NBCU’s Jeff Zucker is now like 14.5 million other Americans: unemployed.
Of course, the exiting NBC-Universal CEO also is unlike those other 14.5 million Americans. The two years he had left on a 3-year contract gives him the kind of unemployment cushion that others only dream of. Money aside -- Zucker's base salary was $6.3 million -- top-level entertainment executives tend to do very well after they’re fired.
But Zucker and his deputy Jeff Gaspin - the NBC entertainment chief who exits with him - join a deep pool of talented, top-level Hollywood executives left underemployed at the peak of their careers.
They include former Universal chairman Marc Shmuger, Fox marketing chief Pam Levine, former Disney chief Dick Cook, former DreamWorks marketing chief Terry Press, Disney digital chief Steve Wadsworth and many others.
Read also: Hollywood Idled: Top Executives in Waiting (Slideshow)
Read also: Craigslist? Former Hollywood Executive Struggles For Any Job
The entertainment industry is a rough arena where competitors play big and fall hard. But many would agree that as studios contract in a tight economy, there's more underused executive talent than is normal - or healthy - for the industry.
"It's like a game of musical chairs where the chairs keep getting taken away," said one television mogul whose job, for the moment, seems secure.
Those out of music have landed as consultants, as producers, as entrepreneurs. Their former colleagues one-and-a-half steps lower down in the corporate hierarchy tend to find the transition far more difficult. None would speak on the record.
Newly out-of-work executives face a substantially different job market than the one they entered, and need to adjust their expectations, Bill Simon, global sector leader in media and entertainment at the executive recruiting firm Korn/Ferry International, told TheWrap.
“People have to be very realistic about what the marketplace looks like today. The compensation levels ... are less than they were,” he said. “It doesn’t mean that people aren’t well paid, it doesn’t mean that there aren’t great opportunities, it means that compensation levels aren’t as robust.”
An individual close to Zucker told TheWrap that the NBC executive has received a number of job offers, but plans to decompress and spend some time with his family before he decides what to do next. And Zucker told a NAPTE audience last week he’s considering a return to news and sports producing.
Gaspin has openly told colleagues he's not sure what he's going to do with his free time, after more than 20 years at NBC.
In fact, one former studio chief told TheWrap that many one-time top executives are happier in their new roles than they were running studios.
"I know one person who would be dying to do it again, but most people I know - and I know several - find themselves surprisingly happy," the former boss said.
