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This story first appeared in the Nov. 9 issue of The The show biz industry Reporter magazine.
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While busy as it is with regard to talent during awards season, they've got nothing on the top executives running the major studios and independent companies. Generally, these execs have got multiple movies to be able to shepherd through the dizzying process and parade of events. To start our annual Honours Season Roundtable Series, THR invited six of them -- The new sony Pictures Classics co-president Michael Barker, 58, Lionsgate Motion Picture Class co-chairman Rob Friedman, 62, Monk Filmed Entertainment chairman and CEO Jim Gianopulos, 58, DreamWorks Animation CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg, Sixty one, Universal co-chairman Donna Langley, 46, and Paramount vice chairman Deceive Moore, 50 -- to engage in a new candid discussion concerning why Paramount transferred Moneyball, the big gambles behind Lifetime of Pi and Des Miserables and how much awards, for better or perhaps worse, mean for many years.
PHOTOS: THR's Executive Roundtable: Some Movie Moguls Sound Off about Second Careers, Preferred Movies and Accolades
The Hollywood Media reporter: What surprised a person most about transforming into a top film executive,
Rob Friedman: Getting my own phone calls returned. (Fun.)
Jeffrey Katzenberg: The passions along with emotions in the movie business have always been fairly intense, and that's probably only gotten better. Today the stakes seem to be so high, and so it really creates a boat load of pressure about everybody involved.
THR: Can it be different when you're directly responsible to stockholders,
Katzenberg: An individual mean as opposed to Rupert Murdoch, (Frivolity.)
Jim Gianopulos: I think exactly what Jeffrey referred to is an fascinating aspect: The complexity, the particular nuance of it, the randomness of how movies come together, the particular collision of compounds that makes a movie, the particular surprising things that become easy and the things that turn into difficult. And on another end of the buzzing telephone is your worst nightmare or your greatest surprise. Somebody failed to come out of their trailer, or the tracking for the movie goes completely and totally wrong.
Katzenberg: Or your film opened to $12. (Laughter.)
D Langley: The best moment is when you have a film in which exceeds your objectives. We've have had a few along the way. Mamma Mia! was a wonderful moment in the firm's history. It is the corporation's most profitable film [$610 million worldwide disgusting on a $52 million budget], also it was a complete shock. I mean, it travelled from being a, "Oh, perhaps it will work around the globe in Sweden," to being a huge around the world hit. And then, naturally, this year with Ted. The one worst moment will be the all-around failure of any movie. This year, to air flow my dirty laundry, it's no secret who's was Battleship.
Rob Moore: With us, Paranormal Activity came out of thin air. It was a movie that we had owned for quite some time and talked about if you should release or not, or to remake it. So there are times when you don't really know, but then you get something. And then there are maybe when you put all this time, energy and expense into something as well as nobody cares. That's when it's really hard.
STORY: Tom Bernard, Michael Barker Panasonic Pictures Classics
THR: Would you get calls coming from Sumner Redstone saying, "What the nightmare were you thinking,Inch
Katzenberg: He's not that considerate. (Laughter.)
Moore: He's been around the movie business his / her whole life, so he or she understands the volatility of it. I think the most effective moment is when you have a surprise like True Grit. It was the Western, and there hasn't been a Western that broke out to that form of success [$251 million worldwide].
THR: Simply how much do awards imply to you,
Katzenberg: When I located Hollywood, I was 23 years old and coming from New York. The fantasy, as a young youngster starting out in this business, is always to own a house throughout Malibu Beach and earn an Academy Merit. (Laughter.) One has been the fantasy regarding, you know, Beach Baby blanket Bingo or what ever, the good life. Which was the representation of the [the late former Vital owner] Charlie Bluhdorn used to call the "Bank of America honor." And the far wall of it was your achievement of one thing great in the sight of your peers. And also the Academy Awards were next and are today -- no matter anything else in terms of what they are to the outside world -- for our community, they are the pinnacles of success. That's often the yin-yang that you get therefore caught up in, which is, "Is this particular about the way each of our customers see our business, or is this about the way we see ourselves,"
Erika Barker: You wanted to live in Malibu and also win an Academia Award ,, I wanted to reside in New York, and my mom wanted to see us at the Academy Awards. (Laughter.)
THR: Are there times you never agree with the best photo winner,
Katzenberg: Pretty much every time. (Laughter.)
Barker: Here's the one thing: The Academy Awards, as far as the nominations are concerned, they've already had a lot of ethics. They don't pay attention to trade and so forth. Yes, there are lots of years when the finest film doesn't win,Replica Watches, but it's almost unimportant. To be in that area means so much if you should choose between five along with 10 high-quality films. Somebody's going to be left out. Occasionally it's a moment in time, understanding that moment in time is the simply time that particular video would win. In the event you look at the history of your Academy Awards, you can see whenever those instances happened,Replica Watches.
STORY: Fox's Jim Gianopulos about Working With Jeffrey Katzenberg: 'We're Used to Demanding' (Q&A)
THR: What's been a "moment within time" for all of you,
Gianopulos: Which era, The time we continued to wait for Sideways for you to win or the period waiting for Avatar, (Frivolity.)
THR: It was a traditional upset when Avatar lost to The Injure Locker, which belonged to Rob.
