This Fantasyland Would Be Letter-Perfect
Mr. Michael Eisner
Chairman of the Board
The Walt Disney Co.
500 S. Buena Vista St.
Burbank, CA 90521
Dear Mr. Eisner,
Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Scott Harris. You may recognize the name. Many people do. But let me assure you I am not that Scott Harris. I am not the Scott Harris who parachuted into your friend Michael Jackson’s ranch a few years back and quite literally crashed Elizabeth Taylor’s latest wedding. I am not a convicted trespasser.
No, I am the Scott Harris who grew up just a few miles from Disneyland and now writes a column for the Los Angeles Times, which brings me to the first point of this letter.
There’s something I’ve been meaning to clear up. Last December, I wrote a column that questioned the values reflected in the California tax code and contained a passing reference to your $203.1-million compensation for 1993.
Reader response gives me the awkward feeling that the mere mention of your salary and stock options was intended as criticism. It was not. The purpose of my column was to explain that although Californians are charged up to an 8.5% sales tax on such items as diapers and textbooks, there is absolutely zero tax on tickets for amusement parks, movies and the Mighty Ducks.
Some people, it seems, look at your compensation and think that would put a lot of cops on the streets and rebuild a few freeways. They think, gee, if we could just get our hands on Eisner’s loot--if, say, we charged the sales tax on the frills and thrills that Disney provides, just as we tax Pampers and textbooks--then maybe Eisner and his like wouldn’t be such profiteers and our own taxes wouldn’t be quite so high.
But, of course, this is an unsophisticated, simplistic view of capitalism and the American way. Sometimes I think these people don’t understand that communism is dead. They just don’t appreciate how our collective economic survival--indeed, their own jobs--depend on the ability of visionaries such as yourself to earn a just wage. And really, every time I ride Pirates of the Caribbean and watch those buccaneers loot and pillage, I can’t help but think that, at $203.1 million, the entire world is getting a bargain in Mr. Michael Eisner.
This brings me to the second point of this letter. It seems to me that people don’t appreciate your contributions the way they should. They envy you, but they don’t love you the way they loved Walt Disney. They seem to think of you as just a lucky fellow who got plucked from Paramount to run an undervalued company and couldn’t help but succeed. And they read about the red ink at Euro Disney and scoff.
This is unfair. And that is one reason I would like to call your attention to a modest investment opportunity that promises a big payoff in money and public image. I can sum this golden opportunity up in just one word.
Gorman.
That’s right: Gorman.
Perhaps you’re familiar with the rustic little truck stop 60 miles up Interstate 5. It’s got a sheriff’s substation, a post office, a motel, a diner, a Carl’s Jr. and three gas stations. But the place is so darn pretty that the artist Christo chose this site to erect a forest of yellow umbrellas.
All of Gorman--including about 3,000 acres of peach orchards and grazing land--is for sale. The Ralphs family--the ones who founded the grocery chain--is asking a mere $13.6 million.
Just think of what we could do here. What I propose is the creation of a new company to purchase and develop this land. Eisner-Harris Imagineering could work wonders. Eisnerland will show the world what you can do without the help of Mickey Mouse.
My thoughts are still a bit sketchy, but Eisnerland will give adults the kind of vicarious thrills that Disneyland gives to children. Instead of “rocket ships” and roller coasters, Fatcat City would have rides simulating limousines and Lear jets. There would be faux gold mines and oil gushers. Instead of Goofy, Pluto and the Three Little Pigs, we’d have look-alikes of everyone from the Trumps, the Clintons and the Windsors to Rush Limbaugh, Teddy Kennedy and Elvis. Jack Nicholson would be a court jester with a 5 iron.
Instead of Main Street, we will offer Rodeo Drive. Instead of the Matterhorn, Aspen. Instead of Toon Town, Schmoozeville. And best of all, instead of Sleeping Beauty’s Castle, we’ll have the Corridors of Power, where patrons would be able to make “campaign contributions” in exchange for political favors. And by the end of the day, customers might ride “Oh Yes, You Can Too Take It With You,” in which they lie in gilded coffins and are covered with the park’s official currency, known as Eisnerbucks.
Obviously, we need to talk. The initial financing should be easy to work out. The way I figure it, if I invest the entire Harris family fortune, and you invest a mere 6.75% of your 1993 income, we can get Eisnerland rolling. (Since I am taking the greater risk, it would seem fair that I control 51% of the company.)
By the way, I read somewhere that you saved $17 million for yourself by exercising your stock options before the Clinton tax plan took effect. Once more, I salute you!
And I look forward to us working together.
Sincerely,
Scott Harris
P.S. To help us get a fast start, perhaps you could mention to your friends in Sacramento the great public need for new off-ramps in Gorman to bring in the heavy equipment. Of course, the taxpayers will cover this, just as they are covering the $50 million for new off-ramps to serve the Disneyland expansion, plus another $47 million toward new parking structures. This is only right. After all, we’ll be creating thousands of minimum-wage jobs.
