The Lion In Sumner

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For his troubles, Karmazin walks away from Viacom with stock and options valued at $250 million. What riles some shareholder groups is that Karmazin, in addition, will get the full value of his full-term contract: $30 million. "We took a hard look at the contract and felt the language was pretty broad, and decided we just didn't want to go there," referring to a severance dispute, says David McLaughlin, chairman of Viacom's governance committee.

The shake-up leaves many questions unanswered. How much will Viacom risk on new content? Redstone says many new cable projects are under way and Paramount is open to making $100 million movies. "We will not be profligate," he says. "They must make sense." Still, the studio has bombed recently with lower-cost movies like Beyond Borders and Paycheck. Megabudget flops would be a disaster. Karmazin's future is also the subject of hot gossip. He wants to be a boss, soon. But there are no big media CEO slots open, and one of the choicest, the job held by Disney's embattled chief, Michael Eisner, isn't coming up for grabs so long as Eisner has support from his board. But bankers would gladly bankroll Karmazin should he decide to build another radio empire, possibly starting with the underperforming Infinity stations that Redstone says he'll dump.

Viacom's king of content has had a hard time with likely successors in the past. Before Karmazin, there was Biondi, whom Redstone fired over a clash in management style. This time Redstone says he really will leave the stage. But many believe the dual heirs apparent might want to keep their options open.