why did cruise and wagner split

Paula Wagner: Tom Cruise’s Former Producing Partner Explains What A Producer Actually Does

Paula Wagner is an unfamiliar name for many film-goers, but if you watch the first three Mission:Impossible  films, you’ll notice they’re made by Cruise/Wagner Productions. Wagner formed the production company with Tom Cruise in 1993. The joint venture marked Wagner’s transition from casting agent at CAA to producer. And Cruise/Wagner Productions gave Cruise more control over projects he acted in, and more of the profits.

Under an exclusive deal with Paramount Pictures, Cruise/Wagner Productions produced every one of Cruise’s films from  Mission: Impossible (1996) to Valkyrie  (2008). Other features made by the production company included The Others, Without Limits, Narc, Shattered Glass, Elizabethtown,  and  Death Race. While Cruise/Wagner closed it’s doors in 2008, after Paramount boss, Sumner Redstone, pulled the plug on his relationship with the production company, both Cruise and Wagner were established as powerful producers, with the lucrative partnership grossing more than $2.9 billion at the box office.

Since then, Wagner has produced two other Cruise projects– Jack Reacher  and  Jack Reacher: Never Go Back– and moved into independent projects, including Chadwick Bosman’s Marshall (2017),  a well-received true story about the first black Supreme Court Justice, Thurgood Marshall.

Wagner, as a result, knows how to co-ordinate the full gamut of film projects from big budget to smaller character-focused productions. In the following video by CookeOpticsTV below, she explains what the role of the film producer is.

Tags: mission: impossible , producer , tom cruise

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Den of Geek

Tom Cruise and The Failed United Artists Experiment

In late 2006, with much fanfare, Tom Cruise was announced as headlined a revived United Artists. But what went wrong?

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This article originally appeared on Den of Geek UK .

Lurking in the corners of Netflix UK is a not-very-widely-seen Tom Cruise movie, that a decade ago was all set to herald a new filmmaking dawn. Directed by Robert Redford, and with a cast that includes Redford, Cruise, Meryl Streep and a then-relatively-unknown Andrew Garfield, Lions For Lambs looked on paper to be a heavyweight political drama. Its focus is on three stories: an ambitious politician giving an interview to tough reporter, an army platoon being ordered to go on a top secret mission by said politician, and a professor trying to talk a promising student into turning his life around.

It looked like Oscar-bait. It turned out to be a footnote in the failure to resurrect United Artists.

United Artists was originally founded in 1919 by Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford, D W Griffith and Douglas Fairbanks, with the ambition of allowing acting and creative talent to have control over their work, as opposed to being studio-dictated. In the decades that followed, the company had a bumpy life, but not without successes. In the 1950s and 1960s in particular, United Artists scored many successes, winning bags of Oscars too. It also, presciently, picked up the rights to the James Bond novels. Not a bad business move.

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But the dramatic fall really came at the end of the 1970s, with new owners Transamerica, and the decision to back Michael Cimino’s notoriously expensive bomb, Heaven’s Gate . Heaven’s Gate bled money out of the company, and a merger with MGM followed. MGM, too, would soon face its own financing struggles.

Fast forward to 2006, though, and a promising future looked on the horizon. Tom Cruise and his producing partner, Paula Wagner, had been under an exclusive production deal with Paramount Pictures since the early 1990s – leading to the Mission: Impossible movie franchise, among other projects – but when that deal came to an end, they looked for other opportunities. This was around the time when Paramount’s then-boss, Sumner Redstone, had made less than complimentary remarks about Cruise’s declining box office draw costing Mission: Impossible III box office green.

A break was inevitable, and an opportunity developed. MGM was looking for what to do with its United Artists label, and negotiations began about an unusual deal. As such, in November 2006, a deal was announced. Paula Wagner and Tom Cruise would take on a minority share in the latest iteration of United Artists. The plan was that Wagner would act as CEO, whilst Cruise would be expected to appear in its films, but wouldn’t be exclusively locked to UA productions (it would have somewhat gone against the originally founding principles of United Artists had he been). Cruise and Wagner would then have autonomy over a slate of up to four movies a year, provided the budgets were on the modest size.

