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So What Happened To Moneyball?
As many of you know, there was a movie version of the bestselling book, “Moneyball”, all set to go into production with Brad Pitt attached… and then suddenly… RIGHT before they were ready to yell “action”, the plug got pulled on the entire project and the film was completely shut down.
Christina Warrenwrote up a fantastic little run down on what happened… why things went off track and where things stand now with the project. I quote it in full here:
Two and a half weeks ago, Columbia Pictures shut-down the Steven Soderbergh helmed Moneyball, just days before it was to start production. Last week, Soderbergh formally bowed out of the project.
Since then, the explanations as to why the project was put into turnaround at the last-minute, especially with a big star like Brad Pitt have been fast and furious, with each side wanting to get their view across.
Trying to parse the entire situation is very (forgive the pun) “inside baseball.” That said, here is a brief summary of this summer’s hottest off-screen drama.
Initially, the explanation for the “Moneyball” axing was blamed on a script that had deviated from its original awesomeness. By all accounts, the original script by Steve Zaillian was great. Soderbergh’s rewrite, well, the consensus was “not so great.”
Sony’s Amy Pascal echoed this idea (while not directly calling Soderbergh’s script “bad”) in a softball interview with the LA Times:
“I’ve wanted to work with Steven forever, because he’s simply a great filmmaker,” Pascal told me today. “But the draft he turned in wasn’t at all what we’d signed up for. He wanted to make a dramatic reenactment of events with real people playing themselves. I’d still work with Steven in a minute, but in terms of this project, he wanted to do the film in a different way than we did.”
ScriptShadow then posted an e-mail from someone purportedly close to the project, which told Soderbergh’s side of the story. That blog entry was forced offline by the Sony lawyers (and other websites reprinting the e-mail were similarly threatened), but if you search Google for cache:http://scriptshadow.blogspot.com/2009/06/more-on-moneyball.html, you might be able to find it.
Regardless, Gawker got an e-mail with similar information, and as a policy, Gawker doesn’t cave to takedown threats. Essentially the Soderbergh side is, that the script everyone loved so much was inaccurate in ways that would cause both Major League Baseball and the real Billy Beane to refuse to sign-off on the film.
Lose the MLB and you might as well forget about trying to make a professional baseball picture. It’s probably also not a good idea to allege that a longtime married man is a skirt-chaser.
So Soderbergh made these changes, wanted to keep the story accurate, and according to the original ScriptShadow e-mail and Gawker, Sony was well aware of these changes in advance.
The Hot Blog’s David Poland has a nice take on the situation, that argues many of the same points as the Gawker and ScriptShadow tip letters, but also says,
“Movies die every day. Feelings and careers are hurt. (Over 200 people were put out of work unexpectedly by this cancellation.) But the cheap slaps at Soderbergh are way over the top and as unnecessary as slapping down someone you just fired with gossipy attacks (even if accurate), adding insult to injury. Hollywood treats artists like shit because of money and ego. But there is no excuse for those of us who cover the industry to be equally venal.”
Now that the dust has settled, the proverbial post-game analysis has started, including an interesting piece in The Daily Beast that calls into question why Sony would cancel a project with Pitt (despite already spending $10 million), only to sign a production deal with other frequent Soderbergh collaborator George Clooney.
It’s an interesting question, especially in-light of how the two actor’s projects stack up financially. I ultimately think the numbers don’t quite add-up for “Moneyball” to be, about money. As Poland says, “movies die every day.”
After reading through the deluge of “Moneyball” commentary, I’m starting to think that THIS saga might make a better movie than “Moneyball” would have ever been.
Or at the very least, one heck of a book!
Christina Warren can be found blogging at The Unofficial Apple Weblog and Flickcast
Is the book worth reading? I guess i should ask is the book worth reading if you dont care for baseball?
As a baseball fan, I enjoyed “Moneyball” immensely. With that said, however, I never could understand why someone would want to make it into a movie. The book is mostly about the development of modern baseball analysis, and the A’s and Billy Beane (at the time of the book) were the quintessential example of it.
I don’t know which side of the story to believe, but I lean toward the studio’s side. I read a Vanity Fair article where the author had reviewed both scripts, and, apparently, Soderbergh’s was more of an art film and less appealing to the average movie going audience.
There is a degree of creative license when making a “true life” story. One can take too much creative license, but also can be too accurate to the point where the movie is boring.
Alfred Hithcock once said “Movies are like life, but with the dull parts taken out.” Maybe, just maybe, Soderbergh put the “dull” parts back in.
From Variety:
Sony is still game on making the baseball pic “Moneyball,” tapping Aaron Sorkin to polish an early script by Steve Zaillian.
Scott Rudin has also stepped up to the plate to co-produce the Columbia Pictures drama, a move that should help keep Brad Pitt attached as its star after Steven Soderbergh walked last month as the pic’s director.
Project is an adaptation of Michael Lewis’ nonfiction bestseller “Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game,” and is quickly reteaming the same creatives behind “The Social Network,” which revolves around the formation of Facebook.
Rudin and Michael DeLuca, based on the Sony lot, recently set up that pic, penned by Sorkin at the studio for David Fincher to helm.
Sony was set to start production on “Moneyball” last month in Phoenix, but studio topper Amy Pascal wound up pulling the plug on the pic just days before lensing was to begin when Soderbergh turned in a new version of the script the studio didn’t want to make.
Pic was put into limited turnaround at the time, giving other studios the chance to pick it up.
But Sony is keeping hold of the project, and Sorkin’s changes will be more in line with the version the studio favored all along, with the focus on Oakland A’s general manager Billy Beane, who assembled a contending baseball club on a shoestring budget by employing a sophisticated computer-based analysis to draft players.
Soderbergh’s draft and production plans took a more documentary approach that the studio felt wouldn’t cross over commercially with moviegoers.
Sorkin is expected to be completed with his revamp by August.
“Moneyball” fits in well with Sorkin’s previous experience as the creator and writer of ABC’s drama “Sports Night.”
Sony initially optioned Lewis’ book in 2004. Stan Chervin penned the initial draft of the script.
“What happened to moneyball” is the same question everyone in Oakland is asking right now.