Avi Arad vs. Tom Rothman - Who's Worse

[Flint Marko]

There's a thread on him that list all of his horrible deeds. The Crimes of Tom Rothman

Thanks

 

[SuperT]

Why does everyone here hate Rothman so much?
I get that he was in charge when Fox cranked out turd after turd in regards to their Marvel properties, but was that his doing? Does he have a knack for meddling in properties and handing down ridiculous studio mandates? I'm asking because I genuinely do not know, I just know he was at Fox during their awful period.

Yes. He's notorious for being an evil micro-manager and was the main reason why tX1 and X2 didn't get the budgets they deserved and why the X-films crumbled when he didn't wait for Singer to return.

 

[Gabe99]

THR:
Tom Rothman on His Sony Era: "I Prize Stability
Amy Pascal's replacement reveals his plans for the studio as his Fox experience and a reputation for frugality won over Japan execs.

The new Tom Rothman era at Sony Pictures Entertainment represents a potential sea change at a film studio that had — at least until quite recently — been known to be among the most talent-friendly and free-spending in town.

When it comes to financial discipline, Rothman, 60, is the diametric opposite of exiting SPE co-chairman Amy Pascal, who, it was initially announced, was to remain in her post until May, but who now will cede the job immediately. Rothman led a very profitable and rarely open-handed film studio at Fox for many years, which heartens Wall Street analysts such as Rich Greenfield of BTIG, who says, "We have long been impressed with Tom Rothman's skills in managing a slate of films, particularly his focus on staying away from uneconomical productions and relationships." Adds Daniel Ernst of Hudson Square Research: "It was important to make the decision and move on in a relatively short period of time -- Sony has done that, and that's a positive."

But in Hollywood, there has been considerable fear about the impact of a Rothman regime. "He's going to shut **** down," says one producer who has worked with the executive at Fox. "He's going to lay a very heavy hand on budgets and deals. It's all going to change. He's going to be Tom Rothman."

 

[UltimateWebhead]

lol. You know it's bad when people are using your name as a descriptive term to explain when something is doomed.

 

[Mike Murdock]

That story makes a good case for Rothman for Sony. But it doesn't make a good case for Rothman for superhero films. Sony probably could use some more budget control, but that doesn't mean he won't be cheap and creatively uninteresting.

 

[eddy]

It will be interesting to come back to this thread in a few years post Marvel's Spider-Man.

 

[Joeyjojo72]

Like Plague vs Ebola.

 

[Doc Ock]

It will be interesting to come back to this thread in a few years post Marvel's Spider-Man.

 

[Gabe99]

YouTube Midnight's Edge:
SPOILERS?
Ghostbusters Reboot: Production Trouble Rumors (Sony-Gate Part 1)

Ghostbusters reboot: Story Leak and Damage Limitation (Sony-Gate Part 2)

Deadpool, the history of FOX mismanagement - a Trankgate Anthology

 

[Flint Marko]

Rothman really has me worried. I can't emotionally handle another mishandled Spider-man franchise.

 

[First Avenger]

Lord Feige will take care of him,Flint.

 

[Doctor Octopus]

I vote Avi Arad. He ruin the Spider-Man movies.

 

[Vchipp]

It's really hard to say, as much as I think he ruined the Spider-Man movies Avi did get the Marvel media (Cartoon, Toys, Etc.) rolling.

 

[Doctor Octopus]

All Marvel cartoons?

 

[Vchipp]

Well the 90s ones

 

[Jason Kane]

Nah. We still don't know for sure if the F4 reboot will fail (hey, miracles happen), and the other franchises she's overseen (Apes, the last three X-Men movies) have done fairly well. Plus, her interviews aren't nearly as insufferable or ignorant as Arad's or Rothman's.

And thanks to Midnight Edge, I misjudged her and Rothman was the culprit behind Fant4stic's existence...

 

[eon001]

YouTube Midnight's Edge:
SPOILERS?
Ghostbusters Reboot: Production Trouble Rumors (Sony-Gate Part 1)

Ghostbusters reboot: Story Leak and Damage Limitation (Sony-Gate Part 2)

Deadpool, the history of FOX mismanagement - a Trankgate Anthology

Salute to you sir. I was about to post some Midnights Edge vids. They have really helped me fully understand the nepotism and insane nature of studios. Rothman must have some deep rooted connections among the studio community. How anyone could continuously **** up but stay in such high level employment is beyond me. Reminds me of Sepp Blatter ridiculously long tenure as FIFA chief. Despite the obvious corruption he was head of the organization for decades.

 

[Doctor Octopus]

Well the 90s ones

Ok. I only like Spider-Man and X-Men ones though.

