{"id":10113,"date":"2010-05-25T11:42:59","date_gmt":"2010-05-25T15:42:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=10113"},"modified":"2022-03-21T09:23:42","modified_gmt":"2022-03-21T13:23:42","slug":"but-what-about-the-offer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=10113","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;But what about the OFFER?&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe style=\"width:120px;height:240px;\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" src=\"\/\/ws-na.amazon-adsystem.com\/widgets\/q?ServiceVersion=20070822&#038;OneJS=1&#038;Operation=GetAdHtml&#038;MarketPlace=US&#038;source=ac&#038;ref=tf_til&#038;ad_type=product_link&#038;tracking_id=thesheivari-20&#038;marketplace=amazon&#038;region=US&#038;placement=1557043744&#038;asins=1557043744&#038;linkId=QHE4MZBK5YBAGBNS&#038;show_border=true&#038;link_opens_in_new_window=true\"><br \/>\n<\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>\nOne of the best books about making movies is Steven Bach&#8217;s <i><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/product\/1557043744?ie=UTF8&#038;tag=thesheivari-20&#038;linkCode=as2&#038;camp=1789&#038;creative=9325&#038;creativeASIN=1557043744\">Final Cut : Art, Money, and Ego in the Making of Heaven&#8217;s Gate, the Film That Sank United Artists<\/a><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/www.assoc-amazon.com\/e\/ir?t=thesheivari-20&#038;l=as2&#038;o=1&#038;a=1557043744\" width=\"1\" height=\"1\" border=\"0\" alt=\"\" style=\"border:none !important; margin:0px !important;\" \/><\/i>.  It is an indispensable and sometimes frightening book about the decision-making process that brought about Michael Cimino&#8217;s disastrous <i>Heaven&#8217;s Gate<\/i> which, in turn, brought down United Artists, the production company started in 1919 by D.W. Griffith, Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks.   Steven Bach was head of East Coast and European Production of United Artists at the time and a participant in the disaster.  He was mainly responsible for making the <i>Heaven&#8217;s Gate<\/i> deal, as he explains in this chilling paragraph:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>David [Field] read [Stan Kamen] UA&#8217;s terms for the picture, essentially what Kamen had asked, including preapproval of Christopher Walken, contingent on his deal&#8217;s fitting the budget, raised that figure to [Lehman] Katz&#8217;s still-leery $7.8 million, and aside from an excited slip of the tongue that offered [Kris] Kristofferson 10 percent of the gross instead of 10 percent of the profits &#8211; a slip that Kamen caught and graciously corrected &#8211; the deal was accepted.  David and I made triumphant eye contact.  We were now running production at United Artists with Danny [Rissner]&#8217;s blessing and Andy [Albeck]&#8217;s and Transamerica&#8217;s, and our first official act, a fairly routine one at that, had been to make the deal that would destroy the company.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Hindsight&#8217;s 20\/20 and all that, but Bach is very honest about the signs he missed, the red flags no one heeded, and how many executives were actually just paying attention to the wrong things.  This happens all the time in business.  Everyone can see perfectly, after the fact, where things went wrong &#8211; but that&#8217;s not an interesting or helpful perspective, at least not in terms of a book such as this one.  Bach doesn&#8217;t come off perfectly &#8211; and it&#8217;s one of the reasons why the book is so effective.  If he wrote it with an axe to grind, if he shoveled all the blame onto Field or Albeck or Cimino, or someone else &#8230; the book would read as <i>petty<\/i>.  The book would be an obvious ploy for sympathy, a biased self-righteous account of one of the biggest corporate disasters in Hollywood history (if not the biggest.  <i>Heaven&#8217;s Gate<\/i> is in the history books for all time.)<\/p>\n<p>One of the best insider accounts of moviemaking that exists.<\/p>\n<p>I also love Julia Salamon&#8217;s <i><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/product\/0306811235?ie=UTF8&#038;tag=thesheivari-20&#038;linkCode=as2&#038;camp=1789&#038;creative=9325&#038;creativeASIN=0306811235\">The Devil&#8217;s Candy: The Anatomy of a Hollywood Fiasco<\/a><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/www.assoc-amazon.com\/e\/ir?t=thesheivari-20&#038;l=as2&#038;o=1&#038;a=0306811235\" width=\"1\" height=\"1\" border=\"0\" alt=\"\" style=\"border:none !important; margin:0px !important;\" \/><\/i>, about the debacle of Brian De Palma&#8217;s <i>Bonfire of the Vanities<\/i>, and while that book is shocking for the access Salamon got (she trailed around with the production), she was not PART of the production.  