Tom Freston on Life After Sumner Redstone

Sumner Redstone fired me in 2006. In retrospect, I should have noticed some signals. I’d had a rift with him a couple of weeks before, when he said he was firing Tom Cruise for the failure of Mission: Impossible III. That led to a real stand-up screaming match, which I’d never had in 18 years of working for him. He had me over to his house on Labor Day and said, “We’re going to have to let you go.” Then he went on Charlie Rose to say I was fired because I didn’t buy MySpace. He said, “I’m humbled. I hate to lose to Rupert Murdoch.”

I wasn’t ashamed—about a thousand people gave me a standing ovation in the lobby when I left Viacom —but I needed to air out and pull back. There were digital media opportunities, calls from private equity companies, offers to be on boards. I flew to Burma for a few weeks to get away from the craziness and came to the conclusion that I didn’t want another corporate job.