 

[Mike Murdock]

Silver Surfer was pretty good.

 

[Gabe99]

Civil War Did Not Cause The Big Split At Marvel Comics – The Rot Set In With Iron Man 2

In a series of recent interviews, the Russo Brothers, directors of the recent Captain America movies, with Avengers to follow, believe that disagreements over plot points in their Civil War film may have led to the splits within Marvel.

These splits saw Kevin Feige take the movie-making side of the company, Marvel Studios, away from the rest of Marvel so that he reported directly to Disney’s Head Of Studios Alan Horn rather than Marvel CEO Isaac Perlmutter. This also meant that Captain America: Civil War is the last of the movies to have direct input from Marvel and the Marvel Creative Committee.

The timing and content of the interviews does seem curious when lined up with a number of other interviews, such as with Shane Black, and others that throw shade on Isaac Perlmutter and the rest of Marvel. I’ve been aware of considerable Hollywood and comics industry upset and dissent over the last few weeks at what some see as a conspiracy, and with convention season heating up, people are talking. And not just David Meisel.

The fact that it seems to have happened just as the final Marvel Studios film that the comic book side of the company had a say was released seems more like a planned hit. And one that Disney has approved of.

Let’s dig in.

I’ve talked to a number of sources who disagree with the Russos’ specific take on the cause of the big split at Marvel. Rather than occurring during Civil War, its origins are with Iron Man 2. And what happened when Marvel executives freaked out after seeing an early cut of the movie. A lot of money had been spent, Marvel wasn’t willing to go back to the drawing board. But changes had to be made.

Do you remember the scenes with a drunken Tony Stark in the suit? Originally, they were far worse. Scenes which showed Stark falling down drunk, and being cruel, demeaning and frankly misogynist to Pepper Potts were cut, reedited and reshot in order keep the character from being totally irredeemable by the end of his first sequel. Though some of the drunkenness still exists in the final cut, in a more comedic fashion.

Kevin Feige encountered opposition by the rest of the Marvel team for a lack of judgement over how he allowed the creative team on the movie to treat Marvel’s up-and-coming franchise. And he was overruled.

But the opposition to his choices appears to have begun the tensions that would lead him to move Marvel Studios away from the comics side. It certainly fostered resentment towards Marvel.

This rift was deepened when Feige seemed to start taking credit for the conceptualising of the Avengers movie, a series of Marvel films that would lead up to that coming together of the characters and the strategy behind that. But when that was being decided, by the likes of high-level executives Isaac Perlmutter, Alan Fine, Avi Arad, David Meisel and others, Kevin Feige wasn’t in the room.

Then in 2012 Alan Horn joined Disney as the Head Of Studios. In this role, he did nothing to smooth out the issues at Marvel, or bring the two slowly fracturing parts of Marvel together. Indeed, he seems to have fostered that split.

He had form in this regard. At Warner Bros, Alan Horn was the man who drove the stake through any remaining connection between DC Comics and WB Studios. Something he seemed he was choosing to do at Marvel as well.

It may be worth pointing out that Horn has never been the best friend to comics. It was his Warners VP meeting a decade ago that saw DC Vertigo forced to change their creator owned contracts to be more restrictive regarding media rights, something that saw Warren Ellis, Garth Ennis, Neil Gaiman, Grant Morrison and others take their projects elsewhere, a creative brain drain that Vertigo never recovered from.

He insisted that Marvel Studios move out of the Marvel offices and relocate on the Disney lot, suggesting it would be beneficial on a creative level. The move finally occurred in 2013.

Feige was now well looked after by Horn and Disney execs who now had instant access to him, and were allowing the fights between Marvel Studios and Marvel to get worse. The inevitable outcome was that Feige and Studios no longer reported to Marvel but directly to Alan Horn himself. Mission accomplished.

But before that split was official, a little over a year ago, Isaac Perlmutter played peace maker – he invited the entire Marvel team to a meeting in Florida in an attempt to clear the air and get back to the business working better together.

It was that meeting when Feige stated his desire to be a part of Disney and not Marvel. This was the point of no return, and when Alan Horn and the rest of Disney learnt of this, they were happy to let the inevitable happen.

So while Ike Perlmutter and Kevin Feige have been seen as Tony Stark and Steve Rogers, Alan Horn is seen as playing at Baron Zemo, pulling the strings of the Civil War, pitting Marvel against itself and putting them on a self-destructive path.

So even though the Russos see their movie as what caused the split, it was merely the last straw.