She was strictly an observer.  It is part of the incredible nature of that story that Salamon would be given the access she would, which makes her observations that much more devastating, but <i>Final Cut<\/i> stands out as an Industry-Insider&#8217;s mea culpa, yes, but written with a practical yet emotional style that Bach manages to keep far far from the realms of self-pity, which would have been a despicable tone for this particular book.  These people are all millionaire wheeler-dealers.  What do they have to whine about?  Whining is not present here.  But an honest examination of the events leading up to Cimino&#8217;s basically hijacking United Artists, and how these men and women, smart, cautious, and with lots of Hollywood experience, allowed it to happen.<\/p>\n<p>While I never agree with the flat-out contempt many ordinary people have for artists and artistic executives (I hear envy masquerading as moral outrage half of the time with these people) who happen to be fortunate enough to make some money, what is fascinating about <i>Final Cut<\/i> is its step-by-step look at how decisions are made.  Some of the decisions are cynical, some are idealistic.  Some SEEM idealistic and then turn out to be cynical.  Sometimes you strike it rich.  Sometimes you come up empty.  Decisions are made all day every day in Hollywood, and very few are of such import that they bring down a Hollywood institution like United Artists.  What happened?<\/p>\n<p><i>Final Cut<\/i> is about just that.  I&#8217;ve read it about 3 times, I think.  If you want to know &#8220;how things work&#8221;, this is the book to read.<\/p>\n<p>Here&#8217;s an excerpt from the start of the book.  All of these characters worked for UA, and all of them would be casualties of <i>Heaven&#8217;s Gate<\/i> (not to mention the re-shuffling of UA at parent company Transamerica&#8217;s insistence &#8211; the book is a masterpiece of corporate culture at work).  Here is a conference about a property that had come their way, one of those intellectual\/artistic\/practical debates that go on all the time, but here take on enormous import because of all that came after.  Christpher Mankiewicz (son of Joseph Mankiewicz, and part of Hollywood royalty) worked in the West Coast division of UA, Daniel Rissner (head of production at UA, and soon to be forced to resign), Steven Bach (who would step into Rissner&#8217;s shoes following his departure, sharing the post with David Field, a situation that was treacherous from the get-go), and Andy Albeck (president of United Artists, but new to the post, and not from an artistic background, which was a blessing and a curse here).<\/p>\n<p>Here, they discuss the third book by an author whose first book was a smash, and the movie made from the book an even bigger smash, changing the Hollywood game entirely &#8230; so they are considering the third book as a possible property.  It becomes easy to guess who they are talking about.  My favorite comeback is one by Mankiewicz, and it&#8217;ll be pretty obvious which one I mean.<\/p>\n<p>Michael Cimino has not yet entered the picture at the time of this conference.  This is merely set-up of some of the main characters, and how deals are made (or not made), and UA&#8217;s desire to seem like a heavy-hitting player in the new landscape of 1970s American cinema.<\/p>\n<p>Great book.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>&#8220;Fellas, this book is a piece of <i>shit<\/i>!&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Chris Mankiewicz&#8217;s considerable bulk rolled behind the statement, imploring the rest of us to agree.  He flung his palms outward toward the room, as if the evidence were smeared there to observe.  After a moment he dropped one hand into the pile of sweet rolls on the coffee table before him, piled high with danish and dirty coffee cups.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Everybody knows that, Chris,&#8221; Rissner sighed.  &#8220;It&#8217;s not about whether it&#8217;s a piece of shit or it&#8217;s not a piece of shit.  It&#8217;s about whether we want to make a goddamn deal.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;On this unmitigated, irredeemable piece of <i>shit<\/i>?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Rissner borrowed matches from someone, lit a cigarette, pointedly ignoring the redundancy.  &#8220;What&#8217;s the minimum bid we could make, you think?&#8221; he said to the room in general.  &#8220;A million?  A million five?&#8221;  His voice seemed casual, but his manner suggested constraint as he bent and rebent the borrowed book of matches.  He looked up at the circle seated in mismatched chairs around the glass and chrome coffee table in his Culver City office.  There was the chairman of the board, down from San Francisco for the morning, looking on with a kibitzer&#8217;s curiosity, his expression acknowledging nothing more than respectful interest; the president of the company, his mouth a tight line, owllike eyes swiveling from one face to another behind his huge spectacles, glinting in the early-morning sunlight like windshields; there were the heads of domestic and ancillary distribution, ignoring Mankiewicz&#8217;s outburst and Rissner&#8217;s question by burrowing into their synopses of the book in question, readers&#8217; reports they were supposed to have read the previous night or on the plane from New York but clearly hadn&#8217;t.  There was Mankiewicz, exasperated beyond belief that his opinion was having no apparent effect on anyone else; there was David Field, looking thoughtful and tactful; and I &#8211; I was <i>confused<\/i>.  Who cared what the distribution guys thought?  I wondered.  Why?  When?  What did they know?<\/p>\n<p><i>I<\/i> knew, so I answered Rissner.  &#8220;My guess is that the least they&#8217;ll listen to is a million five and a gross percentage, and that won&#8217;t make a deal.  If we&#8217;re not prepared to go that high, we shouldn&#8217;t make an offer at all because the agent will decide he&#8217;s been insulted and our relationship with the agency is weak enough as it is.  This <i>is<\/i> the first major submission from them in months, right?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Right,&#8221; Rissner nodded.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The first major submission because they&#8217;re trying to hype what even <i>they<\/i> know is a piece of illiterate <i>shit<\/i>!&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Chris, <i>please<\/i>.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Albeck looked simultaneously alarmed and annoyed.  Why didn&#8217;t Mankiewicz shut up?  He had clearly been given more than a cue by his superior.  Or could the book really be all <i>that<\/i> bad?  He asked the question of Rissner.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Andy, the guy&#8217;s last two books were huge best sellers.  The movie of the first one became one of the top-grossing pictures of all time. The movie of the second one, which was only routine, did forty million dollars.  It&#8217;s not about quality; it&#8217;s about money and track record.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t talk to me about track record,&#8221; retorted Mankiewicz.  &#8220;My old man won four Academy Awards in two years and then went out and made <i>The Honey Pot<\/i>. I know all <i>about<\/i> track record.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Rissner ignored this and turned to me for an opinion.  &#8220;How would I know?&#8221; I waffled.  &#8220;I turned down the first book.  I thought who in Nebraska knows from sharks?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;But what about the <i>offer<\/i>?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Well,&#8221; I said, grateful for a money discussion to get me off the hook of commenting on a book I didn&#8217;t like any more than Mankiewicz did, &#8220;if you want to make an offer&#8221; &#8212; I couched it in Rissner&#8217;s direction with the second-person pronoun &#8212; &#8220;it should be as preemptive as possible.  Otherwise, we look like pikers.  What&#8217;s he want &#8211; an auction, what?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;One offer, all terms, sealed bids.  He&#8217;s submitted the book five places&#8211;&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;He <i>says<\/i>,&#8221; Mankiewicz now seemed to be talking to himself since no one else was apparently listening, except maybe Harvey, but it was hard to tell.<\/p>\n<p>Rissner ignored him again.  &#8220;&#8211;five places, expects five bids by the close of business today, and top bid takes it.  So the offer has to be the best and farthest we&#8217;re willing to go.  If we go.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Andy looked up, puzzled and impatient.  &#8220;Are we obligated to make an offer?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;No,&#8221; said Rissner, anticipating resistance.