Gawker: defamer, revolution

Joe Roth: It's So Adorable When Silly Stage Ladies Want Control Over Their Cute Little Movies!

Mark — Tue, 20 Mar 2007 13:29:54 EDT

Today's NY Times looks at the behind-the-scenes battle for control of the creative soul of psychedelic Beatles musical Across the Universe unfolding between Revolution Studios head Joe Roth and director Julie Taymor, in which Roth's helpful trimming of about a half hour from her cut and a subsequent test screening of his shorter version has a "helpless" Taymor threatening to take her name off the picture before it becomes a full-blown Rothian abomination. While Team Taymor carefully chose its words in responding to the Times' inquiry into the flap ("Sometimes at this stage of the Hollywood process differences of opinion arise, but in order to protect the film, I am not getting into details at this time."), Roth reminded everyone not to pay too much attention to the hysterical stage lady who can't take constructive criticism like a Mann:

He said that Ms. Taymor was overreacting to a normal Hollywood process of testing different versions of a movie, something he has done many times before, including with Michael Mann's "Last of the Mohicans." He called his version of "Across the Universe" "an experiment."

"She's a brilliant director," he said. "She's made a brilliant movie. This process is not anything out of the ordinary. Her reaction through her representatives might be. But her orientation is stage. It's different if you're making a $12-million film, or a $45-million film. No one is uncomfortable in this process, other than Julie."
And he warned that the conflict could hurt the movie. "If you work off her hysteria, that will do the film an injustice," he said. "Nobody wants to do that. She's worked long and hard, and made a wonderful movie."

Following his persuasive and sensitive argument (note his laudable tact in never once mentioning the phrase "on the rag," no matter how badly he wanted to say it), Taymor will probably come around and finally open herself up to "the process" she's so irrationally resisted until now, allowing fellow director Roth to share the cinematic gifts that made Christmas with the Kranks such an aesthetic triumph.

Film Has Two Versions; Only One Is Julie Taymor's [NY Times]

Trade Round-Up: Revolution Winding Down

Mark — Fri, 27 Jan 2006 14:45:22 EST

· Yesterday, there was chatter that Revolution was going down. The details on Rev's "limbo," according to Var: They will release 13 already finished or in-production films via Sony over the next two years, they've ceased development while the studio "tries to figure out its future" (read: bye bye), and Joe Roth is "hammering out" his "future production arrangement" at Sony. And you can stop holding your breath: Rocky Balboa is among the saved projects. [Variety]
· Get ready for some hilarious, improvised bits about bushy mustaches and lisping riffs on the Rough Riders: Robin Williams will play Teddy Roosevelt alongside Ben Stiller in the Fox comedy A Night at the Museum. [THR]
·MGM president Dan Taylor, who oversaw the transition of the studio to Sony, "ankles" the Lion. Really, we never get tired of the ankling. [Variety]
· There is no reason to read any story with the title "'Big Momma' said knock you out." [THR]
· NBC gives a 13 episode commitment to the Aaron Sorkin/Thomas Schlamme behind-the-scenes-at-an-SNLesque-show series, which has lost the name Studio 7, but gained Matthew Perry, Steven Weber, and DL Hughley as stars. [Variety]

End Of The Revolution?

Mark — Thu, 26 Jan 2006 16:30:31 EST

If you've got a couple of minutes to spare before the end of your lunch hour, we recommend that you head over to the Revolution Studios online studio store and pick up some memorabilia, because it seems that anything bearing their logo is about to become a collector's item. The rumor on the street (and in the inboxes of just about every assistant in town) is that the Revolution is over (or, if you prefer a less martial wording, Revolution has stopped spinning), with chairman Joe Roth finishing off a few projects in development and/or throwing some in a cardboard box and carrying them over to Sony in the obligatory producing deal. As is the custom when a studio goes down, we must list a smattering of its most notable failures, so join us in fondly reminiscing about Tomcats, Christmas with the Kranks, Rent, Little Black Book, and the one that rivaled even the immortal Ishtar as a punchline while simultaneously crippling two acting careers, Gigli.

And if it turns out the whispers are wrong, we're sure that the Revolution store has a generous return policy for any unworn apparel you regret purchasing.

UPDATE: The details, according to Variety: They will release 13 already finished or in-production films via Sony over the next two years, they've ceased development while the studio "tries to figure out its future" (read: bye bye), and Joe Roth is "hammering out" his "future production arrangement" at Sony.

Previously: Joe Roth: At Least My Crap Made Money [Defamer]

Trade Round-Up: Billy Bob Thornton, Astronaut Farmer

Mark — Mon, 22 Aug 2005 14:21:35 EDT

· Undeterred by the abandonment of two of his partners, Revolution's Joe Roth will take a more "hands-on role" in ensuring that the studio continues to reliably churn out five or six flops a year. [Variety]
· Buoyed by the inexplicable success of Fantastic Four, director Tim Story signs a deal with Fox to develop and direct two pilots. [THR]
· Billy Bob Thornton to star in the comedy Astronaut Farmer, in which an astronaut returns to—wait for it—the family farm, written and directed by the Polish Brothers of quirky Twin Falls Idaho fame. [Variety]
· The MPAA rules that Saw 2's severed-finger marketing campaign is "unacceptable," helpfully giving the movie more attention than the ads themselves would have attracted on their own. [THR]
· Bruce Willis will co-star with Halle Berry in Revolution's psychological thriller Perfect Stranger, which is "set in the world of the internet," hopefully proving once again that there is nothing quite as cinematic as a fevered exchange over IM. [Variety]
· ABC and Touchstone are sued by a local writer who claims Lost was stolen from his plane-crash-survivors-on-a-creepy-island idea from 1977, also called Lost. ABC immediately dispatched a jungle-loving polar bear, an invisible monster, and three inscrutable plot twists to deal with the aggrieved scribe. [THR]

Joe Roth: At Least My Crap Made Money

Mark — Tue, 24 May 2005 12:18:00 EDT

Revolution Studios head Joe Roth should know better than to bore people by describing his dreams, especially if the person he's boring is a columnist from the LAT and running a tape recorder:

"I dreamed last night that I fired [Revolution partner] Tom Sherak," he says with a wry grin, sipping a Diet Coke between takes. Roth said that, in the dream, he was sitting with Chris Columbus, who's directing a film of the stage musical "Rent" for Revolution. "Tom came in, singing and dancing, all excited, saying, 'I got our trailer on the front of "Star Wars!" ' And I go, 'Which trailer, the one for Chris' movie or the one for mine?' And Tom says, 'Neither! I got the trailer for "Die Hard 3!" '

"I started yelling at him, 'What about my movie, you son of a bitch!' And Tom said, 'Hey, I gotta do what I gotta do.' So I fired him."

This one certainly doesn't require much Freudian analysis, but once you open the floodgates, everyone will feel compelled to share their own dreams. For example, we dreamed that later on in the column, Roth wrapped the supposed humility of realizing that he's churned out crap in a self-aggrandizing disclaimer about his financial success, which sounded something like, "My unwillingness to be exposed to failure has prevented me from being viewed as a serious director. I guess I've been hiding behind making money for my company." Then the dream really got weird, as the Revolution logo rose in the sky, transformed into a giant set of buttocks, then showered the earth with turds labeled "Christmas with the Kranks" and "XXX: State oft the Union." What do you suppose that means?

Joe Roth rewrites his life's script [LAT]