Company Town

Kid stuff: Financier Ronald O. Perelman’s entertainment hiring binge continues. Perelman’s Marvel Entertainment confirmed that it has hired top toy executive Bruce L. Stein as its president and chief operating officer. Stein is leaving his current job as president of Kenner Products, a unit of Hasbro, to replace Terry Steward, who becomes president and chief operating officer of the firm’s Marvel Comics unit. Stein’s hiring comes less than a week after Perelman hired Brandon Tartikoff, former Paramount Pictures chairman and NBC president, to head his New World Communications Group. Perelman owns 80% of Marvel, which boasts such characters as Spider-Man, X-Men and the Incredible Hulk. Separately, Marvel said it has reached an agreement with MCA to develop rides, shows and attractions based on Marvel characters at MCA’s proposed Universal City Florida theme park, scheduled to open in 1999.