time in which you actually have to find those things that make you whole as a human being and then make you better at what you're doing.
20:42
And so having that element as an important part of your life is, I think, an invaluable asset of doing a great job.
20:53
>> As the boss respecting that in your team, in the team around you and what you're building. >> Have to, yeah.
21:01
>> So if we move into he Disney years, everyone has a favorite child.
21:08
So do you have a favorite film from that time?
21:11
>> [LAUGH] >> There are different movies that have different.
21:20
So, first of all, the other genetic defect I have and addition to those others that I gave you is that I don't have a reminiscent gene.
21:34
And so, I tend not to look back.
21:37
And most of all when something's finished for me I turn the chapter and I go to the next thing.
21:42
And so, at least to date, I've not yet found that moment to turn back and actually be reflective in a way about it.
21:52
But there are things and stories that I have told over the years that had a connection to me, because I had something to do with the idea itself, and the idea was in some way a reflection of something going on for me.
22:10
I say that and I want to wave the flag of saying, I had some peace in that, because I don't want to take credit from great writers, great directors, great filmmakers whose names are on these things.
22:28
Sam Goldwyn who is one of the great producers in early Hollywood had an expression which I love, which he said, credit you give yourself isn't worth having.
22:39
And so, I say that as a caveat here of, the story of the Lion King is a reflection of something that had happen to me in my life, in my 20s.
22:52
And I wanted to tell that in a story, not the Hamlet part.
22:57
That had nothing to do with.
22:59
[LAUGH] There's a guy, Willy Shake- >> [LAUGH] >> Something or rather, he was that.
23:05
But the notion that for those of who may have a minor memory of this is that Simba believes that he was responsible for the death of his dad and he runs, because he does not feel he can confront that truth to his mom and to his family, and to his tribe.
23:32
And so he goes away and finds Pumba and Timon and Hakuna Makata.
23:39
And eventually, Nala shows up, this childhood friend of his, and reminds him of what's there and then between Rafiki shaking his magic wand and Mufasa from up there, you must return.
23:59
>> [LAUGH] >> He goes back and faces his truth And I had a situation in my life and my career in which that happened to me, not in the familiar way, which I felt would be the way in which we could all relate to it.
24:17
But there was a set of circumstances in which everything was on the line for me and it was a chance for me to cut and run.
24:25
And I knew ultimately someday, you cannot run from the truth, the truth will find you.
24:31
And so, I made a very bold and very hard and very difficult decision for me to come back and face the truth and by the way the outcome was great for me and doing that and I just felt that was such a life learning lesson for me that I wanted to try and tell that in a story.
24:47
And another movie I've made which probably many of you don't ever know or mabye barely heard about, which was also a reflection of something for me, which is about how I feel about life, I actually don't like the word, no.
25:07
Maybe some of you do but that doesn't work for me, in pretty much any and so, there was a movie called Spirits, Stallion of the Cimarron and it was the last hand drawn animated movie that I made, as that sort of revolution of CG came along, Struck was the next one after it.
25:37
And it was a very, very, it was my homage to really, one of the great things that I think Walt Disney did, which was, it's to allow animation to be it's best and to let the pictures do all the storytelling.
26:03
So, the lead character, which is this indomitable character, Spirit, he doesn't talk, right?
26:15
So there's, it relies on animation to actually tell itself and it is a musical and nobody sings, other than Bryan Adams who sings kind of sound track to it.
26:28
So it was a really incredibly ambitious, very risky animated movie that failed.
26:35
[LAUGH] But not for me and that story specifically of Spirit which is, he is a character that no matter what the circumstances, his optimism and his determination would not allow him to fail.
26:51
And that's me, I just have a bottomless well of optimism and, so and then the third one is I grew up across from the New York City Central Park Zoo.
27:09
And I used to go there as a young kid five, six, seven, eight years old and when I would see the zoo through my eyes as a kid, I thought well, they live on Fifth Avenue.
27:24
I'd see they got steak everyday.
27:27
They were groomed and taken care of and their cages were already washed and cleaned everyday and I thought, God.
27:32
These animals, they're living the top of the line and I thought well, what would happen if they had to actually go back to Africa? And there is Madagascar.
