COMPANY TOWN: HOLLYWOOD MEGA-DEAL : Seagram’s Big Gulp : MANAGEMENT FALLOUT : MCA Insiders Contemplate Life Without Wasserman and Sheinberg

What a way to take the onus off “Waterworld.”

Until a week ago, the executives at MCA Inc./Universal Pictures were preoccupied with the upcoming summer release of the mega-budgeted Kevin Costner futuristic movie. Now the collective mood has shifted to grave uncertainty about the future of the company and of the executives’ own jobs.

The impending sale of the venerable Hollywood entertainment giant to Seagram Co. has MCA insiders contemplating for the first time what life on the Universal City lot would be like without the longtime leadership of Chairman Lew R. Wasserman and President Sidney J. Sheinberg. As of late Thursday, the widespread speculation inside and outside MCA was that the longest partnership in Hollywood history is about to end.

The joint tenure of Wasserman, 82, and Sheinberg, 60, has spanned about 34 years.

“This is probably the end of an era, which is really sad,” said a highly placed MCA executive.

Another bemoaned, “This has been a family place where Lou is the grandfather and Sid is the father, and it looks as if the family unit is about to break up.

“There are an enormous amount of people here who fear it’s coming, and they’re at a loss as to what to do or think,” said the MCA insider, sadly noting that when the “book is written” on the illustrious life and career of Wasserman, “the final chapters will play out like a Greek tragedy.”

In 1990, Wasserman, whose multi-decade career at MCA is the longest of any entertainment executive, and Sheinberg, who joined the company in 1959, agreed to sell the empire they jointly built to Matsushita for $6.6 billion.

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“MCA without Wasserman and Sheinberg is not something anyone here ever thought they’d be contemplating,” says a longtime Universal associate. “In terms of the corporate culture, it’s almost unfathomable and a future nobody would have considered a year ago.”

Seagram’s ambitious president, Edgar Bronfman Jr., 39, who will now fulfill his longtime desire to own a Hollywood studio, placed a call to Sheinberg for the first time Thursday to inform him of the negotiations. A source said Bronfman apologized for not calling sooner.

“This is a notification call that should have come three weeks ago,” said the source. Sheinberg declined to divulge any details of the phone conversation. Wasserman would not comment.

Wasserman received a similar call Wednesday night from Bronfman’s father, Edgar Sr., sources said.

Sheinberg is said to be relieved that MCA will soon be out of the hands of the Japanese parent company that he regards as shortsighted. But he is still uncertain about his own future under the new ownership.

Because of ongoing strained relations with Matsushita, Sheinberg and Wasserman have said they would resign when their contracts expire at the end of the year if matters did not improve. The two have grown increasingly bitter after being blanked out of Matsushita’s plans to sell the company.

While Matsushita has generally been a hands-off owner, it has refused to give MCA senior management the flexibility to expand the company and pursue such acquisitions as Virgin Records or explore a potential network purchase.

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Now it appears that MCA will gain an unfettered visionary owner in Bronfman, who is likely to seize new business opportunities while staying directly involved in the operations of the company.

Some in Hollywood speculate strongly that even if Bronfman asks Sheinberg to stay on, it is doubtful that an executive as strong-willed and independently minded as the MCA president would agree to such an arrangement without guaranteed authority and flexibility.

It is well known that Bronfman wants to be a bona fide Hollywood player in an industry for which he has long had an affinity but in which he has only dabbled, as a fledgling producer and sometime songwriter.

Last July, the Seagram CEO hobnobbed with the entertainment world’s elite--including Michael Eisner, Barry Diller, David Geffen, Sumner Redstone, Rupert Murdoch and John Malone--at Allen & Co.’s 12th annual retreat of corporate leaders in Sun Valley, Ida.

In an Annie Leibovitz photograph appearing in the October issue of Vanity Fair, a casually dressed Bronfman, tanned and smiling, is seated between Turner Entertainment Group President Scott Sassa and Blockbuster Entertainment Corp. Chairman H. Wayne Huizenga.

One player who attended the retreat said Bronfman seemed comfortable with the company he kept: “He loves being in that crowd--it was a great aphrodisiac for him. He really got off on it.” The Hollywood insider also said Bronfman “loves telling Hollywood stories . . . about how he tried to get in and how tough the system is.”

The big question remains: If not Sid and Lew managing the company, who?

Creative Artists Agency chief Michael S. Ovitz, who along with Allen & Co. is advising Matsushita on the sale, has emphatically denied through a spokeswoman that he wants the gig, and sources close to entertainment mogul Barry Diller insist he has no interest, either.

A sale also raises questions about the future of MCA Motion Picture Group Chairman Tom Pollock, who has been running Universal Pictures for the last nine years. Pollock, who was a prominent 44-year-old entertainment attorney before Sheinberg plucked him for the MCA job in 1986, recently signed a new multiyear contract giving him more strategic responsibilities.

Of course, if Pollock or Sheinberg or Wasserman need consolation or advice on what to do next, there’s plenty around.

On Thursday, Sheinberg and Pollock were spotted having lunch at the popular industry haunt Ca Del Sole in North Hollywood, where a few tables away were Jeffrey Katzenberg and Rich Frank, both of whom recently ended their decade-long relationship with Disney boss Michael Eisner.