The TV shows, for ABC, Netflix and others, including Agent Carter, Jessica Jones and Agents Of SHIELD are still part of Marvel. Though they have lost alignment and co-ordination between the movies and the TV shows which would otherwise have co-promoted each other. You may have noted that this season’s Agents Of SHIELD had a scene where the cast talked about what was happening in Civil War – basically after the writers had got to see the almost-finished film.



But Doctor Strange in November will be the first Marvel Studios film without the input of Marvel. It will be the first true test of Marvel Studios-without-the-comics.

 

[Gabe99]

THR:
Sony Pictures Shakeup: Doug Belgrad to Step Down as Film President (Exclusive)
The longtime studio executive has been with Sony since 1989.

Deadline:
Doug Belgrad And Tom Rothman Explain His Transition To Sony-Based Financier/Producer

EXCLUSIVE: Though he was flushed out of the bush quicker than he expected to be by a spate of rumors this week that led to tonight’s press reports about his exit, Doug Belgrad is well along in the construct of a monied production company that will have an exclusive first look deal at Sony Pictures, one that chairman Tom Rothman tells Deadline will generate two to four films per year for the studio.

Belgrad, who spent 27 years as a Columbia Pictures executive and has been a senior exec since 2002 when he became co-president of production with Matt Tolmach, will transition from the post and finish his run as an executive with the release of the Paul Feig-directed Ghosbusters. He’ll help with the transition of a replacement that sources said will be hired from outside to take the post of Motion Picture Group president (the hire is in the works and will happen quickly). And then, Belgrad will begin a new career chapter, one he said was his goal when he first became a studio executive nearly three decades ago.

“I came out here from Wall Street a long time ago hoping to build my own media company, and I got bit by the movie bug and got a great opportunity here to grow and learn the business,” Belgrad said. “But I always had these ambitions, even though I am a late booming entrepreneur.” His goal? “To have a relatively small, nimble company that has financing to back projects I believe in, that are commercially appealing, and to be able to work within Sony’s outstanding global distribution and marketing platforms,” he said. “I will make projects I’m passionate about, that fit the feature space or television platform, with properties and the talent relationships I want to explore. The landscape and possibilities are very exciting, but these executive jobs are more consuming than they were 10 or 15 years ago. I’ve got three kids, two of them who grew up while I’ve been doing this job, and I’d like to have a relationship with them. Part of this is a work-life balance decision. It was time for me to do something else.”

While his new venture doesn’t have a name he would disclose, Belgrad said he has been figuring out these plans since “well before” Sony got hit with a devastating cyber attack. He shelved his aspirations to help weather that crisis. Belgrad said the ambition and first discussions about this go back to discussions he had with Amy Pascal and Michael Lynton during his most recent re-up two years ago. And while Belgrad was a contender for the top job to replace Pascal that went to Rothman, both Belgrad and Rothman said Belgrad put his plans on hold while they got the studio past a slump and pulled together the promising slates for 2016 and 2017.

As word raced about Belgrad leaving (it comes a day after the exit of TV chief Steve Mosko though insiders the two are not related), rumors and one report suggested that Belgrad had been let go. Both he and Rothman wince at that notion, and vehemently deny it. Rothman said that he asked Belgrad to stay and help him put the studio on firmer footing, and that they have been figuring out this eventual transition for months (the rumors certainly have been around that long). The exit plan didn’t progress quickly because Rothman implored Belgrad to stay as they hammered out a slate that besides Ghostbusters includes such films as The Magnificent Seven, Passengers, Inferno and The Dark Tower, among others.

“He has been working his ass off for us in bringing us back to being a 20 picture releases a year studio,” Rothman said.

For his part, Rothman said he’s now determined to make Belgrad’s imminent fund raising efforts as painless as possible. “Doug will have guaranteed distribution slots, which should be helpful to him as he raises money, and he will be located on the lot and we will start him off with a number of projects at the studio,” Rothman told Deadline. “He is going to jump on some of our movies right away, and we will be making a major financial investment in his future. This is not one of those situations where an executive conveniently goes off into some producing deal. This is going to be a meaningful distribution partnership and I will be counting on him for two to four pictures per year. I don’t look at this as a blow to Sony in any way. We are gaining a supplier, one who knows everyone in the system here, and one that we trust implicitly. That is a rare thing.”

They wouldn’t divulge the pre-existing projects that Belgrad will become a producer on; this has all come to a head quickly and a lot of phone calls go into adding producers to existing projects, as was the case when Amy Pascal exited and became a producer on a number of plum pictures including Ghostbusters and Spider-Man: Homecoming, while she began building up her own arsenal of new projects. For Belgrad’s part, he’ll work on those projects Sony assigns to him while simultaneously staffing up and raising funding that will make him an equity player with the goal to grow a multi-platform content company in the mold of New Regency, Spyglass or Media Rights Capital, the latter of which was the catalyst and Sony’s partner in The Dark Tower.