At the time, MGM spokesman Jeff Pryor wouldn’t be drawn on whether Cruise and Wagner had paid for the equity stake, or whether it was in return for having the star power of Cruise involved in UA productions. “I wish Tom and his associates the greatest good fortune on their new venture”, Sumner Redstone said in a statement, whilst hardly battling to keep him on the Paramount lot.

Even from the off, though, response to the new United Artists was mixed. Some questioned whether Cruise had the box office power to make it work still. Others wondered if it was a play by Cruise to show he still had clout in Hollywood. Some, less cynically, suggested he just wanted to make more of the films he wanted to see.

Whichever theory was subscribed to, though, all eyes would inevitably be on the first picture from the new UA.

As it happened, a film was already deep into development. Based on a screenplay by Matthew Michael Carnahan, Lions For Lambs already had Robert Redford interested in the movie as his next directorial venture. He hadn’t directed a picture since 2000’s The Legend Of Bagger Vance at that stage, and was interested in a project that went against the Hollywood trend for purely entertainment projects. He signed on the dotted line, and filming began at the end of January 2007 – less than three months after the new UA deal had been announced. It would be the first picture under the umbrella of it.

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Redford noted subsequently that it was the tightest schedule he’d ever worked to, with less than a year between the film’s announcement and release. But the bigger problem became how to sell it. MGM in the end was insistent that this was a Robert Redford project, rather than a Tom Cruise film, but one look at the poster showed it was also hardly downplaying Cruise’s relatively modest on-screen involvement.

Beyond that, though, the film’s three stories – while independently interesting – didn’t really convincingly gel into one coherent feature film. As such, critics didn’t warm to the movie, and attempts by MGM to half-sell it as a blockbuster film didn’t work either. Costing roughly $35 million for the negative, the film grossed $63.2 million worldwide. It would only crawl towards profit on its home release, and even though, it’s not a curio that too many seek out.

Still, Cruise had a bigger project for United Artists, and this time he would take a starring role. Back in 2002, screenwriter and director Christopher McQuarrie started putting together a film based on a plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler in 1944 by German soldiers. He’d subsequently shape that into a screenplay for what would become the film Valkyrie .

McQuarrie interested director Bryan Singer, who had brushed against the subject matter with his movie Apt Pupil . He agreed to direct, and McQuarrie suggested that the film would be a project the new United Artists would be interested in. He was right.

Paula Wagner liked the pitch immediately, and in March 2007, a deal was struck to finance the film. Cruise was asked to star, and agreed to do so. Filming duly began in July 2007. But in the aftermath of Lions For Lambs ’ disappointing box office, the stakes became a lot higher for Valkyrie . At $75 million, it was a more expensive film for a start. But this would also be a more telling audit of where Tom Cruise’s box office power actually was at this stage.

The film, though, was soon in the crosshairs of the movie press, with a volley of disparaging stories emerging while the film was being made. Not that the constant shifting of release dates helped. Valkyrie was originally set for release in August 2008. Then it moved to June 2008. Then it moved to October 2008. Then it moved to February 2009. Then it moved back to December 2008. At least one of the date changes was to accommodate the filming of an extra sequence, but the others betrayed the leaking confidence MGM had in the film. Once a movie it wanted to target as an Oscar contender, it eventually figured awards wouldn’t be forthcoming, and went to maximise box office instead. Furthermore, it reconfigured its marketing to downplay Tom Cruise’s involvement, and the constant dismissal of the film as Cruise’s “eye-patch movie.”

Contrary to some popular opinion, Valkyrie was a decent commercial success, too. The film has problems, certainly, but reviews were okay, and the global box office of $200.3 million wasn’t a bad return, given the troubles the production had been through.

However, even before the film his cinemas, the new United Artists was crumbling. On August 14th, 2008, months before the film was released, it was announced that Paula Wagner had left United Artists, and instead would be developing films as an independent producer. She kept her ownership stake in the movie, but according to a Variety report at the time, she “frequently butted heads with MGM” when actually trying to get films greenlit. MGM itself had undergone a change of studio head in the interim, and its new boss was more interested in developing a slate of pictures himself, rather than pushing resources to United Artists. For MGM’s part, it argued that Wagner “wasn’t developing aggressively enough.”

