By
Anne Thompson
|
Thompson on Hollywood
February 13, 2015 at 7:56AM
Yes, Pascal got fired, as she told interviewer Tina Brown at
her Women in the World conference this week (see video below). But that
moment also set her free to make better movies.
Jolie and Pascal
Amy Pascal always made an unusual studio chief. In order to gain that
power she had to play the game better than the boys. Anyone who has
ever spent time with her knows how smart she is, how much she gets
movies. But she has never been your standard-issue Hollywood suit. While
she has adapted to the increasingly corporate bottom-line thinking that
governs Hollywood--enabled by her Sony co-chairman Michael Lynton, who
walks and talks like a suit-- she's always had better taste, and
relationships with talent and their agents, than most studio heads. She
hasn't been invested in marketing and distribution and business deals.
With her it's all about making movies.
But we do not need to feel sorry for Pascal as she moves to her
deluxe Sony golden parachute producing deal. Only Rupert Murdoch's
ex-lieutenant Peter Chernin has ever done so well with an exit package.
And Pascal will now be free to release her inner producer without having
to worry about losing her job. Fear has always governed studio heads
who exercise undo caution, worry about short-term market share bragging
rights instead of real long-term returns, and make the wrong movies with
the right excuses: "Ridley Scott won the Oscar for 'Gladiator'! The
Wachowskis made 'The Matrix' trilogy! Will Smith always opens movies! We
needed to establish those action figures! We needed product to fill the
foreign pipeline!"
Yes, Pascal was also free with Sony spending,
which she has been pressured to trim back. It's so much easier to
justify in a climate of fear the need to spend more on A-list directors,
writers, cast and crew and VFX, which in turn lead to more spending on
marketing to back up that investment. 'Twas ever thus.
Here's why
losing her job could be the best thing to happen to Pascal--and Sony.
Instead of "substituting other people's needs for what you think," as
she told Brown, she can own her ideas and focus on making movies that
are as smart as she is.
1. You can't handle the truth!
Pascal was miserable that the Sony Hack revealed her freewheeling use
of email in talent negotiations over such projects as Scott Rudin,
Danny Boyle and Aaron Sorkin's "Steve Jobs," which went to
Universal, and "The Interview," the Sony comedy that led to destructive
retaliation from North Korea. But the emails going public (which Pascal
abhors the media for releasing) may well lead to a stronger studio. And
for Pascal, she admitted, "it was strangely freeing."
Those emails
revealed a studio head who catered to talent and paid the consequences.
Sony was right and Seth Rogen was wrong about the possible real world
ramifications of "The Interview." Pascal should have forced Rogen to
fictionalize Kim Jong-un. Now she's willing to say in public that talent
are "bottomless pits of need"--while reminding us that they are also
"this magical thing that no one else can be."
Read even a
fraction of those emails and it was clear that studio insiders were
largely smarter than their conservative final decisions. They knew
better but still did the wrong thing. I get the sense over the past few
months that the studio has emerged from this shit storm stronger and
more self-aware. Lynton, who is moving to New York, will have his own
job on the line as he exercises his green-light authority and looks for
someone to supervise three very powerful producers. Pascal joins Tom
Rothman (ex-co-chairman of Fox now at Tristar) whose initial slate is
promising and Jeff Robinov (ex-Warner Bros. chief now at Studio 8), who
is just ramping up.
Wait, are we talking about Sony or Disney?
Clearly, whether by sheer opportunism or design, Sony has emerged with a
label system much like the one constructed by Disney's Robert Iger, who
hired ex-Warner Bros. veteran studio chief Alan Horn to manage the
mighty egos and slates of Pixar (which is run by Disney animation czar
John Lasseter), Isaac Perlmutter and Kevin Feige's Marvel and Kathleen
Kennedy's Lucasfilm, charged with bringing back to life the "Star Wars"
franchise. Why not hire the best producers in town to make your movies
for you?
2. Saving "Spider-Man."
The jewels in every studio crown
are its franchises. And Sony has leaned on their hard-won right to the
"Spider-Man" franchise for a long time. But Marc Webb's second
"Spider-Man" installment --starring Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone--did
not deliver "amazing" blockbuster numbers. In fact, Marvel's remarkable
launch of a non-marquee comic "Guardians of the Galaxy"--without
established stars--outperformed Sony's better-known "Spider-Man." Why?
Because
it was old wine in new bottles. Pascal had already figured out that she
had to take a different direction with the 6th "Spider-Man" iteration
(without Garfield and Stone) and various spin-offs (which could include a
Gwen Stacy Spider-Woman). The negotiations with Marvel had already
begun before the Sony Hack to allow Spider-Man to travel. In a digital
and viral world, it only feeds the Sony franchise to allow Spider-Man to
visit the Marvel universe. And who better than Marvel production czar
Feige to advise on the best ways to do that?
Chart by The Numbers.com
On its own, Marvel has devoted itself to burnishing and
protecting its brand. Feige stays focused on staying true to the Marvel
universe, which is where all the comic book characters live. He has
built one story after another knowing that they all intertwine,
intersect, relate to and build on each other. Marvel's power lies in
creating a consistent world that fans want to be part of and revisit.
I
want to see what Pascal does now, as she embarks on this new adventure,
unfettered and no longer seeking to placate and please. She's got
Angelina Jolie's "Cleopatra" and Paul Feig's all-female "Ghostbusters,"
too. Let's see what Amazing Amy can do.
Thursday, February 12, 2015
Video: Tina Brown interviews Amy Pascal
NEW YORK (AP) — In her first interview
since her exit as co-chairman of Sony Pictures, Amy Pascal opened up
about her departure and acknowledged it wasn't voluntary. Speaking
to journalist Tina Brown at the Women in the World conference Wednesday
night in San Francisco, Pascal joked, "All the women here are doing
incredible things in this world. All I did was get fired." After
a long reign as the head of Sony Pictures, the studio last week
announced Pascal was stepping down and would start a new production
venture at Sony. In her new role as producer, she has already inherited
several of the studio's biggest upcoming projects, including Sony's next
Spider-man film, to be made in partnership with Marvel Studios. "I'm
56," she said at the summit. "It's not exactly the time that you want
to start all over again. But it's kind of great and I have to and it's
going to be a new adventure for me." Pascal
also spoke candidly about the trauma of the hacking attack that
preceded her departure. When the extent of the damage was still
unraveling and personal information was found to be stolen, Pascal said
"everybody was really scared." "But
nagging in the back of my mind, and I kept calling them, like, 'They
don't have our emails, right? Tell me they don't have our emails.' 'No,
no no,'" recalled Pascal. "Well, then they did. That was a bad moment." Pascal
came under fire, in particular, for emails with producer Scott Rudin in
which the two joked about President Barack Obama's presumed taste in
movies. Other emails revealed a furious Rudin calling Angelina Jolie
names ("the first person I talked to was Angie after that email," said
Pascal) and showed her tussling with the powerful producer ("We've been
having an ongoing fight since the moment we met," she said of Rudin). "Everyone
understood because we all live in this weird thing together called
Hollywood," said Pascal. "If we all actually were nice, it wouldn't
work." Brown founded the
Women in the World conference five years ago to bring together women
leaders to share stories and advice. Long considered the top female
executive in Hollywood, Pascal was known for, among other things,
supporting female filmmakers. Speaking to Brown, she said much still
needed to change. "The most
important thing we can do in our business is make movies with female
protagonists and movies with female villains and movies where the plot
of the movie is about them," said Pascal. "The worst thing you can do is
be on the sidelines." Pascal
was also entertainingly frank about the inner-workings of the movie
business. She called hypersensitive actors "bottomless pits of need." Said Pascal: "You've never seen anything like it."
