Former Disney CEO Bob Chapek claims his predecessor-turned-successor Bob Iger underwent a “relentless three-year campaign to push me out” after initially appointing him to the job.
“The way Disney’s board and Bob Iger handled my firing made it seem as if I had committed some terrible offense,” Chapek writes in an excerpt from his upcoming book “Behind the Castle Walls,” which was published by Vanity Fair Thursday. “To outsiders, it looked suspicious—who gets ousted on a Sunday, right before a company’s big event, unless they’re guilty of something?”
Chapek took over the Disney CEO job in February 2020 — as Iger’s hand-picked successor. But in November 2022, the Disney board ousted Chapek after a series of missteps and called Iger back into service. (Iger stepped down as CEO this March, replaced by former parks head Josh D’Amaro.)
“From the moment he announced my appointment, he clearly regretted it and seemed to initiate a relentless three-year campaign to push me out,” Chapek writes of Iger. “From day one as CEO, I had respected the board’s decision to have him remain as executive chairman, directing creative endeavors and overseeing the transition until late 2021. I’d always made it clear I had big shoes to fill. But I’d never expected to endure a drawn-out, purposeful undoing of my leadership.”
Disney declined to comment Thursday. Iger declined to comment via a representative at Thrive Capital, where Iger is now a partner.
Disney insiders are said to view Chapek’s book as a “revisionist” account of the events that transpired.
Published by Simon & Schuster, “Behind the Castle Walls” is set to release Sept. 29. While Chapek is making the rounds promoting the book with the Vanity Fair excerpt and an interview published by the Wall Street Journal Wednesday, the title remains in stiff competition with Wall Street Journal reporter Robbie Whelan’s upcoming unauthorized “The House of Mouse: Bob Iger and The War of Succession at Disney,” which is slated for release on Dec. 1, 2026.