flâneur

Founders: #111 David Geffen

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What I learned from reading The Operator: David Geffen Builds, Buys, and Sells the New Hollywood by Tom King. ---- He told me he had recently read Buffett: The Making of an American Capitalist, Buffett was Geffen's hero.Geffen—with searing focus, unyielding drive, and outlandish nerve—had devised and implemented strategies to propel himself to the top of the heap of Hollywood powerbrokers.I used to have phone conversations with David that would leave me sweaty.David might not have realized it, but he was being educated by a master entrepreneur. Batya succeeded in teaching him the value of hard work and the possibilities of life under even the most difficult circumstances. She was a brilliant businesswoman who could account for every penny that went into and out of the enterprise. She kept her overhead low by driving hard bargains with her suppliers and by closely monitoring her expenses.His mother determinedly drilled into him the same advice she often repeated to herself. "You may not be very tall, but you will stand head and shoulders above everyone," she declared. "You think of yourself as head and shoulders above everyone else, and you will be."Arriving in Hollywood for the fir

[00:00:00] Complex, contentious, and blessed with the perfect pitch ability to find the next big talent, David Geffen has shaped American popular culture and transformed the way Hollywood does business. His dazzling career has included the roles of power agent, record industry mogul, Broadway producer, and billionaire Hollywood studio founder. But from the beginning, his accomplishments have been shadowed by the ruthlessness with which he has pursued fame, money, and power. With the operator, Tom King, who interviewed Geffen for the book and had an unimpeded access to his circle of…

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