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It's Official: DreamWorks, Universal Hitched
Posted by STV at 6:20 AM on October 14, 2008
The Dept. of Forgone Conclusions forwarded a memo this morning confirming that DreamWorks has settled with Universal as its new distribution partner for the next five years, officially ending months of speculation and finally slicing the last thread connecting the 'Works to its exes at Paramount. The partnership reinstates Steven Spielberg and Stacey Snider's working relationship with their old friends at the studio, but far more importantly, it sets up a potential blood feud with a nemesis no one dares face when push comes to shove.
After all, it's hard enough facing a happy Brian Grazer, whose Imagine Entertainment is also headquartered on the Uni lot, where it cranks out its own fistful of prestige titles every year. Imagine evil Grazer, suspiciously adapting a Jokeresque grin and pitting his own interns versus DreamWorks assistants in a climactic time-bomb face-off after Snider usurps yet another plum release date for Untitled Shia LaBeouf Sequel. It could happen, reports The New York Times:
[Uni president Ron] Meyer would not discuss anything related to a DreamWorks deal, except to say: "We would be very pleased to be back in business together. We don't anticipate a real impact on our current or future slate from distributing their films." [...]
Officials at NBC Universal have said that they realise a deal with DreamWorks could upset Universal's equilibrium and that they will take that into consideration before entering into any kind of formal partnership. But ultimately, the company wants the deal to happen; the money that the company can make by distributing DreamWorks movies — which are hits more often than not — far outweighs any ruffled feathers.
We certainly hope so for Grazer's sake. It's hard times, after all, and you'd be surprised: All that Hawaiian appliance-and-furniture replacement adds up before you know it.
- DreamWorks, Universal ink deal [Variety]
Comments (AU Comments · US Comments)
There are currently no AU comments for this post.
franimaljones
Posted 7:38 AM 14/10/08
Brian and Stephen worked fine all the years prior, I'm sure they'll be fine. And aren't all the Amblin buildings still over there???
franimaljones
Benovite
Posted 7:34 AM 14/10/08
Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't Dreamworks founded on the basis of being its own studio and not just Spielberg's production company?
Benovite
LargeMarge
Posted 8:45 AM 14/10/08
I wish someone could explain to me why being a distribitor is so hard. From my ignorant POV it would seem that the distributors like WB, Uni, Paramount just get copies of films and send them to theaters. But it seems harder to be a distributor and more expensive. Somebody school me - please.
LargeMarge
Benovite
Posted 7:18 AM 15/10/08
Distributing a movie also involves marketing the movie, and that takes a lot of money. There's also the matter of creating different prints for all the foreign territories, that involves either dubbing or subtitling in different languages. Then there's the money involved in actually making all those prints of the movie, whether domestic or foreign.
So in short, yes, distributing a movie can be very expensive.
Benovite