Lionsgate Chief Executive Office Jon Feltheimer received $35.3 million in compensation for the fiscal year ended March 31, more than triple the $10.9 million from the previous year.
The figure was disclosed as part of the company’s proxy statement filed Friday with the Securities and Exchange Commission for its annual meeting on Sept. 12 in Toronto.
Feltheimer’s package includes $1.5 million salary, $5.4 million in stock awards, $16.3 million in option awards, $12 million in non-equity incentives, and $149,158 in other compensation — including $28,503 in club membership dues and $116,178 for his personal use of company-leased planes.
Lionsgate announced in October that Feltheimer had agreed to a five-year extension of his contract through May 22, 2023 — two months before Lionsgate’s $4.4 billion acquisition of premium cabler Starz closed. Provisions of his extension deal provided for a $5 million bonus if Lionsgate met performance goals within three months of achieving 20% of $52.3 million in annual “run-rate” operational synergies that were anticipated.
Feltheimer’s compensation reflects the front-loading of his stock options that were part of last year’s five-year deal.
The proxy also disclosed that Vice Chairman Michael Burns made $26.9 million during the fiscal year, more than double the $10.5 million in the previous year. Two weeks after the Feltheimer extension, the company gave Burns a five-year contract renewal that extended his deal into 2022.
Feltheimer, 65, and Burns, 57, have run Lionsgate for the past 17 years, far longer than any other duo at an entertainment company. The Starz acquisition has been touted by Feltheimer as doubling Lionsgate’s scale — giving the combined entity more leverage to compete with corporate behemoths such as Disney and improving its ability to exploit fast-growing digital media platforms.
