While it doesn’t quite have the same drama surrounding it as the race to succeed Logan Roy, the competition has begun to see who will replace Bob Iger as the next Disney CEO. And although his name had been propped up as a contender, ESPN President Jimmy Pitaro reportedly wants no part of the job.
That’s according to Bloomberg’s Lucas Shaw, who provides a detailed update on the public and private maneuverings of the candidates to succeed Iger at the mouse. Disney’s Chairperson of Parks and Resorts Josh D’Amaro and Co-Chair of Disney Entertainment Dana Walden were both given high profile front-facing roles at recent events to help round out their profile.
It has been well documented that Walden, fellow Co-Chair Alan Bergman, D’Amaro, and Pitaro had been identified as the four main internal candidates to be the next Disney CEO. Nevertheless, Shaw reports that Pitaro has told the Disney board that he is not interested in the role.
They all possess different backgrounds that give the board a range of options without looking outside. It’s hard for any outsider to understand Disney’s distinct culture and its hold on consumers. And there isn’t much time for an outsider to learn if Iger is really leaving at the end of next year.
Pitaro has communicated to both friends and the board that he’s not interested in the role. Bergman, though Walden’s equal in the organizational structure, has never been seen as an equal rival for the top job. That brings us back to D’Amaro and Walden.
That doesn’t mean the job is certain to go to an internal candidate. When Disney said that it would announce a new CEO in early 2026, most people in Hollywood took that to mean the company was using the time to consider outsiders.
While there’s few bigger jobs in American business than Disney CEO, Jimmy Pitaro may realize that he is leading ESPN through one of the most pivotal times in the entire history of the worldwide leader in sports. He has been at the head of ESPN’s upcoming DTC launch and has overseen a failed partnership with Fox and WBD through Venu Sports and a possible equity deal with the NFL. Perhaps he feels that he needs to remain at ESPN to see these projects through and not add any more uncertainty than already exists.
Or… Pitaro saw what happened to the last person that tried to succeed Bob Iger as Disney CEO and decided that discretion was the better part of valor. Bob Chapek was Iger’s hand-picked successor when he announced his retirement in 2020. However, Iger never truly went away and the result was a total mess that probably is worth its own HBO dramatization. Chapek was fired by the Disney board in 2022 and Iger was reinstated.
So good luck to whoever the next Disney CEO will be, but it looks like it won’t be Jimmy Pitaro.
