Media

Sumner Redstone, media mogul, 1923-2020


Sumner Redstone, who has died aged 97, was one of the last media moguls: a firm believer in the long-term value of content, be it television shows or movies, and a man who continued to call the shots at some of America’s largest entertainment companies even as age began to slow him down.

In a long career, he was unafraid to act impulsively. In 2006 he fired Tom Cruise, then Hollywood’s most bankable star, from his Paramount film studio over the actor’s sofa-jumping antics on Oprah Winfrey’s television show — and for Mr Cruise’s outspoken support of Scientology. “It’s nothing to do with his acting ability, he’s a terrific actor,” he told the Wall Street Journal at the time. “But we don’t think that someone who effectuates creative suicide and costs the company revenue should be on the lot.”

That same year he fired Tom Freston, then the chief executive of his Viacom group, for failing to buy the MySpace social network — a decision that, ironically, would save Viacom a small fortune when MySpace was eclipsed by Facebook.

Paramount was an acquisition added in the 1990s to Viacom, which he had bought the previous decade. Then came his purchase of CBS, the broadcasting network. A long-term supporter of the Democratic party, Redstone also gave millions of dollars to charity: in 2007 his family foundation gave grants of more than $105m to a range of medical causes.

Born Sumner Murray Rothstein in Boston on May 27 1923, he was 17 when his father changed the family’s surname. Media was in his blood: his father started Northeast Theater Corporation, which owned several drive-in cinemas. He graduated top of his class at the Boston Latin School and attended Harvard College, but when the second world war started joined the army, spending the latter part of the conflict working for an intelligence group at the Pentagon responsible for decoding high-level Japanese military and diplomatic codes.

After the war he studied law, working for the Department of Justice in San Francisco and in private practice before returning to run the family business. “Law is just a business, not a crusade for humanity,” he once said. “When I reached that conclusion, I decided I was going to go into business.”

He recognised that the industry’s future lay in out of town, indoor cinemas — larger facilities with multiple screens, capable of screening more movies at the same time. He was the driving force behind the creation of these facilities (he coined the term “multiplex”), turning the company into National Amusements, a cinema powerhouse in the north eastern US.

But he had his eye on a bigger prize: owning the content that appeared on his screens was a more lucrative and substantial business. “Content is king,” he said later in his life — he popularised that phrase, too — and he set about building a media empire with interests in television and film production.

A near-death experience in 1979 put his life on a different trajectory. He survived a devastating hotel fire in Boston by climbing out of a window high up and hanging on until he was rescued, but not before receiving burns to half of his body. He had several lengthy operations and was in hospital for four months.

“People didn’t think I would live or walk,” he said. “And most of the important things that have happened in my life have taken place since then.”

In 1987 he bought Viacom, which he had long coveted, for $3.4bn. It owned a handful of cable television networks, including MTV and Comedy Central, among other assets. With financing arranged by Michael Milken, the junk bond king who would become a firm friend, Redstone triumphed over a rival offer from the company’s management.

In 1994 he added Paramount Pictures to Viacom, defeating Barry Diller, a former chairman of the film studio, in a drawn-out bidding battle. Then, in 1999, he added the CBS broadcast network and Infinity Broadcasting, which had interests in radio. The lawyer-turned-cinema owner had created a media conglomerate focused on the production of original content that could be exported across the US and around the world.

In 2006 Viacom was separated into two companies — Viacom and CBS. Redstone retained control of each entity but entrusted management of them to two loyal executives, Philippe Dauman and Les Moonves.

In the ensuing decade, as Redstone’s health deteriorated, Wall Street investors began to fixate on succession plans. But Redstone, who was once reported to be working on a memoir provisionally titled How To Live Forever, bristled at the question of succession, repeatedly vowing to never relinquish control of his empire. In 2014, aged 91, he told The Hollywood Reporter that he would not discuss succession. “You know why? I’m not gonna die,” he said.

Meanwhile the private life drama surrounding Redstone had veered into a tale worthy of its own Hollywood show, as former girlfriends waged legal battles for their share of his fortune, and his sexual affairs were detailed both in courtrooms and on the pages of tabloids.

His personal soap opera came as seismic shifts in technology were ravaging Redstone’s treasured investments. He had stopped speaking on earnings calls at the same time the US media sector was struck by concerns about the future of cable television. As young people went online for entertainment, investors questioned the viability of channels like MTV, which had been the lifeblood of Redstone’s business.

As succession planning became more urgent his daughter, Shari, was an obvious candidate to take the reins. But the two had a fraught and at times tortured relationship, resulting in public feuds and a prolonged and destructive battle for the future of the company.

The ruckus culminated in a high stakes 2016 lawsuit, during which a doctor assessed Redstone’s health, which had become the subject of intense speculation after he retreated from public view. The doctor told a Los Angeles court that Redstone had difficulty recognising simple shapes and colours. But despite his speech difficulties, Redstone was able to tell the court in videotaped testimony who he wanted to manage his healthcare: “Shari.”

Since then Ms Redstone has managed the business while her father remained largely out of view. She inherits an empire that is decidedly smaller and more vulnerable, after a series of megamergers among rivals that redrew the lines of Hollywood. Last year she reunited Viacom and CBS, with the hopes of extending the family legacy into a world now dominated by Netflix and YouTube.

The media industry is now without one of its most eccentric and influential characters. Redstone was among the last of a breed that includes the likes of Rupert Murdoch, Barry Diller and John Malone: cantankerous men who shaped the contours of films and television.

Redstone’s brash, old-school style (he once bragged that he shaved in the nude by his pool, and boasted about his sexual bravado in old age) was increasingly out of touch with modern Hollywood, with the #MeToo era toppling many of his peers.

But even as the world around him was changing, and with his health in decline, Redstone still managed to make a night of it at his 92nd birthday party. It was a low-key affair at a restaurant in Bel-Air and he was serenaded by Tony Bennett, who sang songs that included “I Left My Heart In San Francisco”.

In a 2009 interview with Larry King, Redstone repeated his claim that he was immortal. When asked his secret to good health, he said it was because he ate goji berries, tomato juice and fish, followed by a shot of vodka every night.

“The people who fear dying are people who are going to die,” he said. “I’m not going to die. I’m going to live forever.”



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