February 3, 2004

“Ich bin ein your stripper!”

It happened so quickly that it needed the pill that comes after Levitra, the one that keeps the gun from firing before clearing the holster. Yet, America couldn’t stop talking about it all day yesterday. Matt Drudge did really good work in establishing MTV’s disappeared pre-event promise of shocking surprises. On the other hand, he needed a second source to confirm that the photo he was publishing was actually a woman’s breast, having not seen (or looked for) one since he started teething.

David Letterman made me laugh the hardest, as he suggested that from now on, they just have a couple of celebrities have intercourse during halftime, saving lots of money on smoke machines. It could be a public service, really. After all, how else will Jessica Simpson ever figure out that her husband has tricked her into an entire year of non-vaginal sex unless she can read about it in the paper?

I’m not exactly shy, but I do think that the moment was completely inappropriate for family demo TV (unlike “The Kiss,” which was both pathetic and inconsequential). In fact, the game was one of the best ever, yet the commercials and half time antics were almost completely uninspired. Ironically, ass was a far more prevalent theme than breast. Whether a talking one, a flatulating one or that streaker, who acted line one, it was all about ass.

After Ted Koppel memorialized the moment on Nightline last night, appropriately using Frank Rich to fully represent the ass element of the event, I hope it is all over and we can all get back to being bored by the Oscar race.

SPEAKING OF THE RINGS – New Line held a lovely cocktail party for the press and the Rings team here in town (Jackson, Walsh, Boyens, Osborne, Ordesky, Ngila Dickson and a few others), as many of have now seen the Oscar frontrunners more often than we have seen some members of our immediate family. (I’m not complaining… I’m still hoping to sit down with the endlessly charming and evasive Ms. Walsh before the month is over.)

Perhaps the most surprising result of the Oscar nominations falling the way they have has been the retreat of almost every studio from the advertising excess that has marked the first couple of months of the Oscar race. Miramax is expected to make another ad push as the final ballots get sent out, but right now, Universal is this year’s Miramax, taking over the home pages of both Variety and The Hollywood Reporter with multiple ads.

I would estimate that the assumed win for Lord of the Rings, combined with the elimination of Miramax from the only category that really changes a film’s box office fortunes and some increased restraint by Fox, DreamWorks, Focus (now shifting to a “Now on DVD” campaign for Lost In Translation), Columbia, Lions Gate and Warner Bros., will cost the trades and other outlets (including MCN/THB) as much as a million dollars that might have been spent under other circumstances, perhaps more.

SPEAKING OF BUENA VISTA - Perhaps the only story as overblown as Ms. Jackson’s mammary, is the “Woe to Disney” stuff going on around the Pixar break-up. While some journalists have gotten some perspective… and more to the point, have allowed themselves to be spun rather handily by Disney, most have spent a lot of space counting money that does not exist.

If you start reading a story about Disney and Pixar and it goes into the significance of the Pixar films on Disney’s bottom line in recent years, run for the hills. Wherever Pixar finally settles, there is more than a little possibility that the deal will be only minimally profitable or even a loss leader for the company involved. And as I have maintained in this space for a long while now, the concept of the tentpole is dead. A hugely profitable movie holds a studio on its shoulders. But expensive movies that bring in big numbers and low profits are no longer winners in the eyes of anyone but media lackies. Smoke and mirrors can only sucker Wall Street for a while before the actual profit and loss becomes the issue.

In fact, I would argue that the future of Disney animation might hinge on failing to get Pixar to sign on.

The reality of almost every business is that having an enormously successful partnership that leans to one side tends to unbalance the entire operation. There doesn’t even have to be a partnership. A big movie can take the focus of a marketing department off of the in-house pictures that are less exciting. The impetus to create your own great big movie can be lost when your partner is delivering one. And it is very easy for a company to forget how to sell a movie that has not been pre-sold for it, by history, reputation or preexisting fan base.

