The term home run has become synonymous with going a great job, and it makes sense considering
what a home run is.
So it makes sense that when you set out to do something you try to "hit a home run".
It'd almost be strange to aim for, say, a single or a double.
Yet that's exactly what Michael Eisner did in the late 80s, and it virtually saved the
Disney company.
"Singles and Doubles" was a strategy that Michael Eisner actually brought with him to
Disney from his previous job as president of Paramount Pictures.
It was a surprisingly simple concept: rather than spend an excessive amount of money getting
the best directors and actors, which in-turn meant the film had to do really well to turn
any kind of profit, focus instead on coming up with good movie ideas and making them with
a low budget.
The profit would be more modest, but the risk was also minimized when a movie flopped because
the budget was low.
That's really it.
Make movies with lower budgets, less expensive actors, and good concepts.
You'd think that wouldn't have to be an actual strategy, but this is Hollywood we're talking
about here.
This idea came from Eisner's belief that beyond famous actors and directors, a good idea was
the most important element in making a good film.
Movies with a clear three-act structure and universal themes that would be easier to market
everywhere would as a result do better at the box office.
Of course that didn't mean a studio couldn't indulge in the occasional blockbuster.
After all, Eisner did sign on a couple of filmmakers named Steven Spielberg and George
Lucas for an action blockbuster called Raiders of the Lost Ark, and it paid off for Paramount.
That said, Eisner took a very modest and tempered approach to the industry.
In a manifesto on the business that he wrote while at Paramount he said:
Yet at the same time he acknowledged that low budget alone wouldn't do the trick, stating
So in 1984 when he made the move from Paramount to Disney, he carried this mentality with
him, and honestly, Disney needed it.
When he took over as CEO, Disney wasn't in a great spot.
Just months prior it would be the target of a potential hostile takeover.
Due to over a decade of towing the line with the mantra "what would Walt do?"
the company as a whole, and the studio specifically, was pretty stagnant.
It would only take days for Eisner to start putting his "Singles and Doubles" strategy into action
A major part of his plan to keep budgets low was to avoid using expensive A-list celebrities.
Instead, his idea was to find talented actors who had for one reason or another fallen from
grace and get them at a reduced price while offering to revitalize their careers in the process.
For their first film under the new leadership, Down and Out in Beverly Hills, they reached
out to Richard Dreyfuss who had just finished drug rehab, and Bette Midler, whose career
had gone cold in the years following the award winning “The Rose”.
As a result the film only cost Disney $14 million to make, but it earned $62 million
at the box office.
The very definition of one of those singles and doubles..
Sometimes though you'd aim for a single and get that home run.
Hiring comedian Robin Williams at a reduced rate due to his recent time at drug rehab,
Disney was able to produce Good Morning Vietnam for only $13 million dollars.
The film would go on to gross $123 million at the box office.
The idea didn’t just include hiring film stars at lower rates.
In some cases it meant looking to other mediums.
For instance when they spent over a million dollars just for the rights to make an American
adaptation of Three Men and a Baby, originally a French film, Disney opted to hire television
actors instead of film stars with Ted Danson and Tom Selleck to save money.
Proving Eisner's point, the film apparently didn't need big name movie stars as it grossed $167
million in the domestic box office with just an $11 million budget.
Overall, this strategy played a major role in the turnaround of The Walt Disney Company.
These singles and doubles not only resulted in modest profits that added up, but occasionally
resulted in big hits that, as a result of their low cost, carried high profit margins.
By the end of 1988, just four years under Eisner's leadership, Disney became the number
one studio in the industry.
Operating income went from $300 million when he joined on to $800 million, and this was
all before the Disney Renaissance.
It would be lucky for Disney to have that renaissance too, because the singles and doubles
strategy wouldn't last forever.
Perhaps it was pressure to fall in line with the industry's growing trend towards event
and tentpole films.
Maybe it was the studio leadership.
It could have also just been a shift in mentality from Eisner himself.
For whatever reason, Disney began to abandon the singles and doubles concept for more high-budget
films like Dick Tracy, Armageddon, and Pearl Harbor later on.
Bigger actors, bigger directors, and more marketing meant that even when a film did
turn a profit, it was a slim one.
It also meant that when a film didn't do well, they were out a lot of money.
Today, the game has obviously changed and the analogy no longer compares.
We live in a time where virtually all films today need to be home runs.
There’s more competition, both inside the realm of film and outside of it.
Studios are competing for people’s money and time at a point where there’s more entertainment
options than ever before.
That means bringing in the big talent that Eisner tried to avoid in the 80s and early 90s.
Bob Iger isn’t interested in singles and doubles, he wants homeruns.
And you know what?
It works.
With the right talent and oversight Disney is pulling in record setting numbers at the
box office, which just shows that there’s more than one approach to the industry.
It’s possible that Disney could have taken such an approach in the mid and late 80s,
but a flop on a blockbuster scale could have easily ruined them financially.
So considering the time, the industry, and the state of the company when he stepped in,
Michael Eisner’s “singles and doubles” strategy may have very well helped save Disney.