Wagner had been hampered by the Writers’ Guild of America strike at around the same time, that led to the collapse of what would have been a further UA production, Pinkville . Bruce Willis had signed to star in the movie, that Oliver Stone would have directed. But when script problems sprung up, UA couldn’t hire writers to fix it. The talent moved on. It also had a dance movie by the name of Move , from Camp Rock director Matthew Diamond, near the starting blocks. That, too, fell apart.

The plan at the point of Wagner’s departure was said to be for Cruise to take a greater involvement in the running of the studio. But there’s no sign that ever came to pass. Valkyrie was Cruise’s last project to date with a United Artists logo on it, and he would instead focus on acting projects again, such as Knight & Day , Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol (that revived that franchise back at Paramount) and Rock Of Ages .

The UA name would potter on. Its logo appeared on two further MGM films:  Hot Tub Time Machine and the remake of Fame . By 2011, MGM had bought back full control of the United Artists banner, but an annual report statement declaring it “may resume using the United Artists banner to develop and produce new films” never came to pass.

Instead, United Artists is now a name without the original company and its ethos behind it. Today, the United Artists webpage is a competition to win a trip to the set of the new Stargate TV show, and that’s it. MGM has used the United Artists name on a new television production deal it struck with One Three Media and Lightworkers Media back in 2014. It’s a subsidiary label, and nothing more, for MGM.

Ironically, since his last United Artists picture, Cruise has been involved in six Paramount productions, including the two lined up for release in the next two years. Lions For Lambs , meanwhile, a film once set to be the bold opening of a revived artistic ethos, loiters around the corridors of Netflix…

Simon Brew | @SimonBrew

Editor, author, writer, broadcaster, Costner fanatic. Now runs Film Stories Magazine.

Tom Cruise's company lands investor after split with Paramount

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Tom Cruise's production company has signed a two-year financing deal with an investment partnership after breaking ties last week with Paramount Pictures.

The deal announced Monday between Cruise/Wagner productions and First & Goal LLC — headed by Washington Redskins owner Daniel Snyder — will cover overhead and development, allowing Cruise and producing partner Paula Wagner to run their company and make deals to produce films.

Financial terms have not been revealed, but they do not include funding for film production and distribution.

Cruise's production deal with Paramount had given the star as much as $10 million US per year for salaries, expenses and discretionary spending in exchange for first right to finance or distribute the films.

But tense negotiations broke off when Paramount offered a much lower deal closer to $2 million annually.

The dispute became public last week when Sumner Redstone, chairman of Paramount parent Viacom Inc.,criticized Cruise's public behaviour.

Cruise blamed for losses

In an interview with the Wall Street Journal , Redstone claimed Cruise's jumping up and down on Oprah Winfrey's couch and aggressive defence of Scientology in the past year lost Paramount $100 million US and $150 million US in ticket sales for the actor's latest film, Mission: Impossible III .

Wagner slammed Redstone last week, calling his comments "surprising" and unbusinesslike. She said it was their decision to walk away from a 14-year partnership with Paramount.

Last week, Wagner said her company had secured funding from two hedge funds, a separate arrangement from the deal with First & Goal. On Monday, she declined to comment on those deals.

First & Goal was specifically set up to invest in Cruise/Wagner, as Snyder moves from sports to entertainment along with partners Dwight Schar, chairman of homebuilder NVR Inc., and Mark Shapiro, president and CEO of Six Flags Inc., the amusement park chain where Snyder serves as chairman of the board.

Shapiro, a former ESPN entertainment executive, will oversee the Cruise/Wagner deal.

"We believe that Cruise and Wagner are a terrific investment," Shapiro said. "The track record speaks for itself."

Cruise will continue to be able to star in films produced elsewhere, just as he did under Paramount.

The spat between the star of Top Gun , War of the Worlds and the Mission Impossible movies, and Paramount is the latest example of tension between actors and executives after what Hollywood analysts are calling a down summer for film revenues.

