Gerald Levin, known to many as Jerry, wasn’t flamboyant. He wasn’t characterized, as were many of his media business contemporaries, by extravagant hobbies, odd peccadillos, inspiring speeches or a spicy personal life.
He could be testy, but he didn’t engage in public brawls beloved by – and between – Ted Turner and Rupert Murdoch. Levin, who died Wednesday at 84 nearly two decades after being diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, was a philosophy major at Haverford College who was said to be fond of quoting Camus.
But he also was private and often enigmatic at a time when the industry was led by brash founder-leaders like Viacom’s Sumner Redstone and News Corp.’s Murdoch.
Michael Eisner was not a founder but a big personality. Bob Iger has been called a CEO out of central casting. “Jerry Levin was not your central casting CEO,” noted one Wall Streeter.
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