27:44
>> It sounds like this incredibly personal connections for you in making these films, the ones that really stick with you.
27:51
>> Well, the animated ones for sure but they're great movies over the years that are just wonderful things were great, film makers, great storytellers, great artists have these amazing stories they wanted to tell.
28:04
And just to kind of be on the sideline cheerleading them, helping them realize those things was just very exciting.
28:11
But I made 406 live action movies, when I say I made, they were made while I was, overseeing these studios over the years and 41 animated movies and there's a lot.
28:26
And man, there's just a ton of dogs in there.
28:29
[LAUGH] >> [LAUGH] You had an abrupt departure from Disney, can you talk to us about what that was like?
28:39
>> Sure, so in the Summer of 1994, the number one movie in the world was the Lion King.
28:52
The number one Album, soundtrack or actually record, period, was soundtrack to Lion King, sold 27, 28 million hard copies.
29:05
Anybody want to think about that today?
29:09
[LAUGH] How extraordinary that is.
29:14
The number one home video in the world was from Aladdin, the year before.
29:20
The number one show on Broadway was Beauty and the Beast.
29:24
The number one TV show was a show we produced called Home Improvement.
29:28
The number one book on the New York Times Best, you get the idea.
29:31
>> [LAUGH] >> Like at a moment in time and I don't know whether that's happened again since or not, maybe it has, certainly possible for the Disney Company, we had number 1 of every single place that we produced for, which is pretty much across the entire spectrum of things that are around entertainment and culture. I got fired.
29:55
And it was horribly ugly.
30:02
I mean, it was, I had, we've been together with the CEO of the company.
30:11
Michael Eisner and I, we're partners together for 18 and a half years and I guess the analogy I would make except I'm fortunately and I have not experienced this but I have friends that have.
30:22
It's like a marriage when perfectly two appoint and then somehow or another just got on the line and there is a reason for this, is that Michael and I had this amazing marriage counselor who was the president of the company, amazing guy, selfless, one of the most selfless people I've ever met, his name is Frank Wells.
30:41
Ans so, there was Michael as the CEO of the company and Frank was the COO and I was the CEO of the Walt Disney Studios.
30:49
And Frank, [COUGH] for all of these years, 10 years, he was the guy that always kind of made things right between Michael and I.
31:00
And that when we would sort of get up on the line or at each other or I wasn't being sensitive or not, for not being inclusive, whatever those things are, Frank would come in my office, sit down and put his feet up on the table and go, I think there's a better way of doing this.
31:13
And he managed to do that and then quite tragically, in April of 1994, he died in a helicopter crash.
31:21
This is where one of my partners always said to me Jeffery, there's your plan and there's God's plan and your plan doesn't count.
31:29
And this is one of those moments where suddenly everything that worked, nothing worked.
31:37
And so Michael and I got sideways with one another, very quickly and they way to became this amazing eruption.
31:49
And he fired me and at the moment in time in which I wasn't doing my job as well as I had ever done it before.
31:57
And at the time, it was incredibly public and incredibly ugly and very personal and very nasty and it resulted in a lawsuit and Just went on for a really long time, and I would have to rank that as probably my greatest regret professionally, not that I got fired, it's how I got fired.
32:19
And that may not make any sense to you, but I just look back today and there must've been a better way for me to go about separating.
32:31
And if I could have a do over, at least I would try and do that.
32:38
And I don't know that it would have a different outcome.
32:42
I don't think it would, but it would have had a better way to get to the outcome of it.
32:45
because it's the most humiliating, embarrassing moment of my career.
32:51
I felt just completely demeaned by it and just hurt by it. And it was hard.
33:01
Eight days later after getting fired, I started DreamWorks with David Geffen [LAUGH] so I got over it in about seven and a half days.
33:11
>> [LAUGH] >> Pretty quick turnaround. >> Yes.
33:17
>> But I just hear so much love for the films and the people involved at Disney, and I really appreciate that you shared all of that with us.
33:26
But you did, you turned right around and took an entrepreneurial leap when you could've taken an operating role at any of the established studios with the track record.
33:35
I mean, you'd just made number one on every measure. So why take the leap?
