Wall Street Turns 20

The iconic movie turns 20.

Since its release in December, 1987, “Wall Street” has been required viewing for anyone working in finance and a standard way of framing the go-go ’80s of junk bonds and power ties – an era that some say has returned during the recent private equity-led mergers and acquisitions boom.
With a twentieth-anniversary DVD released on September 18 and a sequel currently in development, “Wall Street” is again a topic of conversation.
The film is best-known for its lasting character, Gordon Gekko, played by Michael Douglas, who netted an Academy Award for Best Actor for the role. And its most famous line -“Greed, for lack of a better word, is good,” typically shortened to just “Greed is good” – is a favorite of headline writers and Wall Streeters alike.

Here’s an interesting tidbit about the famous “greed is good” line. The original source comes from a speech by Ivan Boesky, but it was hardly in the form of macho Nietzschean posturing. What Boesky said was “Greed is all right; by the way, I think greed is healthy. You can be greedy and still feel good about yourself.”
Feel good about yourself? It’s interesting that he framed it terms of self-image, as if that’s the most important standard. He’s being more Oprah than Michael Milken. The iconic statement from the 1980s is more closely related to the self-absorption of the 1990s.

Posted by Eddy Elfenbein on September 21st, 2007 at 12:54 pm

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