August
14Will UA Become a Ghost Town Again?
Shortly after Tom Cruise was anointed (with Paula Wagner) as the new czar of UA, I encountered him at a party. After I congratulated him on his new venture, Cruise said, “You ran UA once, didn’t you?”“Yes, I ran it for 20 minutes. The trouble is, UA’s a ghost, not a company.” I said.
Cruise smiled his ultra-cool smile and replied, “I’m hoping for 25.”
He was being modest, I realized. There were good portents surrounding his deal, which was orchestrated by Bert Fields, his attorney, and Harry Sloan, chief of MGM. There was a $500 million pool available to finance production. There was a firm commitment of support from the persuasive Sloan.
So Cruise in the end got his 25 minutes and now he’ll go back to being a movie star. Wagner will go back to producing. And UA will go back to being a ghost.
And no one seems to know what will happen to that coveted $500 million production fund.
The folks at MGM say it won’t happen this way, however. They insist UA will continue to make movies under a complex arrangement: Mary Parent, production chief at MGM, will represent MGM’s interests (it’s a 65% shareholder). And the films will be made under Tom Cruise’s “guidance” – that’s the word MGM wants to emphasize.Harry Sloan insists that Cruise will be “our full partner in control of UA.” But since Cruise already is committed to a couple of major acting gigs, it’s not clear how much “guidance” and “full partnership” he will be able to provide.
That, however, is MGM’s problem. Or the bankers. Or UA’s, whoever that is.
All this seems very sad for those few who remember the old UA formed by Arthur Krim and Robert Benjamin. In the late ‘50’s, the two attorneys assembled the various pieces of the original UA from founders Mary Pickford and Charlie Chaplin and propounded a simple, if revolutionary precept: Empower a group of filmmakers who are willing to make inexpensive movies about which they are passionate and reward them by giving them key elements of ownership and control.The upshot was extraordinary: A cluster of successful films ranging from the best of Tony Richardson, Billy Wilder and, yes, James Bond.
Krim and Benjamin stuck to their game plan. Harry Sloan, by contrast, has put out so many game plans over the last two years that it’s confusing where MGM of UA are headed.
All this occurs at an edgy time in Hollywood. The economy sags, strikes loom, there’s too much product around for distributors to slot.
Krim and Benjamin faced tough times, too, but they realized that in the movie industry, dealmakers ultimately need filmmakers.
Harry Sloan is not going to progress until he stops making deals and starts making films. Meanwhile, UA’s ghostly presence will continue to haunt him.
(Photo of Tom and Paula by Lester Cohen/WireImage.com)
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Posted by: ZarabNK | 9/24/2011 6:50:09 AM