Hollywood’s Peter Guber buys into the Golden State Warriors

Peter Guber, the former chairman of Sony Pictures, tried to purchase a piece of the Dodgers, Ducks and Kings without success. The Hollywood player on Thursday finally landed his breakthrough role as a major league owner by joining venture capitalist Joseph Lacob to pay a record $450 million for the Golden State Warriors.

Guber and Lacob, a minority owner of the Boston Celtics, beat out Larry Ellison, the chief executive of Bay Area computer software giant Oracle. Ellison later released a statement contending he submitted a higher bid. A representative of the firm retained by former Warriors owner Chris Cohan to supervise the sale indicated in a Bay Area radio interview that Ellison’s bid arrived too late.

“Larry Ellison is one of the most formidable business people on the planet,” Guber told The Times in his first interview after the purchase. “I only know what we did — we made a tenacious and continual bid for this team.”

Guber, the Sony Pictures chief from 1989-95 who produced films such as “The Color Purple,” “Batman,” and “Rain Man,” has been involved in minor league sports ownership since the 1990s, owning pieces of the Class-A Rancho Cucamonga Quakes baseball team and the Las Vegas Thunder hockey team, among others.

A Lakers fan dating to Pat Riley’s coaching and former business partner Magic Johnson’s playing days, Guber said he was engaged in talks last decade to join Frank McCourt in the Dodgers’ purchase and was also interested in buying the Kings from Bruce McNall and the Ducks from Disney.

“It didn’t work out, sometimes that’s the way it works,” said Guber, who met Bay Area resident Lacob during their mutual interest in the Dodgers.

In the Warriors, Lacob and Guber take over a franchise that hasn’t made the playoffs since 2007, hasn’t won a division title since 1976 and plays in the oldest arena still used in the NBA. In Oakland.

For now, Guber compares the thrill of this challenge to the start of making a compelling motion picture.

“There’s pure joy to telling the story, seeing the audience and exceeding their expectations,” he said. “I’m very excited to take this legacy and make it bigger. And to win.”

Guber’s challenge is intense. He says his investment with Lacob — the prior record was the $401-million purchase of the Phoenix Suns in 2004 by Robert Sarver — underscores Guber’s commitment to reward a strong fan base that ranked 11th in attendance last season despite the team’s 26-56 record.

“The strategy in the entertainment business and the sports business is to win and put [fans] in the seats, and I’ve done it in both,” Guber said. “I believe we’ll tap into this powerful Pacific Rim marketplace in the Bay Area, which has all the earmarks to be tremendously successful, and bring a winning attitude to this loyal fan base. We’ll be doing what we should to fulfill what the promise is.”

Guber confronts tough questions, however. Can his franchise ever rise to the division-rival Lakers’ level? Does he want to keep General Manager Larry Riley and Coach Don Nelson? Will he move the team out of Oakland?

Of the front office and personnel, he said, “I wouldn’t tell you if I knew, but I give you my word I don’t know yet. That comes with the wisdom of getting in the weeds and digging in there. We’ll get into that. It’s the first order of business.”

He’s toured Oracle Arena and says, “I couldn’t give you an answer” about how long the Warriors will remain there, “but that’s a good question for a later phone call.”

lance.pugmire@latimes.com

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