Even though they are not expected to be major players, the companies that I would be looking at if I were in Pixar’s place would be the studios with little or no current investment in animation, but with strong marketing departments. MGM, I am amazed to be writing, would be a perfect fit. MGM has a marketing team that knows what it is doing, but hasn’t had anything much worth selling in a while. On top of that, a Pixar deal would make the floundering studio an even more enticing acquisition target. Or Paramount, which could be under completely different movie management by the time the first post-Disney Pixar film arrives in 2006 or 2007. It seems like a classic Sumner Redstone deal… low risk, low reward, but a nearly guaranteed win. In spite of ImageWorks, Sony is another sensible place for Pixar to land. And at Universal, where Pixar would have to compete for attention with Imagine, the question of how many major producing partners would get in the way of Stacy Snider & Co. being free to deliver a full slate annually would have to be answered before things moved along.

The studio that would most worry me as a Pixar partner is Warner Bros, where one of the great legacies in this business could easily be lost It’s lovely to dream of Pixar picking up the Termite Terrace mantle, but I don’t see it working out.

As for Disney, it is time to find a new voice, regardless of whether Pixar ends of coming back to the table. (One theory around town was that Roy Disney had talked Steve Jobs into walking away from the table, promising better terms and a return to classic Disney animation leadership if Jobs withdrawal from talks was the poison pill that finally killed Eisner off. It hasn’t and it doesn’t look like it will. Eisner is looking like George W these days.) Losing Pixar will force the issue in a way that would otherwise not be happening.

MEANWHILE AT THE HOME ENTERTAINMENT DIVISION – Buena Vista Home Entertainment held a lovely event on Monday night to celebrate the release of The Lion King 1 ½, Spy Kids 3D and The Haunted Mansion… in that order. Sometimes one forgets just how beautifully that studio does these kinds of events and Home Entertainment, now the studio’s biggest cash cow, really knows how to shake ‘em down.

And the goodie bag for this thing actually lived up to the name, causing people to actually say “goodie” when they looked inside. Besides copies of the newly minted DVDs for Spy Kids 3D and The Lion King 1 ½ (The Haunted Mansion was a ghost, perhaps a good idea given the FCC’s current mood about the distribution of disgusting materials), there was a talking, eating, farting Pumbaa (another Super Bowl flashback), a head tripping light sculpture, a can of gummy worms, an iClick Sapphire 350 digital camera and a limited edition (7700 units) Timon & Pumbaa cel. Fun stuff.

I didn’t have time to watch either movie before writing the column, though the clips of TLK1.5 were quite encouraging. The film will probably be the biggest direct-to-video seller of all time… and a lot of fun to boot.

One last note… I met this kid, Mac McLean, whom I had not met before. I just met him for a moment. And he was not insanely solicitous. However, he stinks of success. Like an actor, he just has that intangible thing. I don’t know how talented he is or is not. I don’t know whether he deserves a world of praise or scorn. You can just feel it. He’s a half-inch too slick at the moment. (He signs his name “mAc.” Oy.) But he’ll grow out of that. So if he is working under you now, watch yourself. This kid will be running a division before you know it. I just get that feeling.

READER OF THE DAY: NOT THE ROCK writes: “Saw something interesting today. Several DVD news sites have reported that House of Sand and Fog will be released to DVD on March 30. So, from the 12/21 theatrical release, that's 3 months. (I do math, and weddings). As a big 'H o' S&G' fan, I think this is great. But I'm concerned that they'd pick such a prestige title to close the theatrical-video gap. That sort of thing is for audience-movie bombs. And it's a month after the Oscars, where if they pick up anything at all, it will be Supporting Actress for an unknown - a small amount of momentum, which will have dissipated by 3/30.

I want this movie to find the audience it deserves and pick up more than the 9 mil it has so far so far on a 16 mil budget. But my feeling is the initial 'new' audience for this foggy, sandy house is of finite size, whether you release it in March, May, June, or whenever. This movie's reward is waiting for it a year from now, when two strangers bond at a cocktail party over its undiscovered greatness. Unless it's solely an attempt to maximize first-quarter profits, I just don't see what Dreamworks gains with this move.

So, the sign I see up ahead, does it say "The End is Near", or "Welcome to the Beginning"? Does this kill the theatrical viewing experience, or turn the home viewing experience into what it should have been all along? When the studios can remove the P from P & A, do interesting, quality movies turn a profit, thus ensuring more will be made? Can the shit-stigma of straight-to-video ever be removed? Can this paragraph have any more questions?”

E ME: What do you think?