Earlier this summer, a studio head chided Lindsay Lohan for her behaviour on a movie set in a letter leaked to the press, and an ABC deal with Mel Gibson's production company to produce a four-part series on the Holocaust was cancelled after his alleged anti-Semetic remarks during a drunk-driving arrest.

With files from the Associated Press

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Who Loses in the Split — Paramount or Cruise?

You’re fired! Hey, you can’t fire me, because I quit!

That’s the gist of the war of words between Tom Cruise’s production company and Paramount Pictures following news from the film studio’s parent late Tuesday that it was severing ties with Cruise/Wagner Productions after 14 years.

Sumner Redstone, chairman of Paramount owner Viacom, told the Wall Street Journal , which first broke the story on its website, that Cruise’s “recent conduct has not been acceptable.” Redstone cited the actor’s public comments defending Scientology and criticizing psychiatry. “As much as we like him personally, we thought it was wrong to renew his deal,” Redstone is quoted as saying in the Journal.

But in an interview with TIME.com Tuesday night, Paula Wagner, Cruise’s partner, said that days before Paramount’s move, the two producers had already decided to leave the studio, accept an offer of a $100 million-a-year revolving fund from a group of private investors and produce their future film projects independently. (Under terms of its “first-look” deal with Paramount that recently expired, Cruise/Wagner was paid an annual chunk of money to cover overhead and development costs — a sum estimated by sources at the studio to be around $10 million, although Wagner insists it was much less than that. In return, the studio got first dibs on releasing the pictures Cruise/Wagner produced.) “A few days ago, we instructed our agents to cease negotiations [on a new deal] with Paramount,” Wagner told TIME.com. “We decided that it was best for us to do something where we lead the way in terms of where the film industry is going. We’re very excited to be making films independently.”

The decision by Paramount to end a business relationship with an A-list star like Cruise comes as all of the major studios are sweating out the gate receipt tallies every weekend, aggressively cutting the size of star-driven production deals and all other costs, and looking for ways to mitigate financial risks. It’s a reflection of just how sensitive their publicly traded corporate parents have become about any issue that could pose a threat to the bottom line. It probably wasn’t lost on Paramount executives that about half of the people queried in a USA Today/Gallup poll several months ago had an unfavorable opinion of Cruise, in the wake of his controversial public statements and puzzling behavior such as using Oprah Winfrey’s couch as a trampoline while declaring his love for future wife Katie Holmes. And coming just weeks after Disney’s decision to drop out of a Holocaust TV miniseries project with Mel Gibson following the torrents of negative publicity about Gibsons anti-Semitic comments during his DUI arrest, it’s an indication that in this celebrity-gossip-saturated age, even stars with stellar box-office records are no longer immune from career reverberations when they get entangled in controversy and public opinion turns against them. “This bespeaks something about where the industry is and where it’s going,” lamented one producer.

Officials from Paramount and Viacom declined requests to elaborate on Redstone’s comments to the Journal, or to react to Wagner’s version of events. However, when told about her contention that she and Cruise walked away before being cut loose, a source close to the studio responded dismissively, “Whatever.”

Wagner called the remarks about Cruise’s behavior attributed to Redstone in the Journal “unprofessional, offensive and undignified” and “not good business.” She complained that references to his off-screen actions created a misimpression that their deal with the studio covers Cruise as an actor as well as a producer, when it actually only involves him as producer. “As an actor, he has never had an exclusive deal with any studio,” Wagner said.

Nevertheless, she said the success of the films he has made for Paramount attest to her partner’s enduring appeal. According to Cruise’s publicist, during the past decade, “Cruise has made six films for Paramount with worldwide box office totals of $2.4 billion, accounting for 32% of Paramount’s total income for the six years he had a film in release.” The publicist added that Cruise’s last two films, War of the Worlds and Mission Impossible 3, have grossed $977.8 million worldwide. “As an actor, Tom is responsible for almost $3 billion in box office revenue for Paramount,” said Wagner. “That’s more money than any other actor has made for any single studio in history.”

The source with knowledge of Paramount’s thinking replied, “You have to factor in how much he cost them. His production deal was expensive and he was providing diminishing returns, based on his box office performance and the [off-screen] behavior that the studio executives felt was impacting it.”