33:42
>> Well, again, the sort of recurring thing for me and literally going back to those days of Lindsay and Paramount and Disney and DreamWorks and again here today now, I have loved the idea of a blank slate.
34:01
I know from most people it's a scary thing, particularly, and most of these almost like clockwork.
34:12
These have been ten-year chapters in my career.
34:15
And so they're long and they're deep roots and it's attached to people and projects and friends and family that I grew up within each of these chapters.
34:25
But I find that for me, whether it's the circumstances changed, the team broke up, or I got fired, starting over has always been fantastic for me.
34:39
And what has come in front of me has always, every single time, no matter how great the circumstances, so as great as Paramount was for me, or Disney was for me.
34:51
And they were fantastic times and incredible decades there.
34:55
And so much to love and be proud of, what came next was better.
35:00
And so when Comcast showed up a year and a half ago, I thought my third act was going to be doing another ten years of DreamWorks, and making number 407 and 42.
35:13
[LAUGH] And at first it was like, what do you mean, you want my company, you don't want me?
35:21
It was like, well, I'm kind of hurt by that for a moment.
35:23
And then I thought about it, and honestly one day, I woke up the next morning and went, no, no, no, wait a minute.
35:30
This is a chance to be 25 years old again, with extraordinary, extraordinary resources and contacts and all of these things.
35:38
And honestly, I never imagined there would be another get to start all over again.
35:46
And the moment that that idea just came into my head, I couldn't get it out.
35:52
I couldn't get away, and it became more exciting to me.
35:54
And so passing the baton to the NBC Universal people on DreamWorks seemed like the most obvious must do thing.
36:04
It was better for my employees because they would be part of this $200 billion company, have more job security and more resources.
36:10
And these are people that have been with me a long time and I felt a great sense of obligation and loyalty to them.
36:16
I could afford to take risks, they might not.
36:20
And all of these characters in movies and IP that we had created, to put them in the hands of people that could made them live forever if they so choose to, there couldn't be a better place or a better organization to do that.
36:35
And for the shareholders, it was an extraordinary outcome.
36:40
Stock was selling at $21 a share, they bought it for $41 a share.
36:43
And so I couldn't put myself in the way of all of those three outcomes which were better for everybody.
36:52
And then once that idea of, okay, you can start all over again.
36:55
I went, touchdown, let's go. >> Made it.
37:01
So you are looking into the future with excitement in your new venture.
37:06
You are looking for the team to pull around you.
37:09
And before we were talking, you described building a team for a business as a casting process.
37:15
So how are you casting for your new venture right now?
37:20
>> Well, again, one of the recurring things for me over the years is I've always had great mentors as I talked about Barry Diller, but Michael Eisner was a great mentor.
37:28
Again, we were together for 18 and a half of those years.
37:31
It was a phenomenal partnership and I learned so much from him.
37:36
And so I've had a series of amazing mentors over the years.
37:41
Two people who were mentors that went on to do something different.
37:44
Well, one, Barry Diller, and he started this company called IAC about 25 years ago.
37:51
And the other was John Malone and Liberty Media.
37:54
And I saw in what they did something that excited me, because I'm a builder, and I'm an operator. I'm not an investor.
38:05
And I believe that the most valuable thing is human capital.
38:09
To build businesses, to do things, obviously, you need the cash to be able to do it.
38:18
But the most valuable thing is human capital.
38:21
And so, in starting WonderCo I wanted to put together a partnership of people that if the day you were going to have a business, either one that you were starting or one that you already had started.
38:36
And you wanted exceptional resources to help you take that to some great new plateau, that within WonderCo we actually had everything you would want in a C suite.
38:51
You have a great strategist, you have a great marketing executive, you have a general counsel, a CFO, a COO, a CEO.
38:59
Everything that you would want in a place like that, we got some of.
39:06
And so to have that as sort of the resource because when I look at Barry Diller and John Malone, that's what they have done.
39:12
They had found companies around ideas and around entrepreneurs, and then they have put a ton of people capital into those enterprises.
39:25
Diller started IAC 25 years ago.
39:27
His idea was that intersection of the Internet and to be able to create commercial consumer transactions on it.
