Company Town : MCA Shake-Up Inspires Collective Career-Anxiety Attack : Company Town: Shaky status of Wasserman-Sheinberg team brings more insecurity to an already-nervous industry.

By CLAUDIA ELLER

April 11, 1995 12 AM PT

One of the troubles a major company faces when it undergoes a change in ownership is the overpowering internal distraction. The disruption distorts the way commerce is done and engenders feelings of anxiety and insecurity among managers at all levels.

Such is the case now at MCA, whose Japanese parent, Matsushita Electric Industrial, announced Sunday that it is selling 80% of the Hollywood entertainment corporation to Seagram.

When such a multifaceted entertainment corporation as MCA, whose name and reputation have been synonymous with stability, experiences an institutional shake-up, the ripples are felt throughout the entertainment industry.

Hollywood is already a place that breeds insecurity and instability. When such longstanding partnerships as that of MCA’s Lew Wasserman and his key lieutenant, Sid Sheinberg, are in jeopardy, or when the team of Disney’s Michael Eisner and his 20-year charge, Jeffrey Katzenberg, busts apart, it’s hard for any executive in this town not to feel thoroughly expendable.

“If it can happen to them, how am I supposed to feel secure?” is the question on nearly everyone’s mind in Hollywood today.

Despite their significant executive positions and highly regarded reputations, Wasserman and Sheinberg were publicly humiliated by the parties involved in the sale of MCA, who cut them out of the information loop under the guise of a confidentiality agreement.

On Monday, the two MCA honchos were invited to lunch by their company’s owner-to-be, Seagram’s 39-year-old chairman, Edgar Bronfman Jr., and papa Edgar M. Bronfman, to talk about “the future.”

At a media briefing Sunday right after the deal-signing ceremony, Bronfman Jr. was circumspect when asked whether he sees Lew and Sid in MCA’s future.

“I don’t have an answer to the question because I really want to talk to them about what their vision for MCA is. . . .”

Though Bronfman says he has “no personal interest in being a movie mogul” (the first time we see him dining at Mortons we’ll remember this), his presence is already being felt on the MCA/Universal Pictures lot, where he and the senior Bronfman were sequestered Monday in a small, private dining room off the studio’s main commissary.

No one was saying what happened at this power lunch, but a source said it was followed by a “long meeting” that lasted until 4:30 p.m. More meetings are scheduled among the four later this week.

Naturally, everyone is also wondering when exactly Bronfman will set that power meal with the self-anointed Dream Team--Steven Spielberg, Jeffrey Katzenberg and David Geffen--whose future relationship with MCA looks murky. Sources say the Dream Teamers are awaiting the fate of Sheinberg, Spielberg’s mentor, before they commit even to breaking bread with Bronfman.

Meanwhile, executives at the studio are trying hard to conduct business as usual. But most will admit it’s one hell of a distraction.

One prominent talent agent said he called a senior-level production executive in the movie division the other day to check on one of his client’s upcoming films and was disturbed by the response on the other end of the phone.

“The executive felt a certain level of distraction, and I told him, ‘Hey, we have a movie coming out in six weeks and we want to know what’s happening. . . . Don’t take your eye off the real ball here. You have an obligation to service the filmmakers.’ ”

Producer Brian Grazer, whose summer release “Apollo 13,” directed by partner Ron Howard and starring two-time Oscar winner Tom Hanks, agrees that “people (at Universal) are definitely distracted,” but he insists that “as it relates to our movie, I can’t say it’s affected anything. The marketing department is particularly focused on it and the movie has really taken on a momentum of its own.”

Earlier this year, Sheinberg made a personal request to Grazer and Howard to move up the release of “Apollo” from its original Nov. 17 slot to the July 4 weekend, which required post-production to be accelerated by eight weeks.

Hollywood, more than most businesses, is built on personal relationships. So what will happen to long-term relationships if new overlords come aboard? For instance, Grazer and Howard have made 25 to 30 movies for the same management team at Universal over the seven years that their Imagine Films has had a financing-distribution deal with the company.

“We’ve jumped a lot of hurdles together and collectively made hundreds of millions of dollars in profits together--it’s very unusual,” says Grazer, whose company has produced some box office duds but also major hits such as “Kindergarten Cop,” “Parenthood,” “Problem Child” and “Backdraft,” which have earned a total of more than $1.5 billion in gross revenues.

In addition to all of the creative talent--filmmakers, actors and writers--who have individual movies or multiple “overall” deals at the company, MCA has a number of corporate alliances that need to be preserved. Among those are a partnership with Paramount Pictures and MGM/UA in its overseas distribution arm United International Pictures, a 50-50 deal with Paramount in USA Network, and joint ownership of the specialty film unit Gramercy Pictures.

Talk About Out of the Loop: An ad in the Times Business section Monday for Pepperdine University quoted MCA’s corporate communications vice president, Christine Hanson, as saying, “The team approach I learned at Pepperdine allows me to build strong liaisons both within MCA and with our Japanese parent.” She’s smiling in the photo.