Six days after stepping down as co-chairman of Sony Pictures Entertainment, Amy Pascal
broke her silence on Wednesday at the Women in the World conference in
San Francisco during a candid interview with journalist Tina Brown.
“All the women here are doing incredible things in this world. All I did was get fired,” she said, according to the Recode site.
Among the topics discussed were the hacked email exchanges between herself and producer Scott Rudin, the “The Interview’s” bad reviews, and the pervasive gender gap in Hollywood.
Pascal recounted the moment in November when she realized that her emails at Sony would be exposed.
“I ran this company and I had to worry about everybody who was really
scared…People were really scared…But nagging in the back of my mind, I
kept calling (the IT department) and being like, ‘They don’t have our
emails, tell me they don’t have our emails,’” she said. “But then they
did. That was a bad moment. And you know what you write in emails.”
Right off the bat, Brown asked Pascal about the racial emails about
President Obama, causing the 56 year-old exec shook her head.
“It was horrible. That was horrible,” Pascal said. “As a woman, what I
did was control how everybody felt about themselves and about me…and
there was this horrible moment when I realized there was absolutely
nothing I could do about whether I’d hurt people, whether I’d betrayed
people.”
Pascal also said, “There is nothing you can do. You can’t say anything. You can’t explain anything. It’s just there.”
As for her exchanges with Rudin on Jolie, whom he called a “minimally talented spoiled brat,” she said:"The first person I talked to was Angie after that email,"
“Angie didn’t care.”
“Everybody understood because we all live in this weird thing called
Hollywood,” she said. “If we were all actually were nice, it wouldn’t
work.”
When asked about underpaying Jennifer Lawrence in “American Hustle,” Pascal scoffed.
“I’ve paid (Jennifer Lawrence) a lot more money since then, I promise
you … Here’s the problem: I run a business. People want to work for
less money, I pay them less money…Women shouldn’t be so grateful. Know
what you’re worth. Walk away.”
Brown later said that “The Interview” was a pretty bad movie, to
which Pascal replied, “You don’t get to choose what you stand up for.”
This past week, Sony Pictures Entertainment announced a partnership
to make new Spider-Man movies with Marvel Studios, which Pascal will
produce as part of her new studio deal with Sony.
“The worst thing you can do is be on the sideline,” she said.
The studio also recently announced an all-female “Ghostbusters” reboot with Kristen Wiig and Melissa McCarthy.
“It’s about time we have a female action series,” Pascal declared.
As for the most important thing she learned from the hacked emails?
“Say exactly what you think directly to people all the time,” she said.
“In the moment, the first time.”
When Brown countered that Hollywood stars were sensitive than most people, Pascal snickered.
“They’re bottomless pits of need. You’ve never seen anything like
it,” she said. Then added sarcastically: “They are so great. They’re
this magical thing that no one else can be. They’re filled with the need
to be loved … but that’s because they’re magical.”
The executive also had harsh words for the press when asked if she was surprised about the reaction to her emails.
“I’m not supposed to say anything about that,” she said. “But I will
say that I was. People found reasons that going through my trash and
printing it was an ok thing to do. They found a way to justify that. And
they have to live with that.”
Amy Pascal broke her silence today at the Women in the World
conference at the St. Regis Hotel in downtown San Francisco, in an
onstage interview with journalist Tina Brown.
“All the women here are doing incredible things in this world. All I
did was get fired,” said the departing Sony Pictures Entertainment
co-chairperson, settling in for a free-flowing conversation with Brown.
“Everyone knows everything about me. What am I doing here?”
Brown answered that for her.
“None of us can imagine …” Brown said.
“No, you cannot,” Pascal said.
Pascal’s digital record came into the spotlight when North Korea
hacked Sony in retaliation for producing “The Interview,” a slapstick
comedy about journalists sent to assassinate that country’s supreme
leader, Kim Jong-un. The hackers exposed thousands of internal emails,
including Pascal’s ALL-CAPS-laced missives about celebrities and a racially charged joke about President Obama. This week, she announced she’ll be stepping down
to join the “Spiderman” production team in May (and receive close to a
$40 million production/parachute package over the next four years).
During cocktails before she took the stage, Brown said Pascal decided
to speak publicly in San Francisco for the first time because “the
timing was good. And in her home town, it’s a little too hot right now.”
After a dramatic video intro that featured footage of an explosion to
indicate the hacking, Brown asked Pascal to recount the moment when
she first realized that her emails would be exposed.
“I ran this company and I had to worry about everybody who was really
scared. … People were really scared. … But nagging in the back of my
mind, I kept calling [IT] and being like, ‘They don’t have our emails,
tell me they don’t have our emails,'” she said. “But then they did. That
was a bad moment. And you know what you write in emails.”
We know exactly what she writes in her emails.
Pascal — who dressed casually in clog heels and a leopard print wrap
tied around her waist — said her off-the-cuff emails with Sony producer
Scott Rudin were the result of a 30-year-relationship, an “ongoing
fight” and playful “role-playing” since the day they met.
Brown brought up the Obama emails right away: “They accused you of being a racist,” she said.
“It was horrible. That was horrible,” Pascal said, tossing her hair
and then brushing it out of her face, looking almost teary-eyed for a
moment.
“As a woman, what I did was control how everybody felt about
themselves and about me … and there was this horrible moment when
I realized there was absolutely nothing I could do about whether I’d
hurt people, whether I’d betrayed people,” she said. “I couldn’t protect
anyone. … It was horrible because that’s how I did my job.”
She paused and then said something surprising.
“It was also strangely freeing,” she said, looking at Brown. “Because all of a sudden, that was just what it was.”
Pascal continued: “There is nothing you can do. You can’t say anything. You can’t explain anything. It’s just there.”
Brown mentioned that “The Interview” was actually a pretty bad movie
(no “Citizen Kane,” she said). Pascal had a quick retort: “You don’t get
to choose what you stand up for.”
Relationships had been less damaged than people outside Hollywood may think because it is a unique kind of town, Pascal said.
“Everybody understood because we all live in this weird thing called
Hollywood,” she said. “If we all actually were nice, it wouldn’t work.”
For example, even though Rudin called Angelina Jolie a “minimally talented spoiled brat,” Pascal said: “Angie didn’t care.”
Was she surprised that the press were so harsh?
“I’m not supposed to say anything about that,” she said, looking out
at the audience coyly. “But I will say that I was. People found reasons
that going through my trash and printing it was an okay thing to do.
They found a way to justify that. And they have to live with that.”
Among the leaks was detailed payment information that showed women were paid less than men:
“I’ve paid [Jennifer Lawrence] a lot more money since then, I promise
you. … Here’s the problem: I run a business. People want to work for
less money, I pay them less money. … Women shouldn’t work for less
money. They should know what they’re worth. Women shouldn’t take less.
‘Stop, you don’t need the job that bad.'”
