What Some Studios Brush Off Is a ‘Powder’ Keg for Disney

The flap over the movie “Powder” is a reminder once again that Walt Disney Co.’s most valuable asset can also be its most vulnerable pressure point, one that is likely to be pressed a lot more as the company’s already sprawling empire continues to grow rapidly through acquisitions.

Last week, Daily Variety disclosed that the movie’s director and writer, Victor Salva, is a convicted child molester. It’s hard to dream up a worse nightmare for America’s family entertainment company, which released the film through its Hollywood Pictures unit. Still, “Powder” finished second in the weekend box office with a gross of $7.1 million.

Disney executives say that news about Salva’s past didn’t reach the top floor of Disney’s Burbank headquarters until just a couple of weeks ago, which is a perfectly believable story. The reason: It’s a safe bet that the movie would have been deep-sixed, or jettisoned to another studio, had Disney’s brass known about Salva’s record before the movie crossed whatever point of no return it did. Forget the lip service about how he paid his debt to society. There is too much at stake for Disney to let one movie chip away at the name and goodwill it took so long to build.

The Disney name is arguably the single most valuable asset in entertainment. It’s bigger and more important than any executive who has worked or is working at the company, which is why it was never the Jeffrey Katzenberg Co., isn’t the Michael Eisner Co. and won’t be the Michael Ovitz Co.

The name was built by someone who--as a current Disney Channel special reminds us--was on a first-name basis with every Mouseketeer, insisting they call him “Uncle Walt.” Walt Disney remains an icon nearly 30 years after his death, despite incompetent management at the company in the early 1980s that nearly squandered the name by making Disney a fat target for a corporate raider.

The genius of Eisner, Frank Wells, Katzenberg and the others who rescued the company in 1984 was recognizing that the name was losing value fast, and quickly re-established it as synonymous with family entertainment.

Listening to the reaction on talk radio last week--seemingly nearly all of it negative toward Disney and “Powder”--one couldn’t help but be struck by how Disney is alone among entertainment companies in being viewed as something of a public trust. When Eisner & Co. raised ticket prices at Disneyland shortly after taking over, the outcry resembled the kind of reaction a public utility gets when it wants to raise rates. One almost expected public hearings with a 30-day comment period.

Bogus rumors about subliminal sex messages in MGM’s “The Pebble and the Penguin” would be laughed off. When they spread about Disney’s “Aladdin” or “The Lion King,” the company mobilized a strike force to counter them.

Had “Powder” been released by Paramount, Fox, Sony or another entertainment company, there would have been protests and pickets, but nothing like the sense of betrayal expressed on the talk-radio circuit by parents who no doubt have spent hundreds of dollars on Disney videos, merchandise and Disneyland tickets. Despite Disney’s stony silence last week, those comments reverberate to that sixth floor in Burbank.

By contrast, convicted rapist Mike Tyson had barely shed his prison clothes when Viacom Inc.’s Showtime channel cut a multimillion-dollar deal with him. Nobody urges a boycott of sister company products, such as Paramount’s “Forrest Gump,” United Paramount Network’s “Star Trek: Voyager,” MTV’s “Beavis and Butt-head” or Blockbuster videos.

Likewise, Time Warner was hardly a household name to the public until Bill Bennett, C. Delores Tucker and Bob Dole made it one by singling out violent rap lyrics put out by Interscope Records, which has since left Time Warner’s fold. Despite the media attention and protests, there was hardly a threat to Time magazine, the movie “Batman Forever” or television’s “Animaniacs.”

But, like Disney, Time Warner is vulnerable to its own pragmatic pressure points. Not long after Chairman Gerald Levin defended freedom of speech in a Wall Street Journal opinion piece in the wake of Ice-T’s “Cop Killer” song, Time Warner cut the rapper loose. Time Warner saw the future, and realized it was full of city council meetings packed with cops urging that elected officials refuse to renew cable TV contracts with Warner Cable.

As Disney sprawls, soon adding Capital Cities/ABC to its fold, the pressure points grow. When it bought the envelope pushers at Miramax two years ago, the natural question was what would happen if Miramax wanted to release the kind of sexually explicit films it had periodically released to much fanfare before. The issue was skillfully danced around at the news briefing.

Sure enough, the controversial movie “Priest” came out and Catholic groups were urging Disney boycotts. But with the graphically violent and sexual movie “Kids,” a creative solution was found allowing Disney to sidestep the controversy: spin the movie off to a company called Shining Excalibur controlled by Miramax’s Weinstein brothers and let them distribute the film. Once that happened, Excalibur folded its tent. No doubt “Priest” might have been a good candidate to be an “Excalibur” film had it been released after “Kids.”

Disney now owns 25% of the California Angels baseball team and is set to acquire the entire team upon the death of Gene Autry. Back in 1990, the team signed infielder Luis Polonia, fresh from jail time the previous year on charges of having sex with a 15-year-old girl. Would the Angels have signed Polonia if they’d been owned by Disney? No way.

As it showed with “Kids,” Disney has always moved with extraordinary caution when it smells possible threats to its name, which again is why it’s easy to believe Salva’s background was indeed a last-minute surprise to top company officials. On Saturday, newspaper ads for the film were blank where the credits--including Salva’s name--would have appeared. Earlier this month, Disney, after taking three years to study the issue, joined most other Hollywood studios in extending health coverage to partners of gay and lesbian employees after realizing it could lose some of its top creative talent. The company is still under criticism in the Florida Legislature for doing so.

It’s a safe bet Michael Eisner doesn’t like surprises, especially the whopper he got with “Powder.” It’s also a safe bet that there’s a clear understanding not to let anything approaching that fiasco happen again. That’s why a Luis Polonia won’t play for a Disney-owned Angels, and why Victor Salva won’t direct another Disney movie.

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Isgro case: After spending six years and an estimated $10 million, the Justice Department is on the verge of resolving the biggest payola racketeering case in history. The case, in which Joseph Isgro was indicted in Los Angeles for payola and 56 other felony counts, is expected to be settled Nov. 20 with a plea-bargain arrangement. The final settlement has yet to be approved by federal officials in Washington, but sources said Isgro is not expected to plead guilty to payola. Instead, the former record promoter is likely to plead guilty to two lesser violations--including a misdemeanor tax offense--and will receive no jail time or financial penalty.

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CBS cancels shows: CBS, off to its slowest prime-time start in history, moved Monday to shore up its weak Friday night lineup, canceling the comedy series “Dweebs” and shelving another comedy, “The Bonnie Hunt Show.” The first-year sitcoms have been CBS’ lowest-rated shows this season. The network said Hunt’s series, produced by David Letterman’s company, will return sometime in 1996. Meanwhile, CBS will fill the 8-9 p.m. Friday slot with repeats for the next two weeks, with further scheduling plans to be announced later.

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Times staff writers Chuck Philips and Lee Margulies contributed to this column.

* FILM FLAP: Producer says he was misled about “Powder” director’s crimes. F1