39:36
So everything from Expedia to I'm sure no one in this room has ever actually done anything that has anything to do with Match. com.
39:44
[LAUGH] So Barry's probably built literally $70, 80, 90 billion worth of market cap.
39:52
I mean, it's like a quiet story, not maybe that well told.
39:56
But he's literally one of the greatest entrepreneurs of our time.
39:58
And I think right now, today, is exactly another one of those moments.
40:03
And today that intersection is technology.
40:08
And the intersection of video.
40:11
And the application of video against, or integrated with technology.
40:16
And how transformative and imperative that is going to be for what I think is the next evolutionary, if not revolutionary part of our world today.
40:29
I'll try and maybe translate that, which is if you go back maybe, I don't know, 12, 14 years ago, everybody was on a thing called a Nextel.
40:43
Most people in this room were, too.
40:44
This is you could send a text to somebody on this little sort of pager device.
40:47
Somebody up here laughed, it's probably over 40.
40:50
>> [LAUGH] >> And then we went from that to a flip phone.
40:56
And you had to actually hit three times to get an R.
40:59
I know this, I'm speaking Swahili to you but trust me.
41:03
>> [LAUGH] >> And then I'm now getting into territory here.
41:06
We went to a Blackberry, and then from a Blackberry to a smartphone.
41:10
And so in a course of about 12, 14 years, everything around text, the application of text, the platforms around text.
41:20
So if you think about communication, collaboration, sharing, search, e-commerce and even entertainment.
41:28
In a very short handful of years, text became ubiquitous, the enterprise is built around text became worth hundreds of billions if not trillions of dollars.
41:41
And all of us became expert at it.
41:45
So, literally the ability of all of us and any of us and anyone of us to use text against those seven verticals today, is honestly as easy as putting one foot in front of another.
41:58
So then about five, six years after that happen the next thing that happen in that sort of evolution was photography.
42:06
And so today every single one of us is like a junior and Annie Liebowitz.
42:12
We can all take great photos no matter how inept we are we can't help but take great photos.
42:20
And so now think about these in these last four or five years now, the impact that photography has had. So we had moved.
42:27
And it's not displaced text, it's added on text. Why?
42:31
Because a picture is a thousand, is better than a thousand words.
42:34
You've heard that said before on it.
42:36
So, now you think about communication, collaboration, you get it.
42:39
[LAUGH] The application of photography has been transformed and once again many hundreds and billions of dollars of market values.
42:48
Whether it's Instagram or Pinterest and we can go on and on, okay?
42:52
So we're now in the third cycle.
42:54
The sort of next third evolution is the application of video against each of those very specific verticals.
43:02
And you're seeing what happens when people come along and come up with the application of putting these two things together.
43:11
So two perfect examples of it are Snapchat right?
43:14
In the world of communication and sharing.
43:17
If you thinking of an entertainment best of it is Netflix.
43:21
Netflix is people forget it, they were again I don't know if anybody remember, they used to have a red envelope with a DVD in it.
43:27
That's only seven years ago.
43:30
Now, it's streaming and a $100 billion market cap over the intersection of video and technology.
43:40
So for is today, we have a team that we have build that we think bridges that world.
43:46
And there's 12 of us, 9 of which came were graduates of Stanford, so thank you all very much.
43:54
>> [LAUGH] >> One of us is not a graduate of Stanford.
43:59
He couldn't get in here, so he went to Harvard Business School instead.
44:03
But he teaches here, which is Sujay Jaswajoi.
44:05
He should stand up and wave hello there because hopefully, some of you are being taught by him today.
44:09
Come on Sujay, show that t-shirt off.
44:12
>> [LAUGH] >> Stand up, stand up.
44:15
>> [LAUGH] >> There we go.
44:17
>> [APPLAUSE] >> And so we have a partnership that I think is a great marriage and collaboration between Northern California and Southern California.
44:31
Which right now at this moment in time is highly unique because we are different cultures, we actually speak different languages.
44:39
But our co-dependency on one another, the integration of these two worlds is literally these two trains that are on their way at one another.
44:49
And so for Wonder Co we believe we have the human capital to facilitate that and to take advantage of it and to be entrepreneurial around it.
