Video Age International October 2015

20 October 2015 V I D E O A G E be FeARLeSS Tomorrow’s content begins today. You must prepare and adapt to create the future of content. Join us at NATPE Miami to tackle creative challenges head-on while laying waste to the fears of missed opportunities. be cReAtive be ReADY nat p e . com MIAMI BEACH • JANUARY 19-21, 2016 Fonta i nebl eau resor t MI AMI BeAch / JAnUARY 19-21, 2016 eden roc resor t buyers: $300 through sept. 9; $425 sept. 10-oct. 21; $550 oct. 22-dec. 17; $675 dec. 18-Jan. 13 General attendees: $850 through sept. 9; $1,050 sept. 10-oct. 21; $1,250 oct. 22-dec. 17; $1,450 dec. 18-event be tHeRe Gordon relocated to Bermuda, where he currently resides (in addition to having homes in Wollongong, London and Monte Carlo). Gordon is indeed a world traveler. When in the distribution business, he was often on the road for four or fivemonths eachyear.Heonce summarized his business philosophy this way: “A guy at a station in Japan doesn’t send you a postcard and say, ‘I’ll buy MacGyver ’. You’ve got to get on a plane and go to Japan and see your clients and then make your deal. I live in a suitcase. I don’t spend a lot of time anywhere,” he said, explaining that, as a result, he doesn’t have many close friends. He also tends to have little tolerance for his managers, especially, he says, those who like to reinvent the wheel (not trusting that he has seen all and dealt with all possible unexpected challenges). While at Paramount, Gordon worked with a who’s who of the U.S. entertainment industry, and the Nine Network Australia, including the Spyforce and Mission Impossible series. Despite all his movement, Gordon has not forgotten his roots. “I never stop thinking of myself as Australian,” he told Sydney’s SunHerald in 1990. “I went overseas to work for the Americans and I took Australian programming over there and sold it to the Americans, and I have done everything I could to help the local industry here.” There are a number of legends about this man. One such legend centers around his various nicknames. Internationally, he was known as the “General,” but in Australia they call him “God.” Gordon acknowledged the “General” tag, explaining that after seeing him followed by a group of kids in Bali, a Fox executive kept hailing “General Gordon and his troops.” However, Gordon is surprised to be called “God.” “Most likely, it’s ‘bloody God,’” he said. Then there are others. the late Bruce Gyngell, one of Australia’s top TV executives, once recalled: “In the early ’60s, Bruce got a 22- foot yacht that he named Desilu. The problem was that he’d never sailed before in his life. After reading every book he could get his hands on about sailing, Bruce and Desilu won the Pittwater competition the following season.” Nowadays, when in Bermuda, Gordon gets around on a motor scooter that he likes to service and repair himself. He doesn’t like to brag about his good fortune. On the contrary, he likes to keep quiet so as not to stimulate unnecessary jealousy and envy. He’d rather talk about his humble origins and how television fulfilled his dreams. Gordon is Australia’s 34 th richest personwith an estimated fortune of A$1.1billion,andheownsAustralia’s largest TV network by area, which he once described as being larger than Europe even though it serves only 5.2million people. Gordon’s financial fortune began when, after acquiring majority ownership of WIN, he took the public-owned station private by buying out the other shareholders. Then, in 1989, he purchased CrawfordProductions and in 1991, two TV stations in Queensland, followed by TV stations in Victoria, Tasmania, South and West Australia to complete the WIN network. His cash came from smart acquisitions and timely sales, like in 2007 when he purchased a TV station in Perth for A$163 million, and another in Adelaide for $105 million and sold them both to the Nine Network in 2013 for $400 million. Comprehensive stories about Bruce Gordon were published in theOctober 1997 Issue of VideoAge (a salute to his retirement from Paramount) and in the October 2009 Issue of VideoAge (for WIN’s 30th anniversary). including Michael Eisner, Rich Frank, Frank Mancuso, Marvin Davis, Sumner Redstone, Kerry McCluggage, Jonathan Dolgen and Lucie Salhany. Despite many ownership and management changes, he survived by perfectly timing his foreign sales visits and therefore was never caught taking sides in the middle of corporate in-fights. He was also valued for his ability to fulfill management requests of quarterly sales increases. When Gordon became president, Paramount’s international TV annual sales were $8 million. They were $500 million when he retired in 1997. At the time, all the MPAA members combined generated $2.6 billion internationally. During Gordon’s time in New York, he was able to expand and diversify Paramount’s operations into production, co-production and acquisition, arranging co-productions between Paramount Int’l TV Distribution Hall of Fame (Continued from Page 18)