She said she’s learned a lot from the hack about how to relate to people.
“You should always say exactly what you think directly to people all the time,” she said. “In the moment, the first time.”
Brown said this might be hard to do given how vulnerable Hollywood stars can be.
Pascal unleashed a little of the energy found in those emails.
“They’re bottomless pits of need. You’ve never seen anything like
it,” she said, adding sarcastically: “They are so great. They’re this
magical thing that no one else can be. They’re filled with the need to
be loved … but that’s because they’re magical.”
Amy Pascal is opening up about her departure from her Sony post.
Pascal, who is stepping down as Sony's co-chairman following the devastating hack on the studio, spoke to journalist Tina Brown at the Women in the World conference Wednesday in San Francisco, where she said she wasn't sure she belonged at the event.
"All the women here are doing incredible things in this world — all I did was get fired," Pascal said, according to Recode.
It should be noted that official statements about her departure from
the Sony gig had implied a mutual parting of ways, rather than a firing.
"Everyone knows everything about me," Pascal continued. "What am I
doing here?" Brown replied by saying, "None of us can imagine ..." and
Pascal cut her off with, "No, you cannot."
Brown asked Pascal how she felt when she first realized her emails
would be made public. "I ran this company, and I had to worry about
everybody who was really scared … People were really scared … But
nagging in the back of my mind, I kept calling [IT] and being like,
‘They don’t have our emails, tell me they don’t have our emails,' " she
said. "But then they did. That was a bad moment. And you know what you
write in emails."
When asked about being called a racist for her messages about Barack Obama, Pascal said: "It was horrible. That was horrible." Pascal and Scott Rudin had joked in an email chain about Obama's supposed taste in movies.
Some of Pascal's email threads were scrutinized for harsh words about
her showbiz colleagues, particularly messages between Pascal and Rudin,
but according to Pascal, that's the way the industry operates.
"Everybody understood because we all live in this weird thing called
Hollywood,” she said. “If we all actually were nice, it wouldn’t work."
Pascal said that Angelina Jolie "didn't care" that Rudin referred to her in a leaked email as a "minimally talented spoiled brat."
However, Pascal criticized the press for reporting on the contents of
her leaked messages. "People found reasons that going through my trash
and printing it was an OK thing to do," said Pascal, who will work as a
producer on several of Sony's biggest projects. "They found a way to
justify that. And they have to live with that."
Brown asked about the revelation from leaked Sony documents that female stars such as Jennifer Lawrence
earned less from the studio than their male counterparts. "I’ve paid
[Jennifer Lawrence] a lot more money since then, I promise you," said
Pascal. "Here’s the problem: I run a business. People want to work for
less money, I pay them less money … Women shouldn't work for less money.
They should know what they’re worth. Women shouldn’t take less. ‘Stop,
you don’t need the job that bad.' "
As for what she has learned from the experience, Pascal said: "You
should always say exactly what you think directly to people all the
time." She added that this is hard to do with celebrities, as they are
"bottomless pits of need."
Tuesday, February 10, 2015
Amy Pascal to work on Sony’s Spider-Man team; also, on "Cleopatra" with Angelina Jolie http://t.co/xmzt0s6Hg4
— NYT Business (@nytimesbusiness) February 10, 2015
Amy Pascal Keeps Sony’s Marquee Projects in Portfolio, Now as a Producer
LOS ANGELES — Amy Pascal may be giving up the Sony Pictures crown, but she’s keeping the jewels.
In
a deal announced late Monday, Ms. Pascal will join the producing team
for Sony’s most important film property — the Spider-Man series — when she steps down as the chairwoman of the studio’s movie operation in May. Landing the blockbuster franchise ranks her alongside Hollywood’s most prominent producers.
Ms.
Pascal is also expected to join the producing team of the studio’s
“Ghostbusters” remake, according to people briefed on her exit package
who spoke on the condition of anonymity. She is additionally expected to
tackle “Cleopatra,” an epic starring Angelina Jolie that has long
gestated at Sony; a project involving Dan Brown, the author of “The Da
Vinci Code” series; a “Little Women” adaptation; and a live-action
Barbie movie.
Over the longer term, Ms. Pascal is looking at Broadway projects that
include adaptations of “Tootsie,” “Groundhog Day” and “This Is It,” a
2009 Sony documentary that followed rehearsals for Michael Jackson’s
planned comeback concerts.
Sony
also said on Monday that Kevin Feige, the president of Marvel Studios,
which is owned by the Walt Disney Company, would join Ms. Pascal in
producing the next Spider-Man film – a type of insurance policy that the
series will regain its creative footing after mediocre results for “The
Amazing Spider-Man 2” last year. As yet untitled, the movie will be
released in July 2017. Andrew Garfield, who has played the central
character in the last two installments and who has expressed an interest
in moving on, will not return.
Avi
Arad and Matthew Tolmach, who were producers of the last two Spider-Man
films, will transition to lesser roles on the next Spider-Man movie.
Both men, however, will remain fully involved with Sony’s other
Spider-Man projects, including the villain-focused spinoff “The Sinister
Six.”
Together,
the deals with Ms. Pascal and Marvel signify a structural transition at
Sony, which was struggling with uneven box-office results long before
it suffered a devastating cyberattack in November. Like other studios,
Sony will become less an operation run by an auteur chief — for the last
18 years, Ms. Pascal — and more a federation of powerful filmmaking
arms competing for coveted release dates.
Whoever
succeeds Ms. Pascal will have to play broker among the fiefs. Ms.
Pascal, lured by the attractive new deal and drained by the pressures
and embarrasment of the hacking crisis, announced her departure last week. She declined to comment.
Thomas
E. Rothman, the former chief executive of Fox Filmed Entertainment, is
now in charge of Sony’s rejuvenated TriStar division. Jeff Robinov
recently brought his Studio 8, financed by China’s Fosun Group, to Sony
after leaving his post as the top movie executive at Warner Bros.
Another Sony division dedicated to lower-budget urban comedies and
horror films, Screen Gems, is run by Clint Culpepper.
Mr.
Rothman and Mr. Robinov have only just started to assemble what are
expected to be dozens of films that, alongside the contributions of Ms.
Pascal, will shape Sony’s creative signature through much of the next
decade. Mr. Rothman and Mr. Robinov will work together on one early
film, Ang Lee’s “Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk,” a story of an Iraq
war veteran.
Ms.
Pascal’s presence on so many films will inevitably crowd producers who
might otherwise have had her slot. While there is a long history in
Hollywood of departing studio chiefs cherry-picking producing projects,
the extremely wide latitude being given to Ms. Pascal has already
started some grumbling in the film industry’s producing ranks.
In
addition to Spider-Man, Ms. Pascal is moving toward some film projects
with messy histories. Infighting over “Cleopatra” became public in
December, when private emails stolen by hackers and published online
revealed a vitriolic exchange between Ms. Pascal and the producer Scott Rudin over Ms. Jolie’s involvement.
“Barbie”
has also encountered difficulties. Sony acquired rights to the Mattel
doll after Universal tried, and failed, to find a way to match the
perfectly pert Barbie persona to a film with contemporary sensibilities.
Walter Parkes and Laurie MacDonald, a seasoned producing team, were
hired to film a version that was once expected to begin production last year, but did not.