Still, the decision to end its association with Cruise isn’t risk-free for Paramount. It’s a testament to the ongoing strength of the Cruise/Wagner brand that their company attracted such a huge amount of private capital. Moreover, two of Hollywood’s biggest producers are still fans of Cruise the actor. Wagner says JJ Abrams, who directed Mission Impossible 3 and just inked big production deals of his own with Warner Bros. and Paramount, still wants to work with him.

Jerry Bruckheimer, producer of the Cruise blockbusters Days of Thunder and Top Gun, says, “I’d love to make as many films with him as I can. First of all, Tom gives you big openings no matter what, which is what it’s all about. You always have to be careful about what you do, no matter what profession you’re in. But I don’t think Tom has done anything that would change people’s moviegoing habits if he’s got the right material because he’s a brilliant actor.”

And in ending the relationship in such a public and messy way, Paramount could wind up alienating other talent, industry insiders warn. “As a movie studio, your business is to attract filmmakers and artists,” said one, who is a Cruise ally. “Why would you say something about an important movie star when it could make his friends and colleagues [think twice] about working at a place that attacks artists?”

The combatants are going their separate ways, but the war might not be over.

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Tom Cruise and production partner split

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Tom Cruise and his longtime production partner, Paula Wagner, are no longer United, E! Online reports. Wagner announced earlier this week that she’s leaving her chief executive post at the new United Artists – the nearly century-old studio she and Cruise resurrected after losing their spot at Paramount in 2006 – to pursue projects independently. “I support her in anything she does,” Cruise said in a statement yesterday. According to L.A. Weekly’s Deadline Hollywood blog, her departure is directly related to Cruise’s trouble-plagued World War II thriller “Valkyrie.” “Everyone recognized that Paula has been a disaster,” the source snitched. “But to (Tom’s) credit, he wanted her to have an exit with honor.”

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Chief of United Artists Is Negotiating a Departure

By Michael Cieply

• Aug. 13, 2008

LOS ANGELES — Paula Wagner is in talks to leave her post as chief executive of United Artists, less than two years after taking charge of a planned revamp of the studio in partnership with her longtime associate Tom Cruise.

Ms. Wagner confirmed her departure in a statement on Wednesday afternoon. The planned exit was earlier reported on The Wall Street Journal’s Web site.

In her statement, Ms. Wagner said: “I have longed to return to my true love, which is making movies, so that’s what I’ve decided to do.”

Ms. Wagner and Mr. Cruise will retain their ownership stake in the company, which is co-owned with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, according to a joint statement released late Wednesday by United Artists and MGM.

“Ms. Wagner will continue to be a part-owner of UA and hold a significant stake in UA’s future success,” the joint statement said. “Nothing will change in regard to Mr. Cruise’s involvement with UA.”

The resignation comes after weeks of sparring between Ms. Wagner and Harry E. Sloan, chief executive of MGM, over control of United Artists and its $500 million in backing from an investment group organized by Merrill Lynch.

Mr. Sloan, according to the person briefed on the situation, has been eager to assert more control over the funds and unit as part of his push to expand production at MGM. The company recently hired Mary Parent, formerly a top executive at Universal Pictures, to lead an aggressive expansion into production, but has yet to finance fully its plans to make as many as 12 films a year.

Ms. Wagner, by contrast, is heavily financed under the Merrill Lynch arrangement, but has been slow to use those resources. Under her tenure, United Artists has released just one film, “Lions for Lambs.” That picture, directed by Robert Redford with a cast that included Mr. Redford, Mr. Cruise and Meryl Streep, took in just $15 million at the United States box office in 2007.

The company’s biggest bet to date has been “Valkyrie,” which stars Mr. Cruise as a German army officer who helped lead a failed attempt to assassinate Hitler. The film, which has been reported to cost at least $90 million, was set for release next February. On Wednesday, however, the trade paper Variety reported on its Web site that MGM was planning to release the film in December 2008.

Ms. Wagner did not return calls seeking comment.

In the past, Ms. Wagner, Mr. Cruise’s former agent and now a producing partner, has said she would not jeopardize United Artists by proceeding too quickly with films that were not ready for the screen. She is expected to produce films through the company, including “The Champions,” an action thriller being written by Guillermo del Toro.