Gianopulos: Well, we do win the Bank regarding America award that will year.
Friedman: I did provide to trade the award. (Laughter along with clapping.)
THR: Irving Thalberg would greenlight a movie even though it was a great movie, or so the fantasy goes. Is that still possible,Rolex replicas,
Katzenberg: That was a period when 40 percent of The united states went to the movies once a week. That was the reality as part of his day.
Friedman: I think the procedure always starts with the fabric. You fall in love with it, and then you start to perform the analysis. Will individuals want to see it, Precisely how hard will it be to acquire them to see it, As well as what are the economics, So it's more about "how do we get this done" as opposed to "let's not make this happen."
Moore: We have Airfare, a movie that was an incredibly dark script on the page, but then Bob Zemeckis, who's one of the most productive directors of all time,Replica Watches, began to it. But despite having him, we're saying, "This is the level [at which] we are prepared to do this." So even though it can be Bob Zemeckis, you're just giving him, in such cases, $30 million. There's still the reality of saying, "It has to be perfect execution.Inch
THR: Is there a particular project you loved however had to turn down because it wasn't economically viable,
Moore: The script for Moneyball was available, i had read the guide when it first came out. I found that history very inspirational. And then you get to the business than it, and you're saying: "It can be a movie where a lot of the dialogue is often a discussion about hockey statistics. How is this going to travel, despite having Brad Pitt as part of that," Somebody finally made the movie, and the movie got selected. The movie was a excellent movie that in the end didn't do a large amount of business outside of the U.S. So it was a great movie that we was happy received made and got to see it, but finally it was one that you simply couldn't find a way to help to make those economics work.
Gianopulos: That's why it took Elizabeth Gabler [president of Sibel 2000] over 10 years to acquire Ang Lee on board and also wear Tom [Rothman] and I down to saying yes to Life of Pi at the number that would generally scare anyone.
STORY: Jeffrey Katzenberg, Ann Daly Re-Up at DreamWorks Through 2017
THR: Along with what was that,
Gianopulos: A substantial budget. [Reportedly $100 million.]
THR: Donna, you also required a bit of a gamble about Les Miserables. Why,
Langley: I know it sounds pat, however we really did love the material. Les Mis can be a piece of material which has taken 27 years into the future to the screen. As well as Cameron [Mackintosh, the producer], who is merely an incredible theater impresario, understands the material inside and out. I mean, he birthed it. He or she knew that he needed to wait until he had the proper team around your ex. And so when the total package was given to us -- I was associated with Working Title in persuading Tom Hooper in the future on board and one on one the movie after profitable the Academy Merit for The King's Speech -- it simply all sort of created sense to all of us. From a business point of view, we looked at it as almost a tentpole, yet it's not priced like a tentpole. It's actually priced quite responsibly. But in the IP value of the idea, this is a show which is played for 28 years in 50 countries around the world and it has had hundreds of millions of viewers. So it only made us think that we could present it a real event, mainly in the holiday season.
THR: Jeffrey, how do you feel in The late 90s when Saving Non-public Ryan lost greatest picture to Shakespeare for each other, You were running DreamWorks using Steven Spielberg and David Geffen.
Katzenberg: It's very hard. Shakespeare in Love would have been a wonderful movie, however for me, someone who spent my youth on movies and also remembers seeing Spartacus being a kid on Broadway, Preserving Private Ryan is probably the great movies of all time and will stand test of time. How that will happened will always be mysterious to me.
Barker: That's one particular I'd like to see the election on. It could are already one vote; and we don't know.
STORY: Steven Spielberg along with Jeffrey Katzenberg Give $1 Million Every to Boost Obama Very PAC
THR: Harvey Weinstein changed the game along with his campaign for Shakespeare in Love. Did you realize it at that time,
Katzenberg: Most of these executives below have been in business using Steven Spielberg over the years, and one of the items I've always highly regarded enormously about Steven is the fact that there is no such factor as campaigning, even through our DreamWorks phase. It absolutely was like: "Forget it. I do not do this. This is not exactly what the Academy is about. I can't believe in it.Inches He forbade us through campaigning. Terry Press, who is nearly as good at this as any person, was shackled with duct recording over her mouth.
Barker: I personally think it is completely overdone. I'm a little bit on Mr. Spielberg's facet. I think you have to spend on an Academy marketing campaign to get the Academy associates to see the motion picture, but I don't think they're influenced beyond that will.
Katzenberg: Unfortunately, that's not true. I mean, honestly, that is certainly no longer the case.
Gianopulos: It really is sort of like marketing campaign reform legislation inside political arena. Until everybody plays from the rules and agrees to them, it's not going to quit. Rob and I tend to be members of the panel of the Academy, and also the Academy has attempted to put some lids on what people can perform and some of the practices that have gotten out of hand.
Friedman: If it was left loads of, it would get genuinely bad.
Gianopulos: It would proceed nuts. (Laughter.)
Moore: A few of the spend is governmental. The pressure comes from your filmmakers and the talent once they start to ratchet things up because they see what someone else is doing and they're saying, "Why aren't you doing the same for my video,"
Langley: To Rob's position, when you do vainness campaigns, you look at it that way.
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