Among
her other planned film projects, “Little Women” has been a signature
property for Ms. Pascal. Early in her career at Sony, when she was a
production vice president, she shepherded a 1994 version to theaters,
helping to establish her reputation for having a strong interest in
women’s films and ambitions that went beyond pop moviemaking.
Ms.
Pascal’s exit deal, among the richest in Hollywood history, will
guarantee her income of $30 million to $40 million over four years,
according to people briefed on its terms. Her package also includes a
percentage of profits on movies she produces and roughly $9 million
annually for office costs and discretionary acquisition of scripts.
The
agreement ranks in opulence with the farewell 20th Century Fox package
given to Peter Chernin when he left as president of the News Corporation
in 2009. Among the prime Fox properties Mr. Chernin joined as a
producer was the reimagined “Planet of the Apes” series, which went on
to generate more than $1 billion at the worldwide box office.
Spider-Man
is a Marvel character, but Marvel sold Sony the movie rights in 1999
and has had almost no involvement since. As part of the agreement with
Marvel announced on Monday, Marvel can include the Spider-Man character
in its own movies — starting, perhaps, with “Captain America: Civil
War,” which will arrive in May 2016.
Sony will continue to finance, distribute, own and have final creative control of the stand-alone Spider-Man films.
The
Spider-Man series came to Sony when Ms. Pascal helped connect the
project with Laura Ziskin, a friend who resigned as president of Fox
2000 in 2009 and quickly set up shop as a producer at Sony. With the
immense success of “Spider-Man,” which had about $822 million in
worldwide ticket sales after its release in 2002, Ms. Ziskin helped
reinvigorate the studio. (She died of breast cancer in 2011.)
Two
more sequels, both starring Tobey Maguire as the title character,
delivered mammoth ticket sales. But Sony’s last outing with Spider-Man —
its original deal with Marvel requires the films to keep coming — did
not perform as well as its predecessors, taking in about $706 million at
the global box office in 2014.
While
Sony has struggled to keep Spider-Man vibrant, Mr. Feige has delivered
hits like “Guardians of the Galaxy” and “Captain America: The Winter
Soldier.”
“We
always want to collaborate with the best and most successful filmmakers
to grow our franchises,” Michael Lynton, Sony’s chief executive, said
in a statement.
Friday, February 6, 2015
Random Thoughts
NYTimes reports that Amy Pascal will have a "four-year production deal that will involve
her making some of Sony’s biggest planned films." The all-female Ghostbusters remake is evidently one of them, but there's also a good chance that Cleopatra, a long-time passion project of hers that's finally inching closer to production, could be another. It will be interesting to see if Pascal takes over from Scott Rudin or if Rudin manages to stay in the picture as a co-producer.
LOS
ANGELES — Amy Pascal, an old-style studio chief who was undercut by
new Hollywood economics and bruised by the airing of private emails in a
devastating cyberattack, said on Thursday that she would resign her
post as the top film executive at Sony Pictures Entertainment.
Ms.
Pascal had been in contract renewal talks for months, well before
hackers in December made available private correspondence in which she
made denigrating remarks about President Obama’s presumed preference for
black-themed movies.
She
profusely apologized, and top studio executives stood behind her in the
aftermath. But the pressures of the hacking crisis, coupled with
structural changes at the studio, made alternatives to renewing her
contract more attractive.
She
will leave her positions as co-chairwoman of Sony Pictures
Entertainment and chairwoman of Sony’s motion picture group in May, the
studio said, and accept a four-year production deal that will involve
her making some of Sony’s biggest planned films.
For
the moment, her resignation consolidates power over Sony’s film
operation under Michael Lynton, chief executive of Sony Entertainment.
He is expected to decide in the next few months whether any successor
will precisely match Ms. Pascal’s role, or will function differently at a
studio that has been cutting costs and shifting focus toward both
television and global crowd pleasers driven by special effects.
She
was neither pushed to leave nor begged to stay, and Ms. Pascal’s
decision to move on crystallized over the last two weeks, said people
briefed on the matter, as Sony offered the producing deal as an option.
She also came to a realization, perhaps long overdue, that her romantic
notion of the movie industry — built around stars and stories — no
longer fit with new realities.
Ms.
Pascal also went through a draining month of turmoil within Sony as
studio leaders struggled to cope with a hacking that crippled the
company’s computers and exposed personal data about its employees. Known
to be a fiery counterpart to the more reserved Mr. Lynton, Ms. Pascal
was particularly distressed by the assault, exhibiting both anger and
tearful regret before Sony employees.
Often
identified as the film industry’s top female executive, Ms. Pascal is
the only senior Sony manager to leave her position since the hacking
attack. Though she received a lucrative and prestigious next job, her
departure may invite further scrutiny of an industry often criticized
for a dearth of women in leading positions.
Ms.
Pascal, 56, has been with Sony continuously since 1996, when she became
president of its Columbia Pictures unit after serving as production
president of Turner Pictures. Before joining Turner, she had worked at
Sony since 1988.
“I
have spent almost my entire professional life at Sony Pictures, and I
am energized to be starting this new chapter based at the company I call
home,” she said in a statement. Mr. Lynton and Ms. Pascal declined to
elaborate on the announcement.
Stephen
G. Ujlaki, dean of the film school at Loyola Marymount University,
noted that Ms. Pascal had proved herself a nimble survivor over the
years. “She did a great pivot early on,” he said, adding that Ms. Pascal
had once focused on women’s films but turned sharply toward popular
hits like the “Spider-Man” series as she chased bigger audiences.
While
some details are unclear, the broad terms of her new deal are
breathtaking. Several people briefed on Ms. Pascal’s exit said it
involved a four-year guarantee of $30 million to $40 million. Her
package additionally includes a percentage of profits on movies she
produces and millions of dollars for annual office costs and
discretionary acquisition of scripts.
In
a drive to enhance profitability, Mr. Lynton has been cutting staff and
shuffling executives, squeezing Ms. Pascal, who for years had governed
Sony’s film unit without serious challenge. He recently promoted Doug
Belgrad to the presidency of Sony’s film operation — in effect giving
Mr. Lynton a lieutenant with film expertise, should he choose to
supervise filmmaking without Ms. Pascal.
Ms.
Pascal joined Mr. Lynton in mentoring executives who may now stand in
line for her duties, including the former DreamWorks executive Michael
De Luca; Thomas E. Rothman, the former chief executive of Fox Filmed
Entertainment who is now in charge of Sony’s TriStar division; and the former Warner studio chief Jeff Robinov, who came to Sony as a producer with substantial outside funding.
At
the same time, she was pressed by strategic changes that came with the
retirement of a strong supporter, Howard Stringer, as the chief
executive of Sony Corporation. With Mr. Stringer’s exit, the studio
tightened costs and looked to focus even more heavily on the franchise
and fantasy films that have sustained competitors like Warner and
Disney.
Then
in November came the devastating hacking attack that over the course of
several weeks made public huge amounts of data and information about
Sony and its employees, including personal emails.
Of
those, Ms. Pascal’s were the most embarrassing, including a disparaging
back-and-forth with the producer Scott Rudin about Angelina Jolie and a
Steve Jobs biopic, and another exchange with Mr. Rudin about Mr.
Obama’s supposed movie preferences.
