The Boss of the Month

The president of Viacom (Paramount, MTV…) is the highest paid CEO in the United States, but it’s his French origin that has prompted his invitation to the French American Foundation Gala. Here is a portrait of a New York “mogul” with French roots, and how a CEO’s coming of age gave birth to Spielberg’s production of Tintin…

There are two figures one should know about Philippe Dauman: the president of Viacom is the highest paid CEO in the United States (at $85 million in 2010); and at 13 years old, he got a perfect score on the SAT, America’s famous college admissions test. The CEO doesn’t have much to say about the first figure (“it’s the shareholders who decide” is his standard reply). On the other hand, he is happy to speak of his scholarly brilliance back in his French high school, where he skipped two years ahead of his classmates. “I was terrified,” he recalls to French Morning, who he is hosting in his corner office on the 52^nd floor of the Viacom headquarters in Times Square. “All the other kids were two years older than I was, it was a shock.” He quickly overcame this shock, thanks in part to a young girl in his class. “Like me, she was also very young. The daughter of a Nobel Prize winner, she was extremely brilliant.” Forty years later, he recalls her name – Jacqueline Sobotka. Thanks to her, and a few others, he says, “I never took myself for a genius; I thought everyone was like me.” (Correction: Jacqueline Bonnard-Sobotka, who we were not able to reach before this article was published, has clarified that her father, chemist Harry Sobotka, won numerous awards in his day, but never the Nobel Prize). 

At the time, if he felt any different, it was for an entirely different reason: Philippe Dauman was the son of immigrants. His parents met in the United States but both are from France. His father, Henri Dauman, is a well-known photographer and a collaborator of Life Magazine; his mother, a lawyer, came to the United States to learn English. They settled in New York, where Philippe was born. “Every year, my parents would say that we would return to France, but we stayed.” The Dauman family spoke French at home, the couple’s friends are all French living in New York, and it’s in watching television that the little Philippe tells us he learned English. Since becoming the president of a television and cinema empire, he has often used the anecdote: “TV is good for your children” (a guaranteed effect on all audiences), but it is, he assures, 100% truthful.

The war against Google and YouTube

At some point in his adolescence, “I started to think in English more than in French,” he says. Today, his French is tainted with a faint American accent, but he is convinced that his “bi-cultural” education played a critical role in his career. In any case, it allows him to cite without hesitation that his French heritage, in one notable domain, has inspired him in the battle of protecting intellectual property on the internet. The CEO of Viacom is the most active spokesperson in a campaign initiated by the American cinema and television industry in favor of a law inspired by the French Hadopi, (including most notably, warnings against fraud) regarding protection against fraud. Lobbyists have imitated the approach used in France and enlisted the help of artists and authors. “Our goal is to demonstrate that there is absolutely no contradiction between innovation and intellectual property. On the contrary, films create thousands of jobs, and fraud is a direct threat to those jobs!”

Philippe Dauman began the intellectual property crusade against Google and its subsidiary YouTube shortly after his arrival at Viacom. The internet giant was guilty of allowing is users to broadcast television programs produced by its partners (such as The Daily Show with Jon Stewart on Comedy Central). Viacom lost the first round against Google and the case is currently before the court of appeals, however the episode has cemented Dauman’s reputation in Hollywood, where his rather austere appearance earned him an initially cold welcome. “What fascinates everyone in this industry,” says an industry insider, “is that he was always able to stay on the good side of Sumner Redstone, the billionaire who controls CBS and Viacom.”

Today, at 88 years old, Redstone has designated many heirs to his throne, but Philippe Dauman resists. He has been at the head of Viacom for more than five years. “We have a very strong intellectual connection,” he assured. Their partnership dates back to 1986 when Dauman, then a lawyer, advised Redstone in the hostile takeover that would enable him to take control of Viacom. “He wanted me to work with him immediately (it was 1987),” recalls Dauman. “I refused because I was about to become a partner in the firm, Shearman & Sterling, where I was working.” But in 1992, Sumner Redstone made a new offer that Philippe Dauman would accept. Knighted by the patriarch who he calls “my best friend for life,” Dauman became CEO in 2006 and is credited with the stellar financial results that have earned him a record-breaking salary.

The Adventures of Tintin

Under his leadership, MTV, the former jewel of the group, rose to new success by moving from music videos to reality shows. And Viacom’s cinema branch, Paramount, has become increasingly profitable despite a marked decrease in the number of new films out each year, thanks in particular to the multiplication of highly lucrative franchises (such as Transformers, Star Trek and even Mission: Impossible). It is also under Philippe Dauman’s leadership that the studio has been enlisted as a co-producer in Steven Spielberg’s “The Adventures of Tintin in 3D,” which just hit theaters in France on October 26^th. Although Dauman typically lets the studio choose the films it produces, he recognized this time around that “having someone from my culture, who read Tintin as a child and knows the impact the character has in Europe, was without a doubt essential in producing the film.”

The film is nevertheless a considerable gamble in the United States. For the first time in the firm’s history, the movie will be released abroad before it hits the American market, in two months. The goal, explains the CEO of Viacom, “is to surf on Europe’s hoped-for success in order to create a buzz here, where Tintin is unknown!” Success or a failure, Viacom’s shareholders know that the reason can be found on the young Dauman’s childhood bookshelves somewhere on the Upper East Side…

Written by Emmanuel Saint-Martin on 10/24/2011
Translated by Adrienne C. Gaskell, ACG buzz, LLC

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