Former Disney CEO Bob Chapek is breaking nearly four years of public silence with a new memoir that lays out his version of the 2022 ouster that ended his time running the company, and he’s not holding back on who he thinks was really behind it.
If you’ve followed the Bob Iger and Bob Chapek saga at all over the past few years, you know this one’s been building for a while.
Chapek’s memoir, Behind the Castle Walls: My Thirty Years at the Happiest Place on Earth, releases September 29, 2026, and a new New York Times piece published today gets an early look at what’s inside. According to the report, Chapek directly blames Iger, the man who both hired him as CEO in 2020 and later returned to replace him in 2022, for how his tenure ultimately unraveled. It’s the first time Chapek has spoken publicly and at length about his side of events since the board removed him nearly four years ago.
For anyone who hasn’t followed this closely, the short version goes like this: Iger picked Chapek as his successor and stepped into the CEO role in February 2020, only for the pandemic to hit within weeks, shutting down parks, cruise ships, and film production almost overnight. Iger, still involved as executive chairman during the transition, became more hands-on than a typical outgoing CEO usually would, which reporting at the time suggested created real friction between the two. Chapek stayed in the role through 2022, but the board ultimately fired him that November, bringing Iger back for a second stint as CEO before naming his successor this year upon retirement in Josh D’Amaro. Iger has said publicly that he was “disappointed” watching how Chapek’s tenure played out, though he’s also said he tried to distance himself from it once he’d formally stepped back.
Chapek’s book description frames the memoir around a few pointed questions: was he actually given a fair shot at the job, or set up to fail from the start, and what really drove the decision to bring Iger back in his place. Those are obviously his framing, not settled facts, and it’s worth being clear that this is one side of a story that’s had competing narratives for years.
Timing-wise, Chapek isn’t the only one publishing a book on this era of Disney leadership. A separate book, The House of Mouse: Bob Iger and The War of Succession at Disney, written by longtime Wall Street Journal reporter Robbie Whelan, is set to release December 1, 2026, giving readers a second, independently reported account of the same period to weigh against Chapek’s own telling.
It’s genuinely rare for a former Fortune 500 CEO to write this candidly about their own ouster, let alone name the person they hold responsible for it. Whatever your take on how Chapek’s tenure actually went, having his direct account on the record, alongside an independent journalist’s version arriving just two months later, gives fans and industry watchers a much fuller picture of one of the more dramatic leadership shakeups in recent Disney history than either side has offered up until now.
We’ll keep tracking coverage of both books as they release, so check back with Theme Park Scope for updates, and follow us on social so you don’t miss it.
Are YOU planning to read Chapek’s side of the story, Whelan’s independent account, or both once they’re out?
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