Both
exchanges became fodder for gossip sites, trade publications and
mainstream news organizations, and for a time made Ms. Pascal the public
face of a company dealing with a humiliating crisis.
Eventually,
North Korea was identified by the United States government as having
precipitated the attack, in an attempt to stop the release of Sony’s
provocative comedy “The Interview,” which lampooned the North’s leader,
Kim Jong-un. Through it all, Ms. Pascal pushed for the movie to be
released.
In
fact, “The Interview,” which featured one of her favorite stars, Seth
Rogen, was of a piece with her penchant for ambitious and inventive
movies that traded on relationships with stars and filmmakers like Will
Smith, Adam McKay and Adam Sandler. When those stars and moviemakers
were hot, so was Ms. Pascal.
In
2006, Sony topped the domestic box office, with hits like Mr. Sandler’s
“Click.” In 2012, Sony was on top again, with matching blockbusters
from its two principal film franchises: “The Amazing Spider-Man,” and
“Skyfall,” from a James Bond series that it shared with
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
But
Sony faltered when Ms. Pascal’s favorites slipped. In 2013, the studio
ranked fourth at the domestic box office, and suffered a particular
embarrassment as Mr. Smith, the most reliable star in its stable, took
in just $60.5 million in domestic ticket sales with “After Earth,” an
expensive science-fiction thriller.
Last
year was again wobbly, thanks to the relatively soft performance of
“The Amazing Spider-Man 2,” which underperformed its predecessors.
For
more than a year, talk in Hollywood buzzed with speculation about the
fate of Ms. Pascal, whose output has included Oscar contenders like “The
Social Network” and “Zero Dark Thirty,” and who is popular with
writers, directors, stars and their agents.
But she has been under pressure to spend less, make fewer films and deliver more consistently at the box office.
The
talk reached fever pitch in 2013, when the investor Daniel S. Loeb took
an investment stake in the Sony Corporation, and began pressing, among
other positions, for an overhaul of its film operation.
While
Mr. Loeb eventually backed off, Mr. Lynton joined Ms. Pascal in a
retooling that eventually saw the departure of executives including the
studio’s vice chairman Jeff Blake, who had overseen the marketing and
distribution of films.
A version of this article appears in print on February 6, 2015, on page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: Pascal Lands in Sony’s Outbox.
Sony Pictures Entertainment today announced that Amy Pascal, Co-Chairman of SPE and Chairman of the Motion Picture Group, will launch a major new production venture at the studio. Pascal will transition to the new venture in May 2015.
Ms. Pascal who joined Columbia Pictures in 1988, said that after several decades as a senior executive at Sony Pictures, she had decided to launch her own company that would focus on movies, television and theater. Details of Ms. Pascal’s film venture will be announced shortly.
“I have spent almost my entire professional life at Sony Pictures and I am energized to be starting this new chapter based at the company I call home,” said Pascal. “I have always wanted to be a producer. Michael and I have been talking about this transition for quite some time and I am grateful to him for giving me the opportunity to pursue my long-held dream and for providing unparalleled support. As the slate for the next 2 years has come together, it felt like the right time to transition into this new role. I am so grateful to my team, some of whom I have worked with for the last 20 years and others who have joined more recently. I am leaving the studio in great hands. I am so proud of what we have all done together and I look forward to a whole lot more.”
As part of a four-year agreement, SPE will finance Ms. Pascal’s venture and retain all distribution rights worldwide to films financed. The venture will be located at the Sony Pictures lot in Culver City.
“Amy’s creativity, drive, and bold choices helped define SPE as a studio where talented individuals could take chances and push boundaries in order to deliver outstanding entertainment,” said Michael Lynton, CEO of Sony Entertainment. “The studio’s legacy is due in large part to Amy’s passion for storytelling and love of this industry. I am delighted that Amy will be continuing her association with SPE through this new venture, which capitalizes on her extraordinary talents. In recent months, SPE faced some unprecedented challenges, and I am grateful for Amy’s resilience and grace during this period. Amy has been a great partner to me in heading the studio and I am looking forward to a continued close working relationship with her in her new role on the lot.
“Amy has had a truly extraordinary career,” said Kazuo Hirai, President and CEO of Sony Corporation. “In her years at Sony Pictures, Amy worked with some of the best talent in the film industry to create many of our studio’s most beloved and successful films. I want to thank her for her years of dedication and I am pleased that she will continue to work closely with SPE in her new venture.”
Since Pascal has led the studio, SPE has amassed over $46 billion in global theatrical box office, 315 academy award nominations, 212 golden globe nominations and 115 number one openings.
Some of the movies under Pascal’s stewardship include:
Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace, Skyfall, The Da Vinci Code, the Spider-man film series, Men in Black, To Die For, Ali, Charlie’s Angels, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, Hancock, Michael Jackson’s This Is it, Awakenings, A League of Their Own, Hitch, Stuart Little, Girl Interrupted, Adaptation, 2012, Bad Teacher, Easy A, Superbad, District 9, Zombieland, Pursuit of Happyness, This is the End, Pineapple Express, Stepbrothers, Talladega Nights, 21 Jump Street, Salt, Closer, Something’s Gotta Give, Eat Pray Love, 50 First Dates, You Don’t Mess with the Zohan, Equalizer, Fury, Big Fish, A Knight’s Tale, Memoirs of a Geisha, The Ides of March, Karate Kid, Big Daddy, The Remains of the Day, Little Women, Sense and Sensibility, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Captain Phillips, Moneyball, American Hustle, Zero Dark Thirty, Groundhog Day, The Social Network and The Interview.
Ms. Pascal got her first job by answering an ad in the Hollywood Reporter. She worked as a secretary answering phones for the legendary BBC producer Tony Garnett.
Ms. Pascal is the first woman since Mary Pickford to serve as a Governor of the Executive Branch at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
the wrap
Amy Pascal’s Replacement Faces Daunting Challenge at Sony Pictures
The future is uncertain for co-chair Michael Lynton, an aging Spider-Man, Angelina Jolie’s “Cleopatra” and a potential spinoff
In the wake of Amy Pascal’s exit Thursday, Hollywood and Wall Street focused on the fates of her Sony Pictures Entertainment co-chair Michael Lynton, an aging Spider-Man and Angelina Jolie’s remake of “Cleopatra.”
What was next for them, or who would be named as Pascal’s replacement, wasn’t clear to industry insiders and analysts. But they were certain that the job will be a tremendous challenge for whoever steps in.
“They’re going to be playing catch-up to the other studios for years, because they don’t have a viable signature franchise and just about everybody else does,” said an executive at a rival film studio.
Most insiders are convinced that Lynton will need someone strong to step in as he digs the studio out from the hacking and subsequent leaked emails and business plans, and that Pascal will be productive in her new role as a producer. But several questioned whether Lynton had protected himself with Pascal’s departure and soft landing as a producer on the lot.
“The person responsible for this at end of day is Michael Lynton,” said a knowledgeable Hollywood executive. “When the CEO of any company has this kind of breach, he should take the fall. So the deal here is, ‘You take the fall Amy, and we’ll give you a producer deal.’ It’s all about protection.”
Whether Sony Corp.’s leader Kazuo Hirai and its board will stick with Lynton in the months to come remains to be seen. But if he does stay, his task looks tougher than ever.
