Disney names new publishing president
Walt Disney Corp. has promoted R. Russell Hampton Jr. to president of its publishing division, replacing Deborah Dugan, who announced her resignation earlier this week.
Hampton, who had been general manager of Disney's The Baby Einstein Co., was named executive vice president of the conglomerate's Home and Infant business last year.
Dugan joined Disney Publishing Worldwide in 1998, and was promoted to president in 2002. Under her supervision, the division developed the popular W.I.T.C.H. comic book series, which has sold more than 20 million copies worldwide, and Disney Fairies.
Dugan also oversaw the acquisition of J.M. DeMatteis and Mike Ploog's Abadazad -- purchased along with CrossGen's other assets during the bankruptcy auction -- as well as Kean Soo's Jellaby.
Abadazad is being released in a quirky format that blends prose, comics and spot illustrations. Soo's Jellaby, nominated for an Eisner Award for Best Online Comic, is set to appear as two or three volumes.
Disney is the No. 1 publisher of children's books worldwide, producing books, comics and magazines in more than 55 languages in 74 countries.
posted by Kevin Melrose @ 10:23 AM
3 Comments:
I guess in corporate circles, stepping down "to spend more time with the family" has become pretty euphemistic.
I don't follow Disney internal politics very closely, but I can't recall seeing anything negative about Dugan. She seems pretty savvy, and the W.I.T.C.H. franchise has been incredibly lucrative for the publishing division. So maybe in this case, she really is leaving to spend more time with her family.
I'd not heard of Hampton before this, so I don't know anything about him -- other than he and Dugan both started with Disney in strategic planning around the same time (Hampton in '96 and Dugan in '98).
Ha! Thanks, Tim.
dd never got the chance to shine in the shadow of Big D [corporate]
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