44:59
>> An incredible vision, you seem to have pretty boundless ambition for what's to come and Meg Whitman is obviously going to blend a huge amount of experience for that.
45:08
Well, it's a perfect example, I've known Meg for 30 years.
45:11
She's truly one of the most extraordinary leaders and just great people.
45:18
She was on my board at DreamWorks Animation.
45:20
We met when I was at Disney.
45:22
We've started this new business, which is right now we as our working title is called New TV.
45:28
But it's an incredibly, incredibly exciting, ambitious, improbable, likely impossible dream that she and I now are sharing.
45:39
And it can only work by putting our two worlds together, and she brings just a level of knowledge of expertise.
45:51
She's been at every, whether it's what she did at eBay or certainly at HP.
45:57
She just has an incredible, incredible set of skills I don't.
46:02
And it is, I believe it is one of those things where 1 plus 1 is going to equal 11. >> Better to see it.
46:11
I want to thank you for everything that you shared with us so far.
46:14
We're going to pause for a moment to open up to questions. >> Love it. >> And than we'll close. >> Great.
46:26
All right, my name is David, and I'm a second year here.
46:29
And I'm inspired by your talk of the movement from the third, to second, to third wave of video.
46:35
Does Wonder Co have any sort of ambitions on saying what's after the third wave?
46:40
Well no, because we've got to get to the third.
46:42
[LAUGH] I think we're at the beginning of the beginning of the third wave, but I actually think that you just imagine what the application is.
46:55
Let me give you just one place here, which is e-commerce.
47:00
So think of how much E-Commerce was changed from text to photo.
47:04
Right, that the ability that you can actually look at commerce on your phone and see displayed for you.
47:15
Every single version sneaker you can imagine, right? Okay now, move to video.
47:20
And video, which is how the human being actually functions, sight and sound.
47:25
And it is really the way in which we ingest data in the most effective, most efficient way and we can put emotions around those things.
47:33
So now think about how all those versions of Nike will look like in video.
47:36
So and I say that because we're in Mr.
47:40
Nike's home here, >> Building.
47:43
>> [LAUGH] >> So you can thank him for this.
47:46
So but, the application of video for commerce is going to be transformative.
47:53
As much as we think we had a, I would say we're in that sort of evolutionary revolutionary moment from retail into E-commerce.
48:03
I would bet that we'll look at five, seven years from now, it won't look anything like, I mean, it'll just go to a whole another level.
48:10
By the application of video.
48:12
Just that one, and now we can go to the other verticals and I think it'll be as impactful. >> I'm Arial.
48:19
I don’t know if this is on.
48:22
>> Yeah, we can hear you.
48:23
>> Great, I'm an MBA I and my question is what you learned from your partnership with Spielberg and Geffen and how you've applied that into building Wonder Co and how you'll build you future teams within the company.
48:36
>> Well, I mean it's amazing partnership and I think taught me about what the value of partnering can be.
48:49
When Stephen and Dave and I came together in 1994.
48:51
If you went to Las Vegas, probably as many of you are going to tonight, you could place a bet on how long would the three of them be able to be in the same sandbox without killing each other.
49:02
Right, and the odds were 100 to 1 that it would blow up in a year or two [COUGH] but what Steven and David and I found in each other [COUGH] is very specific expertise.
49:20
And as partners we actually could rely on one another.
49:24
So quite obviously in the world of story telling, Steven Spielberg arguably is the greatest storyteller, certainly among greatest storytellers of our time.
49:36
And so to defer to him as the sort of final arbiter in that regard seems easy and good to do, and even for me who had had amazing success before we came to that partnership.
49:53
I always felt deferential.
49:56
And even on our animated movies, I would always bring Steven in, I mean, right up to the very end.
50:02
Once a week, he'd come over and give me a morning.
50:05
And I would engage him in every way and any way.
50:08
I didn't always agree with him, but I always wanted to hear what he would have to say.
50:14
David Geffen, in the media space, probably the most successful entrepreneur of our time.
50:21
He literally made billions and billions and billions of dollars from being brilliant in the music business, brilliant in Broadway, successful movie producer.
50:30
It's just, the guy has taste.
