They Just Cannot See Eye to Eye

Jeffrey Katzenberg couldn’t help himself. Holed up in his Carlton Hotel suite at the Cannes Film Festival earlier this year, where “Shrek” was on display as Hollywood’s first animated feature in competition since “Peter Pan” in 1953, the DreamWorks partner was reveling in his company’s enviable Oscar track record.

“Three years in a row we have seriously competed for the Oscar and won it two out of three times,” he told a journalist from the British newspaper the Guardian. “For a company that’s only been releasing movies for four years, I’m really proud of that.”

Katzenberg’s voice suddenly rose to a fever pitch. “You know, I worked at Paramount for 11 years and I worked at Disney for 10, and I want you to know the last time either of those companies had a movie in competition at Cannes was ‘Days of Heaven’ in 1979.” As if to make sure the journalist understood the astonishing nature of this accomplishment, he bellowed: “1979! You were not born yet!”

Katzenberg’s colorful braggadocio and unquenchable thirst for victory perfectly capture the self-promotional, competitive zeal of today’s Hollywood mogul. It could just as easily have been Michael Eisner or Sumner Redstone talking; read their books if you don’t believe me. The way the conversation segued directly from DreamWorks’ Oscar success to “Shrek’s” acceptance at Cannes is telling because the two were completely intertwined. The film’s Cannes debut was the beginning of a shrewd image-making campaign designed to give the immensely popular picture the heft of an Oscar film.

In previous years, this would’ve been a pipe dream. Animated films don’t win best picture Oscars: “Beauty and the Beast” is the only one to even be nominated. But this year is different. For the first time, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is giving out an Oscar for best animated feature. And it’s no coincidence that Katzenberg, who’s been instrumental in creating the modern-day animated film, first at Disney and now at DreamWorks, has taken a producer credit for the first time on “Shrek,” entitling him to the Oscar night spotlight if his movie wins.

There’s just one major obstacle: Disney, the hallowed home of animation, and Pixar, the company that made the hugely successful “Toy Story” films, have a high-profile Oscar contender of their own: “Monsters, Inc.,” which arrives in theaters Friday.

Though “Monsters, Inc.” is a shoo-in to open at No. 1 at the box office, it doesn’t have the weekend to itself. In an era in which new DVD releases make more money in their first week than the top-grossing new movie does in theaters, DreamWorks is launching its “Shrek” DVD on the same day “Monsters, Inc.” hits the theaters.

Because home videos are normally released on Tuesdays, not Fridays, the move has attracted considerable industry attention and is viewed as the latest salvo in a bitter feud between the two studios.

“Do I take it personally? Sure I do,” says Disney marketing chief Oren Aviv. “Did they have to go out on our date? No. They chose to put it out on our date. It’s obvious that it’s not strategic, it’s personal; otherwise there’s no reason to do it.”

Katzenberg declined to comment. But DreamWorks marketing chief Terry Press responded: “Nobody sat in a room and decided on a Friday because of ‘Monsters, Inc.’ The reason was to have a big opening weekend. It doesn’t make sense to release DVDs on Tuesday anymore. I don’t see us cutting into their opening weekend at all. The ‘Shrek’ DVD won’t keep one parent from taking their child to see ‘Monsters, Inc.’ opening weekend.”

It’s hard to take DreamWorks’ claim that Friday is its new preferred date for DVD releases very seriously, because release of neither of its next two DVD releases, “Almost Famous” and “Evolution,” is scheduled for a Friday. The question of whether “Shrek’s” arrival in home video will cut into “Monster, Inc.’s” box-office gross is more complicated. Until now, the DVD boom hasn’t had any effect on theatrical box office. But this is the first time that a heavily promoted family hit has come out on home video the same day as a major film going after the same audience.