It is unclear if Ms. Parent will take control of United Artists, an arrangement that might require the assent of investors whose agreement to finance the company relied heavily on the involvement of Ms. Wagner and Mr. Cruise. Several senior executives remain in place, including Don Granger, the company’s production president.

Founded in 1919 by Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks Sr. and D. W. Griffith, United Artists has had a long history of ups and downs. In taking charge in November 2006, Mr. Cruise and Ms. Wagner, whose producing partnership has yielded movies including “Mission: Impossible” and “The Last Samurai,” pledged to honor the company’s roots.

Almost immediately, however, they found themselves mired in the controversies that have surrounded Mr. Cruise, who suffered a career blow when Sumner M. Redstone, the chairman of Viacom, blocked the renewal of a long-term deal under which Mr. Cruise and Ms. Wagner had produced films for Viacom’s Paramount Pictures unit.

Mr. Cruise’s involvement with Scientology became a problem for the company when some Germans cited his religious beliefs as a reason he should not be allowed to play Col. Claus Schenk von Stauffenberg, the hero of “Valkyrie.”

Inside the Media Industry

Tubi:  The free platform has exploded in popularity  over the last 18 months, establishing itself as one of the most popular streaming outfits in the United States.

Paramount:  The parent company of CBS, Nickelodeon and MTV is laying off 15%  of U.S. employees , cutting staff ahead of its merger next year with the Hollywood studio Skydance.

The New York Times :  The Times will stop endorsing candidates in New York races , though the paper’s editorial board will continue to endorse presidential candidates, as it has for more than 160 years.

ABC:  Kamala Harris is a longtime friend of Dana Walden, a senior Disney executive whose portfolio includes ABC News, the host of the next debate. ABC says she does not weigh in on editorial decisions .

CNN:  Oliver Darcy announced that he would leave CNN , where he writes the Reliable Sources newsletter, to start an independent, subscription-based news site dedicated to the media industry.

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The movie company is concerned that Cruise's behavior hurt his most recent film, "Mission: Impossible 3," said the report.

"As much as we like him personally, we thought it was wrong to renew his deal," Redstone was quoted as saying in the Wall Street Journal . "His recent conduct has not been acceptable to Paramount."

A statement from Cruise/Wagner Productions tried to characterize the split as more of a mutual decision.

"Agents for Cruise/Wagner Production Company ceased negotiations with Paramount over a week ago and has since secured independent financing," said the spokesman for the firm.

Paula Wagner, Cruise's partner, told the Journal that Cruise/Wagner Productions had decided to set up its own independent operation, backed by two unnamed hedge funds. She also noted in her comments to the Journal that Cruise had made Paramount vast sums of money over the years.

Cruise has worked with Paramount on hit films such as "Mission: Impossible," "Top Gun" and "Days of Thunder."

But speculation has been on the rise that Cruise, and mega-stars in general, are not worth the price , especially when personal behavior intrudes on their public persona.

Cruise has starred in 27 movies producing an average box office gross of $99.9 million, according to The-Movie-Times.com, an online Hollywood database.

The database estimates that the total gross of his movies has been $2.6 billion, good for No. 5 among all actors, as 13 of his films have done U.S. box office of $100 million or better. Only Tom Hanks, with 14 $100 million films, has done better.

In June 2006 Cruise took the No.1 spot on Forbes magazine's annual list of the world's 100 most powerful stars. In the last 10 years all but one of his movies have grossed more than $200 million worldwide. His top-grossing movie was "War of the Worlds" (2005), which topped $590 million around the world.

His pay has been among the tops in the industry. He received $75 million for "Mission Impossible II," according to Movie-Times.com. The film is his No. 2 best grossing film, with worldwide box office of $420.4 million.

But "Mission Impossible III," which came out in May, was seen as a disappointment, with a $47.7 million opening weekend at U.S. theaters, below the $65 million to $70 million that had been projected by some box office trackers. The film debuted in 4,054 theaters, the fourth largest debut to that point.

Still box office tracking service Box Office Mojo puts the worldwide gross of "Mission Impossible III" at $393 million.