50:32
And everything he did, worked.
50:35
And so, but most of all, a fantastic entrepreneur.
50:39
So, and I'm the builder, right.
50:41
So we had a dreamer, an entrepreneur, and a builder.
50:45
And those three things were just incredible, and supportive of one another and so.
50:52
Finding that, and being able to respect that in one another, I thought it was a bargain, because in 1994, as I said, I had just been fired.
51:03
Steven Spielberg had won the Academy Award in the spring of 1994 for Schindler's List, and in June of 1994, he put out the first Jurassic Park.
51:13
So in our world, he had won both the Academy award and the Bank of America award.
51:17
>> [LAUGH] >> Something, rarely somebody does those two at the same time.
51:21
David Geffen had actually just recently sold his music company for the third or fourth time, for another billion dollars, to Universal.
51:31
And when I got fired, I went back to my office, I left Eisner's office, and when I walked back to my, I did not know this at the time, just to give you an idea how kind of nasty it got.
51:45
So I'm in his office, he goes well I don't think this is going to work any longer.
51:49
Stating what at that point was truly the obvious.
51:52
What I didn't know is while I was in his office, he put a press release out saying that he had fired me, right?
51:57
So I get back to my office, and literally I walk into my office, and my assistant says to me, Steven Spielberg and Bob Zemeckis are on the phone, and they would not hang up, they've insisted on holding on until you come back there in Jamaica together.
52:14
So, the three of us had made a movie called Roger Rabbit together, and actually had kind of a great bond and, you know, relationship came out of that movie.
52:23
And so, I get on the phone.
52:25
And they're laughing, they go my God, this is fantastic.
52:28
It's just great and it's funny and I'm going, really.
52:31
>> [LAUGH] >> Explain to me what I'm missing here because I'm not feeling any of this, guys.
52:41
And Bob Zemeckis, I will give him the credit for it.
52:44
Bob Zemeckis says, you know what Geoffrey, you should just start your own studio.
52:49
And I hung up the phone and I went, hm, now that's a good idea.
52:54
>> [LAUGH] >> Literally, that was the moment.
52:57
[LAUGH] >> So we're almost out of time.
53:01
To close, I would ask you to dig the reminiscence gene just one more time for us on stage.
53:08
On the day of the September 11th attacks the entire country is paralyzed, in shock, and mourning, and you spring into action.
53:18
You activate that sense of personal responsibility and you put yourself at the center.
53:23
Can you describe that moment for us and your leadership- >> Yeah, it It was a moment for everybody in this country, if not around the globe, in which I think every single person was not only feeling fear, but also helplessness.
53:50
And most of all, what can I do?
53:54
And I thought about that, I felt like I have to do something, I'm not a fireman, I'm not a policeman, I'm not soldier, I'm an entertainer most of all, above all what I've tried to do my whole life Is actually bring laughter to people. That's been my mission.
54:15
And if you think about the movies and the most joyful, rewarding thing for me is to stand in the back of a theater and hear an audience in laughter.
54:24
That's my joy and it's literally the most beautiful thing in the world to me is to hear laughter and particularly the laughter of children.
54:30
And I thought okay, it would be great if we could have a shared healing moment.
54:40
And we, my community of entertainers, actually could do something.
54:46
And so, I had this idea of doing a telethon that would be a tribute to America and the strength of our country.
54:58
And was able to do the thing I was able to do, which is to get everybody and anybody on the telephone and talk them into doing something that they never would ever think of doing or would not likely do.
55:13
And so for the first time actually in history, every single television station, every cable station, every radio, everything, for that two hours, stopped.
55:25
While the greatest and the best entertainers, singers, actors, spoke from the heart.
55:37
And I just, for me, when I think of all of the wonderful things that I have been able to do and had in my career, honestly, nothing even comes remotely close to that moment and that time.
55:50
In which I felt it was the ultimate unifying, shared moment and just for a second, I felt maybe there was, at this tragic, tragic time, happiness.
56:06
>> Thank you so much for the gifts that you've given us over an incredible career.
56:09
And today, in this auditorium, we are so blessed to hear your lessons on leadership. >> Thank you. >> [APPLAUSE]