Wednesday, Jun 2, 1999 4:00 PM UTC

The mouse roars again: Did Disney deal spike an Eisner biography?

By Craig Offman

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Last week Broadway Books, a division of Random House — itself now a division of the German media giant Bertelsmann A.G. — made the startling announcement that it was dropping one of its biggest spring books, “The Keys to the Kingdom,” a biography of Walt Disney chairman Michael Eisner by Time and Vanity Fair reporter Kim Masters. Random House spokesman Stuart Applebaum chalked up the controversial move to house editors’ having “found the author’s reporting to be sadly inadequate.”

Is it only a coincidence that Disney is deep in business negotiations with Bertelsmann? Last month it was reported that Disney is spinning off its majority stake in Super RTL, a family-oriented German television channel that is expected to have $121 million in revenue this year, and Bertelsmann is a probable purchaser. Through CLT-Ufa (a joint venture with Luxembourg’s CLT), Bertelsmann controls Germany’s leading commercial TV network, RTL, and owns Super RTL jointly with Disney. Now Bertelsmann wants outright control of the channel, which claims a respectable 1.6 percent share of the German audience.

The New York Times reported last week that William Morrow, a division of Hearst, is interested in Masters’ book. On Tuesday, Morrow executive editor Henry Ferris confirmed that the house is still considering the biography. “We’re very, very interested,” Ferris told Salon Books. “We think very highly of Kim Masters’ reporting.”

Craig Offman is the New York correspondent for Salon Books. More Craig Offman.

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The week in 10 pics

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Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
Credit: AP/LM Otero
Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
Credit: AP/Matt Rourke
A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher
Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
Credit: AP/Molly Riley
Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite
Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster
O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid
Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield
When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin
A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin
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The mouse roars again: Did Disney deal spike an Eisner biography?