What's Jeffrey K. Been Up To?

Mr. Katzenberg hasn't let the grass grow under his feet. He's been raking in bucks for his new "short content" enterprise.

Media mogul Jeffrey Katzenberg and veteran tech executive Meg Whitman used the prominent platform of Vanity Fair’s New Establishment Summit to announce the name of their new mobile video startup and drop the names of four high-profile Hollywood players who will create content for the subscription service.

Filmmakers Sam Raimi, Guillermo del Toro and Antoine Fuqua and noted producer Jason Blum will all create shows for the new mobile subscription service, which launches next year.

“These people are so excited about doing something new. They want to be the pioneers. They want to be able to show the path in doing this,” said Katzenberg. “We are going to do be able to do extraordinary storytelling.” ...

Jeffrey has come full circle.

Back in the early eighties at Paramount, he was overseeing live-action features. Then he moved with Michael Eisner to Disney, and supervised live-action and (as a side show) the studio' animated features.

Initially Mr. Katzenberg found success with both live-action and animated movies, but over his ten years at Disney, it was animated product that took flight. He was an unqualified success with Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin and Lion King but the offerings with flesh and blood actors foundered. In '94 Disney President Frank Wells died and Jeffrey grabbed for that brass ring. Michael Eisner pushed him overboard and he became the junionr partner of DreamWorks SKG.

For twenty years Jeffrey oversaw a string of animated features, then he sold out to Comcast Universal and dove back into live-action. Mr. Katzenberg is now a billionaire, but his day-to-day reality will be superintending (again) live-action. The difference this time around? The product will be 8 to 10 minutes in length, instead of two hours.

Progress. (I suppose).