The movie studio had a solid financial performance in 2014, ranking ahead of Universal and Paramount in terms of market share for the year. But last summer’s performance of “The Amazing Spider-Man 2” made clear that the franchise’s best days were behind it. It didn’t come close to $1 billion at the global box office, topping out with $709 million, and it underwhelmed domestically with a franchise-low of $202 million.
That left Sony searching for a replacement, even as rivals Disney and Fox were expanding their relationships with powerhouse Marvel Entertainment, Warner Bros. and DC Comics were building on their partnership and all were setting tentpole strategies for years ahead. Sony’s answer so far has been “Sinister Six,” a 2016 spin-off based on baddies that Spidey has faced in the comics.
The “Cleopatra” questions are the direct result of the emails between Scott Rudin and Pascal that were leaked by the hackers, in which the prolific producer called Jolie a “minimally talented spoiled brat.” That makes it a good bet that the actress, who directed last year’s “Unbroken” for Universal, will take the remake to another studio.
Wall Street shrugged at Pascal’s exit, and paid more attention to a rosy forecast issued Wednesday in Tokyo that lifted the stock. But if Sony can resuscitate Spider-Man, investors will care.
“That might do it,” said analyst Hal Vogel, who heads Vogel Capital Management, “but what would get everyone to really pay attention would be a spinoff.”
The idea of taking the film unit and possibly grouping it with Sony’s music division for a public offering isn’t new. Activist investor Daniel Loeb pushed the idea in 2012 after the studio suffered a string of misfires including big-budget bombs “After Earth” and “White House Down.”
“It was a good idea then and it is now, at least for the next three or four months,” he said. “After that, the volatility of the market is going to make it impossible.”
But Sony Corp. has historically backed its U.S. entertainment unit, and would in the near future, said Brian Wieser, senior analyst at Pivotal Research Group.
“Institutionally, they seem devoted to it,” Wieser said. “They’ve always gone to extensive pains to integrate as much as humanly possible. I’m sure if the right place came along, as CBS did a few years ago, they’d have to acknowledge it — but no transaction would ever take place this close to Pascal leaving.”
When I've interviewed Amy Pascal, she's shown a wry sense of humor about the way studio heads are discussed in print. Probably handy today.
— Mark Harris (@MarkHarrisNYC) February 6, 2015
From the moment a series of racially insensitive jokes about President Barack Obama and her controversial back-and-forth leaked emails about A-list actors and talent became public, Amy Pascal was widely perceived as a dead executive walking.
Fairly or not, the Sony Pictures studio chief has become a corporate cautionary tale for the digital age. On Thursday, it was announced that Pascal was exiting her perch of more than a decade as gracefully as could be expected, landing a production deal at Sony with the promise of a four-year commitment to back a mixture of critically and commercially oriented projects.
But, in her new role, Pascal still has some fence mending ahead of her.
“Her relationships and her effectiveness in dealing with talent had been compromised,” said Hal Vogel, a media analyst. “It’s a healthy move for her and the studio. It’s the kind of thing that requires a shift in leadership and an opportunity to change direction and put all of this behind them.”
Pascal’s replacement at the studio will likely come from within Sony’s current ranks, according to individuals with knowledge of the situation. Among the contenders, TriStar chief and former Fox Filmed Entertainment Chairman and CEO Tom Rothman has run a major film studio and Sony Production President Michael De Luca has deep relationships with talent, but Columbia Pictures President Doug Belgrad likely has the inside edge. He’s popular on the Culver City lot and has a firm grasp of finances.
As for Pascal, she will remain in place throughout May and will help with the transition. Industry observers and analysts predict that the new production company offers Pascal a chance to restore her damaged brand as a creatively minded executive with a passion for film that’s rare in bottom-line oriented Hollywood.
Dave Logan, author of the book “Tribal Leadership” who teaches leadership at USC’s Marshall School of Business, thinks that Pascal can repair her reputation if she re-emerges as an apologetic figure who has learned from her mistakes. “I actually think if she plays this right, she’s going to come out from it at least as strong,” Logan says, adding that people love a comeback story. “…if she publicly apologizes and spends time out of the spotlight and appears to have changed. She’ll become one of those figures seen as having depth. I don’t think it’s going to happen right away. But if she approaches it the right way, this can turn into an important learning moment, not a career-ending moment.”
Even before the hack, Pascal weathered rough waters as Sony struggled with profits. After the studio suffered from 2013 box office bombs “After Earth” and “White House Down,” hedge fund manager Daniel Loeb wrote a public letter advocating that Sony Entertainment be spun-off from its parent company. (Loeb’s hedge fund, Third Point, invests in Variety.)
The public denouncement set off widespread panic and $100 million in cost-cutting — among the casualties, reportedly, was a personal assistant for Pascal who made $250,000 annually. Pascal had been telling her staff that she needed “The Amazing Spider-Man 2″ to gross $1 billion to keep her job. The May 2014 tentpole release topped out at $709 million worldwide, and the bad buzz from an “Annie” reboot prompted rumors that Pascal could be pushed out after the holidays.
But the Sony hack turned the business leader into an unwitting celebrity. She suddenly felt the glare of tabloid reporters and TMZ paparazzi, with websites dredging up her salty conversations with producer Scott Rudin about Angelina Jolie and President Obama.
The ordeal that Pascal and Sony went through after leaks of stolen email exchanges, budget information and financial details ordered by North Korea in retaliation for the studio’s Kim Jong-un assassination comedy, “The Interview,” cost the studio $15 million “in investigation and remediation costs,” according to Sony’s earnings report on Wednesday, although it’s expected to have wider ramifications across the corporate landscape.
Pascal’s most shortsighted move, analysts claim, is not just that she participated in jokes about the President preferring movies like “The Butler” and “Twelve Years a Slave,” or that she shared her unvarnished opinions of Harvey Weinstein and Leonardo DiCaprio. It’s that she did it on company email instead of her own private address.
“There is no such thing as a reasonable supposition of privacy,” said Brian Solis, a digital analyst at the research and advisory firm Altimeter Group. “Privacy isn’t what it used to be and in an era of Anonymous and other factions like it, it’s easy to hack into something and expose skeletons in everyone’s closet.”
In a recent Vanity Fair story on the Sony hack fallout, Pascal was described as an obsessive e-mailer. However, she has tempered her enthusiasm for electronic communication. The magazine noted that she now uses four different devices to communicate, and has changed her email addresses and passwords.
The fact that Pascal was widely perceived to be vulnerable during the last months of her reign obscures the fact that she achieved remarkable longevity, having been president of the studio since 1996 and co-chairman since 2006.
“Every studio head is quite aware of the fact that they are fungible,” said Howard Suber, professor of film history at UCLA. “She became the issue. The films are supposed to be the issue and anything that distracts from that, you’re going to have people say, ‘do we really need this person?'”
Pascal’s relationships with talent may be strained and the 56 year-old exec has been on an apology tour of late with people who were maligned in her leaked emails and those of her top lieutenants. Yet, she still has an enviable contact list and is a favorite of top film business players such as George Clooney, Aaron Sorkin and CAA managing director Bryan Lourd, all of whom rose to her defense during the hacking fallout. Insiders say that if she’s to survive as an important Hollywood figure, it will be thanks to these relationships.