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It’s hard to imagine the move’s not being personal. There’s been bad blood between the two studios ever since Katzenberg was fired by Disney czar Eisner, Katzenberg’s mentor dating to their days at Paramount. Soon after, Katzenberg joined with Steven Spielberg and David Geffen to form DreamWorks. He also sued Disney for 2% of the future income from projects he’d put into production.

An ugly court case ensued, capped by an Eisner witness stand appearance at which he had to answer to charges that he’d denied Katzenberg his rightful earnings and called him a “little midget.” Katzenberg ultimately won a settlement of roughly $250 million, but the ill will has yet to melt away. As media titan Rupert Murdoch once observed: “DreamWorks, I mean, they are driven. They are about the destruction of Disney.”

It was inevitable that the feud would fester, especially because Katzenberg’s goal at DreamWorks has been to make the company a major player in animation, Disney’s core business. Ramping up DreamWorks’ animation wing, Katzenberg went after Disney talent, wooing away the likes of Brenda Chapman, who’d been a Disney animation story supervisor before directing “The Prince of Egypt” for DreamWorks, and “Lion King” composer Hans Zimmer, who has since done the music for numerous DreamWorks films.

In 1998, Katzenberg moved up the release of “Antz” so that it hit theaters just weeks ahead of Disney/Pixar’s “A Bug’s Life.” When Pixar chief Steve Jobs and “Bug’s Life” director John Lassiter complained that DreamWorks stole their idea, Katzenberg responded with typical overstatement, calling his rivals sore losers. “If they could have reversed the tables, they have shown many, many, many times that they’re much more predatory than all of us added together and multiplied by a thousand,” he told the Washington Post.

In an interview the other day, Lassiter took the high road, noting that when “Shrek” was released, he sent a big bunch of flowers to PDI, the computer graphics firm that worked on the film. (DreamWorks went flowerless.) As for the issue of “Shrek’s” home video release date, Lassiter said, “It’s for others to judge whether [the “Shrek” video release] is an attempt to hurt us. We’re not rooting for anyone to fail. For us, if everyone succeeds, it’s good for animation.” Lassiter can afford to be generous--after all, he lives in laid-back Sonoma, not the jungles of Beverly Hills. Down here everyone plays to win, including Disney. In 1994, when New Line released the animated film “The Swan Princess,” Disney crushed it by putting a re-release of “The Lion King” on the same date. In 1997, 20th Century Fox made a bid to crack the animation business with “Anastasia,” opening the film before Thanksgiving. Disney planted a re-release of “The Little Mermaid” on the same date, siphoning off a big chunk of “Anastasia’s” business.

Competitiveness is a primal urge; it’s wired into the DNA of Hollywood. The early moguls feuded during the day and played high-stakes poker together at night, gloating over every victory. Today’s executives are just as competitive, whether it’s at tennis, golf or opening weekend box-office bragging rights.

But if they gave Oscars for being maniacal competitors, it would be hard to keep Katzenberg away from the podium. After he left Disney, Katzenberg confessed to the New York Times that he had operated for a long time like a mercenary soldier.

“If someone poked me in the chest, I would hit them with a baseball bat. And if they hit me with a bat, I would blast them with a bazooka.... It’s a very hostile, angry and predatory way to live life.” Katzenberg’s friends say he’s changed, but his industry peers aren’t so sure. If he wants something, niceties don’t get in the way. When Katzenberg was looking for a new production chief earlier this year, he secretly tried to poach two of Universal’s top production executives, even though Universal distributes DreamWorks films on home video and overseas and regularly partners with DreamWorks on film financing.

As famously combative baseball manager Leo Durocher once put it: Nice guys finish last. People play hardball in show business too. But Hollywood is also built around relationships, and it matters how you play the game. Before Katzenberg starts campaigning for a “Shrek” Oscar, maybe he should watch his movie again. One reason the heartfelt fable is so widely loved is that it has a healing message: that beauty comes not from our accumulated wealth and power but from our inner self. Wouldn’t it be amazing if the people who rule Hollywood actually practiced what they preach in their own movies?

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