Founded in 1975 by five refugees from the William Morris agency—Bill Haber, Ron Meyer, Michael Ovitz, Rowland Perkins, and Mike Rosenfeld—Creative Artists Agency became within its first decade one of the most significant agencies in Hollywood, and soon thereafter a multifaceted, dominant force in the worldwide entertainment industry. By 1995, the agency represented most of the top stars and directors in motion pictures, and CAA boss Michael Ovitz was appearing on magazine covers, proclaimed the “Most Powerful Man in Hollywood.”

CAA had reconfigured the industry’s power equation in profound and even shocking ways, pressuring studios into paying stratospheric salaries for its stars and expanding into new areas such as investment banking.

While there had been hints along the way suggesting change was possible, few people, inside or out of the agency, could have guessed the drama and disorder that would unfold.

Soon, Ovitz and Meyer would be embroiled in backroom deals and negotiations on behalf of their worst clients: themselves.

RON MEYER (co-founder, CAA; vice-chairman, NBCUniversal): Something was happening. You could feel it.

MICHAEL OVITZ (co-founder, CAA): I saw a bunch of young guys who I was overpaying who thought I wasn’t paying them enough, and the more time I spent with these corporate deals—not just doing the M&A work but advising people after as well—the less connectivity I had with my important clients. That meant that the younger guys I had shared these clients with were having more and more contact with them. And people were talking in their ears, rabble-rousing them up. Don’t kid yourself; I knew this.

MAGIC JOHNSON (athlete, businessman, CAA client): I felt Michael’s pain. We had become good friends, as we are today, and I only wanted the best for him. One day I said to him, “Why don’t you run a studio?” He said, “Earvin, I don’t have to run a studio. I run them all now anyway.”

BARRY HIRSCH (entertainment lawyer): Sometime toward the mid-90s, I noticed Michael started to behave like he was more than tired; he was disenchanted with what he was doing.

BILL MURRAY (actor, CAA client): Once a year—and it was sort of towards the holidays—Michael would let his hair down, look out his window from one studio to another, and just go off on those guys running them. It was really, really funny, much funnier than any pissed-off actor could be because he really knew these people, and he had them by the throat. I would laugh so hard. We’d stay on the phone maybe 45 minutes, or even an hour, and I felt so good for him that he got to let go like that. You can jab at each other when you’re doing business, but you can’t really let it fly. And he would let it fly.

IRVING AZOFF (manager and music executive): Ovitz had wanted to be the most powerful man in Hollywood, and now that that was happening, I’m of the opinion that he started believing his own press and getting kind of ego’d out.

BILL HABER (co-founding head of television department, CAA; producer): For any agent, the minute you become more important than your client, your company is finished. It is never about you. Michael had become the most powerful man in the industry—so high-profile, so important, and so successful—that he came to be more than the company.

RON MEYER: I kept saying to Mike, “We have to have an exit plan. We’re going to burn out being agents. We’re working seven days a week, 24 hours a day. It’s got to stop.”