I don’t think I’ve ever seen a case in entertainment where both sides have acted with such stupidity. Ok, here’s the background as I understand it:
– Peter Jackson didn’t think New Line was being above board with their accounting on DVD sales for the first Lord of the Rings movie.
– Jackson demanded to see the confidential proprietary books of New Line
– New Line refuses turn over private books and asks Jackson to sit down with them to talk about the problem and try to resolve it
– Jackson proceeds to act like Jackass. “Don’t you know who I am? I’m Peter Jackson. I do things how I want, and if you don’t bow to my will we’ll go straight to court. I’m too important to sit down and try to resolve the problem any other way first before resorting to that.”
– New Line proceeds to act like Jackasses. “How dare you speak to us, the all powerful New Line, that way! Even though it could solve things, we are going to dig in our heals and refuse to budge on this because… well… just because damnit! For we are New Line.”
– Jackson: “Give me the books. Grrrrr”
– New Line: “Sit down and talk first. Grrrrr” (proceeds to pound chest)
– Jackson: “Oh yeah? I’m going to write ludicrous, bordering on dishonest open sob letters to my completely biased fans and talk about how mean you’re being to me”
– New Line: “Oh yeah, well we’re going to put out totally distorted statements about what an ungrateful pig you are, just a millionaire trying to get more millions… and just for good measure… we’re kicking you off The Hobbit”
– Jackson: “You can’t fire me from The Hobbit! I QUIT!”
– New Line: “Grrrr”
– Jackson: “Grrrr”
On and on and on it’s gone now forever. This thing could have been resolved ages ago if Jackson just agreed to sit down and negotiate with New Line… or if New Line just agreed to turn over the books. But both have been stubborn to the point where it doesn’t even matter who was right anymore.
THAT BEING SAID….
New Line has taken it to a new level. In the ongoing court case, the Judge ordered that New Line submit to the court certain documents. I worked in law for a few years… so let me explain… when a Judge tells you to do something… YOU BLOODY WELL DO IT. Well… New Line decided they were too important to listen to a nobody like a Judge. The folks at Yahoo News give us this:
A ticked-off federal judge in Los Angeles has ordered the studio to pony up a $125,000 penalty for failing to turn over documents related to the case, in which Jackson claims the studio used creative accounting to cheat him out of millions in royalties from the first chapter in his big-screen trilogy, 2001’s The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring.
In his Sept. 18 ruling, U.S. Magistrate Steven Hillman said New Line not only failed to comply with his previous court orders to produce the paperwork and emails, but he suggests that New Line “haphazardly” searched for the requested documents and may have destroyed potential evidence.
To say this looks sort of suspicious is like saying Paris Hilton is sort of useless. Let me be totally clear here: I do not like how Peter Jackson has handled himself for the duration of this whole thing… at all. That was never contingent on who I thought was “right” and who I thought was “wrong” in this case. There is a proper process for doing things, a proper way to do things…. Jackson in all his self importance snubbed his nose at all of that and acted poorly in the process…. BUT HAVING SAID THAT….
It sure does look like New Line has indeed been the bigger Jackass of the two now doesn’t it?
I am a big fan of Peter Jackson’s work (I recently called Return of the King the best all round movie ever made), and while I’m totally fine with someone else directing the Hobbit (it could be as good or even better than Rings), I still would RATHER see Jackson back for it. Let’s just hope sanity and cooler heads prevail here soon, that they get this ugly matter behind them… and all parties just get back to the business of making movies… preferably The Hobbit… preferably together. Just my two cents worth.
