Getty Abigail Disney
Abigail Disney, granddaughter of Roy O. Disney, who co-founded the Walt Disney Company, recently put the CEO of her family’s company, Bob Iger, on public blast. In a series of tweets, the Disney heiress called his pay package, which totaled to $65.6 million in executive pay last year, to be an “insane” amount when there are workers at DisneyLand Park that can’t afford to feed their families.
This isn’t the first time Abigail has shaded Iger’s income, which according to Equilar, is 1,424 times more than the average Disney employee. While appearing on CNBC in March Abigail said, “Jesus Christ himself isn’t worth 500 times his median workers’ pay.”
Abigail, 59, who’s married to Pierre Hauser and the mother of four children, also works as a veteran documentary film producer. In 2015, she co-directed The Armor of Light, a doc exploring the need for America to re-examine their stance on gun laws. The outspoken philanthropist who’s film Pray the Devil Back to God won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2011, also serves as the President and CEO of Fork Films, and founded the non-profit, Peace is Loud.
Here’s what you need to know about Abigail Disney:
1. Abigail Has Been Married to Pierre Hauser for 31 Years
Abigail Disney, husband Pierre Hauser and their four children in 2008
The Disney heiress tied the knot with husband Peter Norman Hauser on October 8, 1988. The two met while studying at Yale University, and as announced in the New York Times, they were married at St. Paul’s Chapel at Columbia University.Together they have four children, Henry, Olivia, Charlotte, and Eamon.
Hauser, originally from San Francisco, works as an editor at Chelsea House, a publishing firm in New York City, and has produced a few documentary films with his wife’s company. He’s also an activist. With Abigail, he co-founded and is president of the Daphne Foundation, which helps funds programs dealing with the consequences of poverty in New York City and West Africa. He also works with the Flawless Foundation, is on the board of the North Star Fund, and the Roy Disney Family Foundation.
2. She Has a Net Worth of $500 Million
Abigail Disney
Born on January 24, 1960, according to Net Worth Post, Abigail has an estimated worth of $500 million based on data collect in 2017. A California native, Abigail attended college Yale University where she studied English Literature, before earning her Master’s at Stanford, and eventually, a PhD in Philosophy at Columbia University.
In addition to her family’s wealth, Abigail is a successful director and producer. While the company she founded Fork Films has produced a long list of documentary films, and in 2015, she debuted as a director and screenwriter on the movie The Armor of Light. The film premiered at Tribeca and went on to win the Best International Feature Documentary and the Special Award at the Traverse City Film Festival.
3. She Likes to Spend Money on Nice Dinners & Good Shoes, But That’s It
GettyAbigail Disney in 2018.
Abigail said, “I’m in a position to continue giving a lot of money away until the day I die. I really considered giving it all away at a certain point in my 20s, and I know people who did that. Now I’m glad I didn’t give it all away, because my money has grown. Now I’ve given away so much more than I inherited. And I’m so much smarter now. What I would’ve done in my 20s would have been great and nice, but I’m so much more effective now.”
When Abigail does splurge, she likes to go out to nice dinners, drink good wine and eat delicious food. She also cops to spending way too much money on a nice pair of shoes or handbag. “Luckily, I’m not a real-estate girl,” she said. “I don’t need a ranch and a ski resort and whatever else. And I don’t want a private jet because it hollows you out from the inside. So, I’m lucky that the things I love are really not expensive, considering. But to most normal people, what I spend on a really good dinner at a really good restaurant, that would be horrifying. They couldn’t even imagine spending that. So I wouldn’t pass muster with a lot of lefties, I have to say.”
4. Abigail Fights For Higher Taxes on the Rich
Honorary chair and co-founder of Level Forward, Abigail E. Disney speaks onstage.
This isn’t the first time the out the granddaughter of Disney’s co-founder has spoken on pay issues. A member of Patriotic Millionaires, she part of a group that actively supports higher taxes on the rich, which she voiced in the 2017 video for “Now This.”
In an interview with The Cut, Abigail confronts the fact that she’s grown up with more money than most people will ever see in their lifetime, however, she talks about how she’s given away nearly $71 million since she turned 21.
“[When] Michael Eisner came in and reinvigorated the [Disney] company, the stock price, which was basically my family’s entire net worth, was ten times, 20 times, 50 times what it had been when I was growing up. So all of the sudden, we went from being comfortable, upper-middle-class people to suddenly my dad had a private jet. That’s when I feel that my dad really lost his way in life. And that’s why I feel hyperconscious about what wealth does to people. I lived in one family as a child, and then I didn’t even recognize the family as I got older.”
5. Abigail Professes To Be the Opposite of Kim Kardashian
GettyAbigail Disney speaking at The Sundance Institute in 2018.
Growing up with such a famous last name has brought Abigail much wealth, but it’s also made it extremely difficult for her to find real friends, and has brought along a lot of self doubt. “Like, did Yale really say yes because I was that good, or did Yale say yes because of my last name? I’ll never know,” she said. “I’ve spent a lot of time earning things like post graduate degrees that make me feel legitimate. And those feelings have started to go away. But that’s outsourcing your sense of self. That is handing your self-esteem to the world to tell you whether or not you’re allowed to have any. And that’s a dangerous game.”
“I think that people who grow up in this kind of life go one of two ways,” Abigail said. “They either go the Kim Kardashian route, which is spending, spending, spending, completely absorbing the idea that, ‘Yes, you are that special,’ and wanting everyone to look at you. Or, and I know a lot of people who’ve gone this way — especially my women friends — you do the opposite. I wore shitty clothes around. I didn’t want anyone to know what I had but money is morally neutral. It does not, in and of itself, make you a bad person. It also does not, in and of itself, makes you a good person. You are who you are and the least important thing about you is what you have. That was not, “You haven’t earned it,” you know. So my philosophy is you try to earn it in reverse.”
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