Marvel Entertainment's Ike Perlmutter booted amid Disney layoffs

Walt Disney Co. has bounced Marvel Entertainment chairman Isaac "Ike" Perlmutter.

The 80-year-old comics titan, who has long been a prickly presence within the Burbank entertainment company, got swept up in a broad cost-cutting move that began earlier this week. Disney confirmed Wednesday that Perlmutter had received his pink slip.

When Disney purchased the comic book publisher Marvel in 2009, Perlmutter instantly became one of the largest individual shareholders in the entertainment conglomerate, giving him rare powers. Disney afforded the Israeli American billionaire a wide berth to help shape Marvel strategy and projects, including "Iron Man" and "The Avengers" — movies that have generated billions of dollars in box office receipts for Disney.

In recent years, Perlmutter's purview has been significantly smaller and separate from the powerful Marvel film studio led by Kevin Feige.

Perlmutter, once Marvel's chief executive, saw his role diminished in a 2015 management shuffle. The fracas began when Perlmutter tried to get Feige, the architect of Marvel’s lucrative film strategy, fired.

"I thought that was a mistake and stepped in to prevent that from happening," said Disney Chief Executive Bob Iger during a February appearance on CNBC. "So I moved the moviemaking operation of Marvel out from under Ike into the movie studio under Alan Horn. ... [Perlmutter] was not happy about it. And I think that unhappiness exists today."

Perlmutter played a supporting role in Disney's recent boardroom drama when he lobbied Disney leadership to support the campaign of billionaire activist investor Nelson Peltz, who was agitating to join the Disney board of directors.

Peltz's efforts began last year before Iger returned to the company.

At the time, Bob Chapek was still in charge, and Perlmutter called the embattled CEO, Disney Chief Financial Officer Christine McCarthy and board member Safra Catz to advocate for Peltz’s inclusion on the board, Disney said in a regulatory filing.

Perlmutter, according to Disney, said having Peltz would “help Mr. Chapek counter recent headwinds he had faced, solidify his position as CEO, and preempt any other potential shareholder nominations of director nominees.”

According to Disney’s filing, Perlmutter said, “Without Mr. Peltz there, former executives, including Mr. Iger, would be back at Disney.”

After Iger returned in November, he made clear that Peltz was not welcome on the board.

Instead, Iger focused on a corporate restructuring and cost-cutting program to find $5.5 billion in savings. The plan includes the elimination of about 7,000 jobs, or about 4% of Disney's global workforce, with those layoffs expected to conclude before early summer.

The cost-cutting won the endorsement of Peltz, who disbanded his proxy campaign in February.

The New York Times first reported that Perlmutter had been laid off.

Perlmutter, who lives in Palm Beach, Fla., also is known for maintaining friendly relations with former President Trump. Iger, long an outspoken Democrat, has entertained the idea of running for president, though he decided against it.

Despite the tensions within Disney, Perlmutter was key to one of Iger's biggest success stories.

It was Disney's $4 billion acquisition of Marvel, following the 2006 purchase of Pixar Animation Studios, that helped transform the company into a juggernaut. The deal brought a trove of pop culture figures, including Spider-Man, the X-Men, Iron Man, the Hulk, Captain America, Thor and the Fantastic Four, among other characters that helped inspire movies, television shows and video games.

The purchase was part of a creative shift in Hollywood, as movie studios became increasingly reliant upon comic book-based stories that appeal to an established fan base.

Perlmutter served in the Israeli army during the Six-Day War of 1967, according to Dan Raviv’s “Comic Wars: Marvel’s Battle for Survival.”

He arrived in New York months later with $250 in his pocket and dreams of making his fortune, his friend and former Marvel board Chairman Morton E. Handel told The Times in 2012. He sold toys in Brooklyn and eventually started the Odd-Lot Trading Inc., a company that purchased discount soap, beauty products and toys that it resold at dollar stores.

Perlmutter sold the company in the mid-1980s to drugstore chain operator Revco. The turnaround specialist went on to reinvigorate other firms, including Coleco Inc., the struggling maker of Cabbage Patch dolls, and Remington, the electric shaver firm. With the sales of those companies, Perlmutter generated huge windfalls.

He bought Marvel out of bankruptcy in the late 1990s by out-maneuvering legendary financiers, including Carl Icahn.

Under Perlmutter, Marvel reinvented itself.

Comic books became, in effect, Marvel’s research and development arm, developing characters and storylines that could be exploited through film, TV and games. He expanded the business by licensing Marvel characters to movie studios, including Sony Pictures, Paramount Pictures and 20th Century Fox.

Iger, in a 2009 interview with the Los Angeles Times, said he had been studying the comic book publisher and Marvel movie studio for some time. He said he admired the way its executives managed the company from a creative and business perspective.

In June 2009, Iger and Perlmutter met in Perlmutter’s New York office to discuss a possible deal, which was unveiled three months later.

Three years later, in 2012, The Times described Perlmutter's management style and his eye for recognizing value in businesses that others deemed worthless. The executive — whose net worth is estimated at $4 billion by Forbes — also was legendary for his frugality.

Former executives say Perlmutter would retrieve paper clips from the trash and tear up old memos to create new notepads.

“This guy’s whole life is dedicated to being a success,” said former Marvel executive Scott M. Sassa told The Times in 2012. Perlmutter had shown himself especially adept at turning around troubled companies, Sassa noted.

“He’s not Mr. Charming, but once you get to know him, he’s a guy that I really like a lot,” Sassa said. “He’s super smart, incredibly loyal to people and highly principled.”

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.