"Internationally, Cruise is an even bigger draw," said Brandon Gray president and publisher of Box Office Mojo.

However Hollywood's highest accolade - an Oscar - has eluded Cruise, despite three acting nominations for his roles in "Magnolia", "Jerry Maguire" and "Born on the Fourth of July."

In May 2006, a USA/Today poll showed his public approval rating had slipped to 35 percent. Many of those polled cited his blunt criticism of actress Brooke Shield's treatment for depression and of psychiatry in general.

In 2005, he became the butt of jokes for a manic, couch-hopping TV appearance declaring his love for girlfriend Katie Holmes on the Oprah Winfrey show.

Reuters contributed to this report.

__________________________________________________________

Who needs Mad Mel and Cruisazy Tom?

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Tom Cruise and Paula Wagner Make United Artists Strikeproof

Wga continues chipping away at amptp's resolve..

His big-screen alter egos have saved the world on numerous occasions, and now it seems as though Tom Cruise — and his partner Paula Wagner — may have helped bring an end to the writers’ strike.

No one is setting down their picket signs just yet, but Variety reports that Cruise and Wagner, who run United Artists, have followed in the footsteps of David Letterman ‘s Worldwide Pants production company, brokering an interim deal with the Writers Guild of America. The terms of the deal, though not immediately available, will follow the precedent set by the Worldwide Pants agreement. From the article:

For UA toppers Tom Cruise and Paula Wagner, it’s a major declaration of independence from MGM and underlines that the duo — who have a 35% stake in UA — have the final say in operations. The deal affords the revived studio an opportunity to move forward on projects after initially stumbling out of the gate with “ Lions for Lambs .”

Though MGM had no comment about the deal, sources said over the weekend that MGM topper Harry Sloan has opposed the UA interim deal and added that it was highly unlikely that MGM would break ranks from the congloms and sign its agreement before the strike ends.

The deal comes too late to save Oliver Stone ‘s Pinkville , which ceased production after the strike started and has already lost star Bruce Willis to another project, and it won’t bring an end to the strike all by itself; United Artists, under the terms of its current financing arrangement, is only set to release “15-18 films over the next five years.” It does open the door, however, for the WGA to continue its “divide and conquer” strategy, proving the Guild’s terms are reasonable enough to function at the indie level — and making UA highly attractive to investors who may not want to wait for the strike to end before making their next film.

According to Variety , Lionsgate and The Weinstein Company “are viewed as the most likely to sign interim deals with the guild”; the Weinsteins have been vetting a WGA proposal for the last couple of weeks, and Lionsgate has a deal on the table as well. From the article:

Such a deal would not be surprising for the Weinsteins, who have been strong supporters of screenwriters. The brothers formed the indie operation two years ago after a dozen years of working for Disney.

For Lionsgate, a pact with the WGA could be more complicated than for UA or TWC since the company also has TV operations. Lionsgate’s been in an expansion mode, taking stakes in Mandate Pictures, Break.com and Roadside Attractions and setting a $400 million, 23-picture theatrical slate financing agreement.

Source: Variety

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Ugly Divorce: Paramount and Tom Cruise Sever Ties

Aug. 22, 2006 — -- Paramount Pictures is terminating its 14-year relationship with Tom Cruise -- one of the most successful actors in Hollywood history -- because of the actor's off-screen behavior, according to a report published late Tuesday in the Wall Street Journal.

"As much as we like him personally, we thought it was wrong to renew his deal," Viacom Inc. chairman Sumner Redstone told The Wall Street Journal. "His recent conduct has not been acceptable to Paramount."

Viacom is the parent company of Paramount, the studio where Cruise/Wagner Productions, Cruise's production company, has maintained offices since 1992.

Cruise's partner, Paula Wagner, told the Associated Press that negotiations on a new contract simply fizzled.

The deal in recent years paid Cruise and Wagner up to $10 million a year to develop films and operate an office on the Paramount lot, the Journal said Wednesday. It was reported that Cruise and the studio had been discussing a less lucrative deal. A spokeswoman for Cruise/Wagner Productions declined to comment on the Journal story.