Even now, many filmmakers and producers aren’t shy about singing Pascal’s praises. Kenny Ortega, who directed the 2009 Michael Jackson documentary “This Is It,” said Pascal inspires loyalty because of how she nurtures filmmakers. In his case, that meant bolstering him in the wake of the King of Pop’s unexpected death months prior to “This Is It’s” release.
“She pushed me to tell the story,” Ortega said. “I was traumatized and going through a lot of grief at the time. Basically, she said, ‘You need to step out of your own way. You need to find objectivity or don’t do it.’ And at the end of the day, she let me make my movie. She had strong ideas, but at the end of the day, she trusted that I knew the story.”
Ortega says that Pascal has tried to show remorse for what happened. “I think we all make mistakes,” Ortega said. “I think she knows that she blew it with regard to language and correspondence. I think she came out and said, ‘Don’t let this define me.’ We should give her a shot. She’s an extremely talented and gifted woman who has proven herself in the industry.”
Amy Pascal’s departure as co-chairman of Sony Pictures Entertainment and chairman of its motion picture group leaves Hollywood unsettled over the fate of the studio’s upcoming slate.
The biggest questions at Sony surround the Spider-Man franchise, sequels to the “Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” and the “Cleopatra” project.
It could take several months at the minimum before the post-Pascal priorities come into focus. And of course much depends on who her successor turns out to be. If Pascal’s top lieutenant, SPE Motion Picture Group president Doug Belgrad, gets the gig as many expect, there could be minimal changes to the line-up.
Pascal will remain in place through May, at which point she will segue to a producing deal at Sony. Besides Belgrad, other possible replacements from within are former Fox studio chief Tom Rothman, who runs TriStar Pictures; and Columbia Pictures Production President Michael De Luca, who ran New Line during the 1990s.
It’s probable that Sony Pictures Chairman-CEO Michael Lynton will be averse to tinkering with projects being developed by Rothman and Jeff Robinov’s Studio 8.
The biggest decision for Lynton and Pascal’s successor will be how to handle the Spider-Man franchise. “The Amazing Spider-Man 2″ did respectable business last summer but was hardly the $1 billion blockbuster that Pascal had told folks that she needed it to be.
“Spider-Man” remains a cash cow but the plans for expanding the Spidey universe through villain spin-offs and the next installment may be reexamined — since Pascal played the leading role pursuing that path. A new regime may take a stronger look at returning to the negotiation table with Marvel Studios over Spidey’s rights.
Sony’s last move on that front came in July during Comic-Con when the studio dated spin-off “Sinister Six” for Nov. 11, 2016 as the next tentpole in its key property — while moving back “The Amazing Spider-Man 3″ two years to 2018. The idea of bringing in villains is aimed at making Sony a stronger competitor against the likes of Disney/Marvel’s “Avengers” and Warner Bros.’ “Justice League” superheroes in the coming years.
The studio has also slated “Uncharted” for June 10, 2016 — the date previously held by “The Amazing Spider-Man 3” with Charles Roven and former Marvel Studios chief Avi Arad producing. Based on the PlayStation videogame series, it follows the adventures of treasure hunter Nathan Drake, signaling Sony’s desire to develop an Indiana Jones-style franchise.
The uncertainty will also extend to Sony’s relationship with powerhouse producerScott Rudin. The Sony hack revealed a several nasty emails between Pascal and Rudin; additionally, Pascal decided to put Rudin’s Steve Jobs biopic into turnaround in November, resulting in Universal quickly picking up the project.
Still, Pascal was still Rudin’s biggest champion at the studio and a big reason he signed a first look deal with the studio in 2011. The most prominent of his projects include sequels to 2011’s “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo” — “The Girl Who Played with Fire” and “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest.”
“Dragon Tattoo” was a critical success and performed respectably at the worldwide box office with $230 million but no one has been in any hurry to make the next two installments in the series. Pascal’s departure leaves the continuation of that series very much in doubt.
Rudin is also developing a “Little House on the Prairie” movie but the project does not appear to have gained much traction. That said, Pascal could wind up teaming with Rudin to produce the film once she’s launched her own production company at the studio.
“Cleopatra” also remains a big question mark as the big budget biopic was probably Pascal’s biggest passion project at Sony. With Angelina Jolie seemingly irked about the leaked emails in which Rudin derided her and Pascal being the film’s biggest supporter, the chances of this movie moving elsewhere seems highly likely.
“Salt 2,” which is not a Rudin project, may also have a murky future with Jolie due to her feeling jilted by the emails.
In terms of projects on the franchise side, “Ghostbusters” and “21 Jump Street” seem safe, but the “Men in Black” series may either be reconsidered or completely abandoned, especially following the much-derided leaked email that suggested creating a spinoff that would combine the “Jump Street” movies with “Men in Black.” Additionally, “Men In Black 3″ was so costly and so panned by critics that the new regime may take a pass on this series altogether.
By Gregory Ellwood @HitFixGregory| Thursday, Feb 5, 2015 3:06 PM
The news that Amy Pascal will step down as chairwoman of Sony Pictures is not shocking. In fact, it was expected.* This is how Hollywood works. You spend years running a studio or acting as president of production and then something goes wrong and you segue to a “producing” deal. That’s the way it’s been for almost 30 years and that’s the way it will be for the foreseeable future. Surviving any controversy, even one outside of your own control, is simply impossible.
*Although forgive our surprise this wasn’t left to a late Friday afternoon announcement to quell reaction from the cable news talking heads.
Pascal’s fate was sealed when numerous E-mail conversations she was a part of were leaked after a massive security breach credited to North Korean hackers took place on Nov. 24. Her E-mail exchange with producer Scott Rudin about the President of the United States' film tastes created a media firestorm nationally, but the revelations about current and past projects arguably were more damaging. Private E-mails that ripped upcoming films such as Cameron Crowe’s “Aloha” and the creative fights over “Jobs” (now at Universal) and a “Cleopatra” remake with Angelina Jolie (now likely dead) made many top creatives hesitant to continue working with the studio or Pascal’s team. It didn’t help that her efforts to make up for the leaks, which included a conversation with Al Sharpton and a now iconic moment with Jolie at a Hollywood event, came across as PR blunders both inside and outside of the industry.
Things got worse when Sony mishandled the release of “The Interview” in theaters last month. After receiving threats from the hackers not to release the film, the studio and theater owners became involved in a he said/she said, which found the Seth Rogen and James Franco comedy pulled from theaters just days before its scheduled opening. This led to a rare moment of bipartisanship in Washington with President Obama saying the studio “made a mistake” and Republican lawmakers joining in pushing the industry to put the movie back in theaters. Sony changed their tune and found 581 mostly independent theaters to play the film on Christmas Day. Pascal’s co-chairman, Michael Lynton, took the brunt of this particular debacle, making appearances on news shows, standing by the studio’s original decision, but it was just another example of how the overall leadership of the Culver City powerhouse was failing. Now, Pascal, the more public face of the studio, is taking the fall for it all.*
*Why Lynton is not suffering the same fate is an excellent question.
