Eleo Hensleigh

Walt Disney Co. created the new position of chief marketing officer for its West Coast-based TV networks and appointed ranking cable executive Eleo Hensleigh to the job. Hensleigh will oversee advertising, marketing, research, media planning and "synergy" for the ABC television network and cable channels ABC Family, Disney Channel, SOAPnet and Toon Disney.

Walt Disney Co. created the new position of chief marketing officer for its West Coast-based TV networks and appointed ranking cable executive Eleo Hensleigh to the job. Hensleigh will oversee advertising, marketing, research, media planning and "synergy" for the ABC television network and cable channels ABC Family, Disney Channel, SOAPnet and Toon Disney.

Former TriStar Pictures President Marc Platt is the preferred candidate of MCA Inc. to replace Hal Lieberman as head of production for Universal Pictures, according to sources close to the studio. Lieberman left the post this week to become an independent producer at the studio. Sources said Platt could enter formal talks with MCA brass as early as this weekend.

Hollywood is full of know-it-alls. Walt Disney Co.'s Anne Sweeney isn't among them. "She's comfortable not having all the answers," said cable industry pioneer Geraldine Laybourne, who built the Nickelodeon channel and was Sweeney's mentor. "I put her in one new situation after another, knowing she could figure it out." That trait is sure to be put to the test as Sweeney now tackles the biggest challenge of her career: trying to turn around ABC Television.

Nine-year-old Mia Savagian of Redondo Beach stuck out her tongue at a two-way mirror in Nickelodeon's Santa Monica test-viewer lab one recent evening, then beamed when she was handed a $50 check for what amounts to jury duty in a court of popular culture, where verdicts hold sway over what kind of shows America's kids will eventually get to watch on television.