Cruise's box office success is legendary, but his recent films have been overshadowed by his personal antics. These episodes include his infamous May 2005 couch-jumping interview on Oprah Winfrey's talk show, and his war of words with Brooke Shields over postpartum depression and the use of prescription drugs

The Journal story said Paramount believes that Cruise's behavior hurt box office receipts of the most recent "Mission: Impossible" movie, which was released in May.

His recent film, "Mission: Impossible III," has grossed $133 million domestically and $390 million worldwide. But with a massive budget, estimated at $150 million, it was far beneath expectations.

But Cruise still has considerable clout. In June, he ranked No. 1 on Forbes' "Celebrity 100" list of the most powerful stars in Hollywood, with estimated earnings in 2005 of $67 million.

"Cruise is Hollywood's most bankable actor," Forbes said, just weeks before "M:I:3" opened. The magazine cited "a combination of his awesome earnings from 'War of the Worlds' and the media onslaught following his pairing with actress Katie Holmes."

"War of the Worlds" -- with worldwide box office revenues of $591 million -- is ranked as the 22nd biggest international blockbuster.

The 44-year-old actor has worked hard for the title as Hollywood's most bankable star. Since his breakout performance in 1983's "Risky Business," he's starred in such hits as "Top Gun," "The Color of Money," "Rain Man," and "Jerry McGuire," earning three Oscar nominations.

Between 1986 and 2001, Cruise was the top box office draw a record six times, according to Quigley Publications' annual poll of movie exhibitors. The only actors to be named No. 1 five times are Clint Eastwood, Tom Hanks, Bing Crosby and Burt Reynolds.

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Paramount cuts ties with Tom Cruise

The latest high-profile Hollywood breakup is between Tom Cruise and his studio.

Sumner Redstone, whose company owns Paramount Pictures, said the studio would sever its 14-year relationship with Cruise’s film production company because “his recent conduct has not been acceptable to Paramount.”

“As much as we like him personally,” the Viacom Inc. chairman told The Wall Street Journal, “we thought it was wrong to renew his deal.”

Cruise’s partner, Paula Wagner, said negotiations on a new contract simply fizzled.

The deal in recent years paid Cruise and Wagner up to $10 million a year to develop films and operate an office on the Paramount lot, the Journal said Wednesday. It was reported that Cruise and the studio had been discussing a less lucrative deal.

The studio had offered the pair $2 million a year, plus a $500,000 discretionary fund during each of the next two years, the Los Angeles Times reported Wednesday. It cited sources with knowledge of the talks who didn’t want to be named because of the sensitivity of the matter.

In the past year or so, the usually guarded actor came under intense scrutiny after he jumped up and down on Oprah Winfrey’s couch while proclaiming his love for Katie Holmes, openly advocated Scientology, and criticized Brooke Shields for taking prescription drugs to treat postpartum depression. The religion founded by science-fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard opposes psychiatry and its medication.

Redstone estimated that Cruise’s off-screen behavior cost his latest movie, “Mission: Impossible III,” $100 million to $150 million in ticket sales, even as he praised the film as “the best of the three movies” in the action series.

“It’s nothing to do with his acting ability, he’s a terrific actor,” Redstone said. “But we don’t think that someone who effectuates creative suicide and costs the company revenue should be on the lot.”

Wagner told The Associated Press that agents for Cruise/Wagner Productions stopped negotiating with Paramount over a week ago and have since secured independent financing, effectively taking any contract-renewal deal off the table.

Slideshow    47 photos

“For some reason, Paramount has chosen to negotiate in the press,” Wagner said, calling Redstone’s announcement “surprising.”

“It’s not really the most businesslike approach,” she said. “We’ve had virtually no dealings with Mr. Redstone.”

Each of the actor’s last seven films have generated more than $100 million. And the collaboration between Paramount and Cruise/Wagner Productions, based on the Paramount lot since 1992, has produced $2.5 billion worth of business, Wagner said.

Wagner said she and Cruise had been considering independent financing for their company “for a long time.” She said the company has already obtained commitments from two hedge funds, whose names would be announced soon.

“For us, this is a very new and exciting direction. We look forward to working with all the studios.”

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