The 56-year-old industry veteran had worked continuously for Sony since 1996, when she was named the studio’s President. In 2006, she was named co-chairman of the studio alongside Lynton. She had tremendous success helping shepherd the reboot of James Bond in “Casino Royale” and “Skyfall." There was a breakthrough run of Seth Rogen and Judd Apatow comedies including “Superbad” and “Pineapple Express." Will Ferrell became an established star with smashes such as “Step Brothers” and “Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby." Will Smith delivered hits such as “Hancock” and “The Pursuit of Happyness” and produced "The Karate Kid" remake staring his son, Jaden. And, for better or worse, there was a consistent run of “mostly” hit comedies from Adam Sandler.
Under Pascal's watch Clint Culpepper’s Screen Gems division knocked one profitable genre picture out of the park after another. And to balance out the less creative works, Pascal had refocused the studio on prestige pics, bringing Sony back into the awards season game. Before 2010’s nomination for “District 9,” the studio hadn’t landed a Best Picture nomination since the company’s art house division Sony Classics released “Capote” in 2005. The last time the big studio had a player in the Best Picture race was when “Jerry Maguire” was nominated in 1997. Since “District 9,” the studio has impressed with nominees such as “The Social Network,” “Moneyball,” “Zero Dark Thirty,” “American Hustle” and “Captain Phillips.”
It’s the creative failures along with the hack, however, that likely sealed Pascal’s fate. The studio’s “Spider-Man” reboot has turned into a creative disaster potentially damaging a superhero franchise that was once king of the box office of all superhero franchises. The modern day version of “Annie” earned worse reviews than the original 1982 movie adaptation (a cult classic now that wasn’t well liked at the time) and is nowhere near profitable. Outside of smaller franchises at Screen Gems such as “Underworld” and “Resident Evil,” big Sony hasn’t been able to generate the tentpole players their competitors thrive on outside of Bond (a partnership with MGM) and the aforementioned, sinking “Spider-Man.” Those are results that make stockholders nervous.
If 2014's mixed bag is one of the key reasons for her departure, it must be a tough pill for Pascal to swallow. The upcoming year features potential new blockbuster franchises in “Pixels” and “Goosebumps,” the return of 007 in “Spectre” and potential Oscar players in Robert Zemeckis’ “The Walk” and Will Smith’s “Concussion.” A new Robert Langdon thriller, “Inferno,” is set for 2016 and Paul Feig’s new “Ghostbusters” looks like it could be a monster. And yet, like other studio heads that have fallen before her, Pascal won’t get any real credit for their success.
There will be a lot of speculation as to who will replace Pascal in the coming days. Former 20th Century Fox co-chairman Tom Rothman is already running a reinvigorated Tri-Star Pictures at Sony and former New Line and DreamWorks president of production Michael De Luca seems like a strong candidate as well. Forgive us if we’re disheartened by the lack of female candidates to succeed her.
In an age where the diversity microscope is pointed at Hollywood more than ever, Pascal’s departure nearly finds every one of the world’s movie studios being run by men for the first time this century (Donna Langley at Universal saves it). Fifteen years ago, Stacey Snider was the chairman of Universal Pictures, Sherry Lansing was the co-chairman of Paramount Pictures,* Nina Jacobson was president of Walt Disney Pictures and Pascal was then president of Sony Pictures. Today, only Snider survives as co-chairman of 20th Century Fox, a position significantly junior to longstanding Chairman and CEO Jim Gianopulos.
*Full disclosure, I worked for Paramount during Lansing’s reign.
In a world where FOX is now co-run by Dana Walden and Nina Tassler is now the chairman of CBS, Jennifer Salke is NBC Entertainment president and Bonnie Hammer is chairman of NBCUniversal Cable, something’s not quite right in the movie industry, is it? But, hey, let’s ignore the obvious, right? At least Pascal’s departure means they’ll finally figure out what to do with Spidey, because for too many people on the inside and outside of the industry, that’s all that matters.
One of the most contentious chapters in movie-studio history came to an end today as embattled Sony Pictures head Amy Pascal stepped down, transitioning to a new role as a producer at the studio. Pascal had weathered brutally negative press in recent months as the massive Sony hack revealed a corporate culture in crisis: Each day last December seemed to bring a new damaging email exchange to the fore, whether it involved Pascal sparring with superproducer Scott Rudin about Angelina Jolie, blithely speculating about the president's taste in black films, or dithering about the future of the company's fading Spider-Man franchise. Still, there's more to Pascal's stepping down than just the leak.
Simply put, Sony had been in a bad place for a while, and this latest, greatest incident was the final punctuation mark. The shit really started hitting the fan for Pascal back in 2013, when the studio suffered through a summer season distinguished by twin bombs After Earth and White House Down. For everyone else, 2013 was a record-breaking year where three blockbusters grossed over $400 million domestically and nearly every studio had multiple franchise-spawning hits that passed the $200 million mark; meanwhile, Sony's biggest success was American Hustle, which made just $150 million — a terrific total for that particular film, but not exactly the sort of thing you want at the top of your earnings report. (The next two highest-grossing Sony movies that year were Grown-Ups 2and Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2, both of which failed to make as much money as their predecessors.)
Sony's dramatic underperformance that year prompted billionaire Daniel Loeb — who has used his Third Point hedge fund to become a major investor at the studio — to repeatedly take Pascal and her co-chief Michael Lynton to task in the press, blasting the studio heads for their inability to produce new blockbuster franchises in a moviemaking climate that is now dominated by them. And while Sony ally George Clooney hit back at Loeb, calling him a "market manipulator" who would scare the studio into only producing tentpole properties, the investor did have a point: Sony's franchise-making heyday had long passed, and the studio was still yoked to movie stars and properties whose returns had been continuously dwindling, like Will Smith, Adam Sandler, Men in Black, and Spider-Man.
The sputtering of the Spider-Man franchise was a particular problem for Pascal, who couldn't seem to settle on a strong direction for the character. Sony recast the superhero for a 2012 reboot that failed to outgross Sam Raimi's three previous Spider-Man films, while last year's critically derided sequel The Amazing Spider-Man 2 was the franchise's lowest performer yet. That downward trajectory put Pascal into panic mode, prompting the studio to delay The Amazing Spider-Man 3 even as plans continued to expand Spider-Man's shrinking universe with spinoffs like the villain-centered Sinister Six. Even a potential deal that would loan Spider-Man out to the hugely successful Marvel Studios failed to come to fruition, as leaked emails revealed Pascal's continued indecision on all things Spidey.
Sony did have one bright spot last year — the 21 Jump Street franchise boomed with its second installment, which nearly outgrossed the studio's own The Amazing Spider-Man 2 — but Pascal remained on thin ice into the winter, when headlines were dominated by the studio's disastrous attempt to release The Interview and the continued damaging revelations from the email leak. Those would be difficult blows for any studio head to recover from, but they proved impossible to surmount for Pascal, who came into that imbroglio already hobbled. The primary tasks for her successor, then, will be twofold: He or she will have to continue restoring Sony's post-hack reputation while inevitably capitulating to the demand for bigger blockbusters that Pascal wasn't able to meet. At least the slate they'll inherit contains two bright spots: This November, Sony has the James Bond sequel Spectre on tap (which follows up 2012's Skyfall, the studio's biggest worldwide performer ever); and Paul Feig's highly anticipated Ghostbusters reboot will land July 22, 2016, a release date Pascal picked as one of her last orders of business.
