Perlmutter helmed Marvel during its sale to Disney and later served as an executive chair. During his 30-year tenure at Marvel, Perlmutter has been blamed for holding back the inclusion of women and people of color in the studio’s films. In a set of leaked emails from 2014, Perlmutter argued that past superhero movies with a female lead flopped, while a memoir from Disney CEO Bob Iger revealed that he had to get past Perlmutter’s “roadblocks” when getting movies like Black Panther and Captain Marvel into production.
Beyond his notorious interference with the course of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, here’s a list of some of the other scandals that the 80-year-old Perlmutter has reportedly been involved in, which include (but aren’t limited to): allegedly bribing a New York police officer to expedite the process of renewing his gun license; supposedly influencing the Department of Veterans Affairs using his connection to Donald Trump’s golf course; and a White Lotus-esque legal dispute involving tennis courts, stolen DNA, and hate mail.
More recently, Perlmutter helped stir up a proxy fight at Disney by supporting his longtime friend Nelson Peltz’s campaign to get on Disney’s board. The two men shared the same views on cost cutting.
