Not siNce somebody figured out that you could attach
two black plastic disks to a skull cap and make everyone look like
Mickey Mouse has a pair of ears sent such a buzz through a media
executive. The new set were green, wing-shaped and attached to a
baby space alien. The instant Disney CEO Bob Iger saw them, his
heart leapt.
“As soon as those ears popped up from under the blanket, and the
eyes, I knew,” says Iger, recalling when he first saw footage of Disney’s
newest bankable piece of intellectual property, known to the world
as Baby Yoda. He likens the feeling to when he was running ABC’s
prime-time TV division and 16-year-old Leonardo DiCaprio showed
up on Growing Pains. The next moves were obvious: start produc-
tion on little green dolls and theme-park rides and lunch boxes, then
throw open the vaults and clear space for more cash.
But Iger is the kind of guy who, if given the marshmallow test,
would not only decline to eat the marshmallow, but persuade every-
one else to sell him theirs and corner the market on S’mores. So he
made a different call: no Baby Yoda merch yet. The cuddly alien was
the heart of the new Star Wars–themed series The Mandalorian. That
show was the anchor of Disney’s new streaming service Disney+, and
Iger would not spoil the first episode’s big reveal.
BUSINESSPERSON
OF THE YEAR
Bob Iger
HOLLYWOOD’S MOST DEPENDABLE CEO
IS WRITING DISNEY’S NEXT STORY
By Belinda Luscombe
ILLUSTR ATION BY TIM O’BRIEN FOR TIME
