Disney has described publicly ? came as part of a board shake-up. Bob Iger, 73, who came out of retirement in late 2022 to retake Disney's reins, has publicly said he is "definitely" leaving when his contract expires Dec.

31, 2026. The timeline ? the first Disney has described publicly ?

came as part of a board shake-up. James P. Gorman, a veteran Wall Street banker who joined the board in February, will become Disney's chair on Jan. 2, the company said.

He will replace Mark G. Parker, who will step down after two years in the role and leave the Disney board entirely. In August, Disney's board put Gorman in charge of finding a successor to Bob Iger, 73, who came out of retirement in late 2022 to retake Disney's reins. The board rehired Iger after it fired Bob Chapek, Iger's handpicked successor.

Iger has publicly said he is "definitely" leaving when his contract expires Dec. 31, 2026, a vow some people inside and outside of Disney have viewed with skepticism. During his earlier, 15-year stint as Disney's CEO, Iger delayed his retirement four times and seemed reluctant to leave when he did.

The Disney board and Iger are widely viewed as having botched the selection of Chapek, who had been running the Disney theme parks. The board never interviewed Chapek, and Iger soon turned on him, leading to a power struggle just as Disney was contending with the pandemic and the entertainment industry's shift to streaming. Disney has been hit with multiple shareholder lawsuits related to Chapek's tenure.

This time, four division leaders at Disney are vying to succeed Iger. They are Dana Walden, Disney's top television executive; Josh D'Amaro, who runs theme parks and video games; Alan Bergman, Disney's movie chief; and Jimmy Pitaro, whose fief is ESPN. The question of whether any of those executives will ascend to the top job has captivated Hollywood since Disney announced in January 2023 that it had formed a succession planning committee.

In recent weeks, chatter in the gossipy entertainment industry has escalated, with people speculating one day that Walden had already won the race, and the next day that D'Amaro was instead the choice, perhaps with Walden as chief creative officer. Gorman ran Morgan Stanley, the investment bank, from 2010 until last year. He remains the bank's executive chair, a role that ends in December.

He was recruited to serve on the Disney board as part of Iger's response to attacks from activist investors ? one of whom, Nelson Peltz, harshly criticized the company for slipshod succession planning. Parker indicated in a statement that he needed to focus attention on the troubles at Nike, which he ran from 2006 to 2020 and where he remains executive chair.

He was recruited to the Disney board in 2016, when Iger served as both chair and CEO. The board asked Parker to consider serving as interim CEO in 2022, when Chapek was struggling with internal discord over a restructuring and the consequences of a political battle with Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida. Parker declined, citing his Nike workload.