Shaye: New Line Blacklists Jackson

In the latest comment in the controversy surrounding a proposed movie based on J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit, New Line head Robert Shaye told SCI FI Wire in no uncertain terms that the studio won't work with Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson on that film or any other film. Ever. At least not as long as Shaye is in charge.

Shaye's comments marked the first time a New Line executive has commented publicly on the fracas since Jackson announced that he has pulled out of the project and also appears to harden New Line's position against Jackson.

"I do not want to make a movie with somebody who is suing me," Shaye—New Line's chief executive officer—said in an interview on Jan. 5 while promoting The Last Mimzy, a New Line family fantasy that marks his first time in a director's chair since 1990's Book of Love. "It will never happen during my watch."

Jackson had told TheOneRing.net in November that he and partner Fran Walsh were bowing out after New Line, which produced the Rings films and has production rights to The Hobbit, told them the studio was moving ahead with The Hobbit without them. Jackson has said he won't discuss The Hobbit until a lawsuit against New Line over Rings accounting practices is settled.

As far as Shaye is concerned, Jackson is no longer welcome. "There's a kind of arrogance," Shaye said. "Not that I don't think Peter is a good filmmaker and that he hasn't contributed significantly to filmography and made three very good movies. And I don't even expect him to say 'thank you' for having me make it happen and having New Line make it happen. But to think that I, as a functionary in [a] company that has been around for a long time, but is now owned by a very big conglomerate, would care one bit about trying to cheat the guy, ... he's either had very poor counsel or is completely misinformed and myopic to think that I care whether I give him [anything]."

Shaye, who was also an executive producer on the Rings films, added: "He got a quarter of a billion dollars paid to him so far, justifiably, according to contract, completely right, and this guy, who already has received a quarter of a billion dollars, turns around without wanting to have a discussion with us and sues us and refuses to discuss it unless we just give in to his plan. I don't want to work with that guy anymore. Why would I? So the answer is he will never make any movie with New Line Cinema again while I'm still working for the company."

Shaye said that many of the Rings trilogy actors "suddenly, because, I'm guessing, of Peter's complaint," have declined to participate in celebrating New Line's 40th anniversary. "I'm incredibly offended," he said. "I don't care about Peter Jackson anymore. He wants to have another $100 million or $50 million, whatever he's suing us for. He doesn't want to sit down and talk about it. He thinks that we owe him something after we've paid him over a quarter of a billion dollars. ... Cheers, Peter."

New Line's hardened position against Jackson isn't the end of the story, of course. MGM, which owns the distribution rights to The Hobbit, on Nov. 20 told Variety through a spokesman that "the matter of Peter Jackson directing the Hobbit films is far from closed."

In his own online statement, Jackson said that New Line executive Mark Ordesky, who shepherded the Rings trilogy, argued that New Line is dumping Jackson because the studio has a "limited time option" on the film rights, obtained from Saul Zaentz.

Wingnut and Peter Jackson respond to Bob Shaye's tongue-lashings!!
Ahoy, squirts! Quint here again with the response out of Wingnut about this whole mess that Bob Shaye made when he publicly attacked Peter Jackson today. This is all starting to get into a side of the business that I really hate and AICN rarely covers. I felt comfortable posting the Bob Shaye comments because that seriously affected the future HOBBIT movie. I'm posting this because it's only fair to print Jackson's response, although I don't think he needed to respond. I think Bob Shaye did more damage than good for himself with his comments.

Some pretty crazy shit's going down. I had a theory that I posted in the talkback to the previous article and reading the below makes me believe it even more.

Someone sued Paramount over COMING TO AMERICA in which the books on that film were opened and audited. That lawsuit resulted in Eddie Murphy, having nothing to do with the lawsuit, getting a crazy amount of money and never having to go to court. The studio was cheating everybody, so they were forced to pay everybody, not just the person who sued.

It sounds to me like New Line isn't risking just having to pay Jackson what they owe him, but if the books on all 3 movies are made public, they could owe so many more people money. Or they could have completely fulfilled their contractual obligations to everybody, but then why would they deny access to a contracted party? And why would they do everything they could to make it go away, roll it in with that deal for Jackson to direct HOBBIT? It's looking more and more like New Line cooked the books a bit and shortchanged at least Jackson, if not more we don't know about.

The seedy underbelly of Hollywood... I hate dwelling on this stuff, so unless any further comments are directly related to Middle Earth, or a kiss and make-up party happens, this'll be the last I post on this topic.

Here's the official statement from Wingnut:

Looks like the new Rosie v. Donald. Actually, thinking about that now, Rosie sort of resembles Peter Jackson.

This is akin to "you can't fire me, I quit."

Jackson: "Look, we're officially pulling out of the Hobbit project, and not working with New Line, until the lawsuit gets settled."

New Line: "Well, we don't want to work with you because you're suing us!"

Jackson: "No shit, that's what I just said."

ohmygodohmygodohmygod

edit-

it just sounds like they are saying the Hobbit will be broken up into two movies. Not that i'm complaining but that seems kind of excessive. It's not a very long book.

any chance they're talking about the silmarillion?

i haven't read it, but isn't it a prequel of sorts to the Hobbit? Like of a collected history of Middle Earth leading up to the events in the Hobbit and LOTR.

id rather have 1 hobbit and then some of the other stuff, like the Silmarillion stuff.