There will be the cynical reaction that Belgrad’s exit was inevitable because that is what happens when two executives compete for the top job, and one doesn’t get it. Studio president Michael De Luca was also a candidate, and he left for a lucrative producing deal at Universal, for instance. “I understand the question, but this genuinely has nothing to do with me not getting the job as chairman,” Belgrad said. “I understood the decision that was made, at the time. Tom has the most experience of any executive around in running a studio, and he’s talented. I wanted to stay on. We have affection and respect for one another, and we had a great time putting together these films. I just didn’t feel right leaving when there was adversity to overcome, and I felt that there was a lot of job left for me to do before I took this on. I look not only at the Sony slates as accomplishments for us, but also moving Hannah Minghella to TriStar and Christine Belson to the animation company. The company is in a good place, and I sat down with Tom and explained my ambition and he has been most helpful in figuring out how to make the transition.”

Rothman said he understood Belgrad’s desire to change course, and in the course of conversations, the shape of Belgrad’s venture began to evolve with a greater involvement from the studio. “What evolved over months of discussion was a situation that was mutually beneficial to both of us, with this large and meaningful production deal as a major supplier for us. I asked him to stay and put together the slate, and our Cinemacon presentation showed an exceptional year of executive work that Doug and his team were responsible for. We are in a very strong place for the next 18 months, and that is why I don’t feel we’re losing a colleague as much as we’re gaining a supplier.”

 

[Gabe99]

Tom Rothman on 'Spider-Man' Plans and Loving 'Ghostbusters' Trolls: "Can We Please Get Some More Haters to Say Stupid Things?"
Sony’s movie chief believes the men against his movie are doing the marketing for him, bets big on ghosts, Jennifer Lawrence and a global strategy.

Animation is so competitive right now. How do you make something stand out?
It's competitive because it's very lucrative, right? You can't run that business without a view toward the costs. Those movies do not have to cost $150 million.

Can they cost half of that?
Yes, they can cost half of that.

Is that a rule?
No, not at all. We’ll make more expensive ones — particularly sequels — and we’ve had back-to-back successes, with Hotel Transylvania 2 and Angry Birds, which is going to be the fourth highest-grossing American animated movie in China ever. The sequel's in the works and we have the next four or five movies lined up. We have Smurfs all animated coming out next year. For the first time, we'll actually have three animated movies in the same year, [along with] The Emoji movie. And then the third animated movie will be at Christmas, an extension of our very good faith business. We're making an animated Nativity story, called The Star, from the animals' point of view. It's really sweet and lovely and that's a much lower cost. And we have dated Christmas 2018 for what I believe is truly going to be a breakthrough animated sensation. Lord and Miller, who did the Lego movies, are doing an animated Spider-Man. And it has a very breakthrough look to it, and a fantastic story, and it's independent from our Marvel Spider-Man.

Since you teamed with Marvel, do you plan to make a whole Spider-Man universe? Do you have plans for more work with Marvel?
Yes to both those questions. It’s been fantastic, our relationship with Marvel.

Who has greenlight authority?
Sony has the ultimate authority. But we have deferred the creative lead to Marvel, because they know what they’re doing. We start shooting the new Spider-Man in Atlanta [in mid-June].

Do you want to trim the costs of that franchise?
I don’t want to trim costs. I want to make money. And sometimes you make money by trimming costs and sometimes by investing in things that are profitable. A movie like Spider-Man by Marvel, that’s not inexpensive. But it’s a great investment. Knowing that Marvel has such a clear, creative vision, I sleep very well at night.

 

[Jason Kane]

Civil War Did Not Cause The Big Split At Marvel Comics – The Rot Set In With Iron Man 2

I'll never forgive Horn for what he did to DC. He's why DiDio's around in the first place along with crippling Vertigo

 

[Flint Marko]

Lord Feige will take care of him,Flint.

I hope this is the case, but I have a feeling I won't be relieved until I exit the theater on July 7th, 2017.

Tom Rothman on 'Spider-Man' Plans and Loving 'Ghostbusters' Trolls: "Can We Please Get Some More Haters to Say Stupid Things?"
Sony’s movie chief believes the men against his movie are doing the marketing for him, bets big on ghosts, Jennifer Lawrence and a global strategy.

He's saying all the right things, I'll give him that.

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

Sony has the ultimate authority. But we have deferred the creative lead to Marvel, because they know what they’re doing.

I think that's the smartest thing I've ever heard come out of Tom Rothman's mouth. Maybe a leopard can change its spots after all.