In 1985, the ever-restless Kerkorian announced that he would sell his film company -- by then called MGM/UA Entertainment Co. -- and repurchase the United Artists unit from Ted Turner, who couldn’t afford the entire company. In 1986, Kerkorian bought back the MGM name as well. In 1990, he sold the studio.
Pursuing Leisure
Kerkorian continued to invest in other leisure industries with the conviction -- as he told Fortune -- that prosperous Americans would seek such pursuits.
He started MGM Grand Air in 1987 to provide luxury airline service between New York and Los Angeles and sold it in 1995. He built a new MGM Grand Hotel Casino in Las Vegas in 1993.
He also acquired almost 10 percent of Chrysler’s stock in 1990. Kerkorian told the Los Angeles Times that he purchased the shares because he was impressed by then-chairman Lee Iacocca, whom he had met at a Florida racetrack the previous year.
In 1995, he teamed with Iacocca -- then retired -- to offer to buy the remaining 90 percent of the company, but Chrysler rejected the offer. Three years later Daimler-Benz agreed to buy the U.S. auto maker for $43 billion in stock and assumed debt, then the largest foreign takeover of a U.S. company.
Far from settling into his own retirement, Kerkorian in 1996 negotiated the repurchase of his old MGM film company, took it public and helped finance its acquisition of the Orion film company in 1997 and PolyGram film library in 1999.
In April 2011, Kerkorian said he would be stepping down from the MGM board to become director emeritus. “I just didn’t care to keep going back to meetings,” he said in an interview.