<\/p>\n<p>He was rescued by the musings of domestic distribution.  &#8220;Forty million?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Domestic or worldwide?&#8221; asked ancillary.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Domestic, I <i>think<\/i>.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Albeck shot sharply: &#8220;That was because of big boobies in wet T-shirts.  Does this book have boobies?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Jim Harvey&#8217;s placidity seemed suddenly jarred, by the subject matter or Andy&#8217;s terminology one couldn&#8217;t tell.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It has boobies and rapes and S and M, and not one word of it has any resemblance to human behavior as we know it!&#8221; Mankiewicz chimed in.<\/p>\n<p>Rissner looked bored.  &#8220;Yes, Andy.  It has boobies.  Wet ones.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>While Andy mulled this over, frowning, I asked where else the book had been submitted.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;You have to assume to the producers of the first picture and the second picture, if only as courtesy submissions.  They would be buying for Universal or Columbia.  Then there&#8217;s us, probably Fox and &#8230; maybe Paramount.  Or Warner&#8217;s.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Danny, you&#8217;re close to Warner&#8217;s,&#8221; said Andy.  &#8220;Can you ask them what they think?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Why would I do that?&#8221; said Rissner, appalled.  &#8220;What difference would it make?  Who cares if they like it or hate it?  The point is, what do <i>we<\/i> do?  Do we make an offer or not, and if we do, what&#8217;s the goddamn offer?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I got it,&#8221; said Albeck, chastened, gloomy, but instructed.<\/p>\n<p>We voted.  Andy agreed; Harvey said nothing.<\/p>\n<p>An offer was framed, approved, and made, as Mankiewicz fumed in uncharacteristic silence.  The offer came to slightly more than $2 million for the movie rights, based on a floor price which escalated with performance of the book on best seller lists, in book clubs, and so on; a gross percentage of box-office receipts was added to make the offer unbeatable.<\/p>\n<p>It was beaten.<\/p>\n<p>The producers of the movie made from the author&#8217;s first book secured the rights for something closer, it was believed, to $2.5 million.  Losing the book was almost a relief.  We had demonstrated we had the money, were willing to spend it, and it hadn&#8217;t cost a penny.<\/p>\n<p>Two and a half years later, when the movie based on the book was released and landing with a critical and financial thud, I had lunch with Mankiewicz, who had been long gone from UA.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I told you it was a piece of shit.&#8221; He laughed without a trace of a sneer.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;That was never the point, Chris,&#8221; I said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It should have been.&#8221; He smiled.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><iframe style=\"width:120px;height:240px;\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" src=\"\/\/ws-na.amazon-adsystem.com\/widgets\/q?ServiceVersion=20070822&#038;OneJS=1&#038;Operation=GetAdHtml&#038;MarketPlace=US&#038;source=ac&#038;ref=tf_til&#038;ad_type=product_link&#038;tracking_id=thesheivari-20&#038;marketplace=amazon&#038;region=US&#038;placement=1557043744&#038;asins=1557043744&#038;linkId=QHE4MZBK5YBAGBNS&#038;show_border=true&#038;link_opens_in_new_window=true\"><br \/>\n<\/iframe><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One of the best books about making movies is Steven Bach&#8217;s Final Cut : Art, Money, and Ego in the Making of Heaven&#8217;s Gate, the Film That Sank United Artists. It is an indispensable and sometimes frightening book about the &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=10113\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15,4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10113"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10113"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10113\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":100892,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10113\/revisions\/100892"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10113"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10113"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}