Apparently UA/MGM felt otherwise. "There is a complete alignment of interests in this deal," MGM chief operating officer Rick Sands told the AP today. "They are equity owners in the company and they share with us in the upside."
UA — home of such classics as Some Like It Hot, Midnight Cowboy, the Rocky, Pink Panther, and James Bond series, and Rain Man, which co-starred Cruise and won four Oscars in 1988 — has been mostly dormant of late, which Sands expects Cruise and Wagner to change dramatically, saying the pair is free to make big budget action films starring Cruise, and low budget arty flicks as well. "It really depends on what they as the creative executives want to produce," Sands said. "It's a real studio that we are reinventing."
Sands doesn't care about that wacky Scientology/love freak stuff either. "We believe Tom is a terrific creative force," Sands said. "If you look at his track record, he's generated huge box office and we believe the relationship of being a partner is different from a studio/actor relationship."
Sounding a similar note, MGM chairman and chief executive, Harry Sloan, told the New York Times that Creative Artists Agency, the Hollywood talent giant representing Cruise and a number of the industry's biggest stars, would be actively involved in United Artists’ future. "The studios and talent don’t trust each other. We need to start a dialogue."
"The talent friendly studio will be reborn as a place where producers, writers, directors and actors can thrive in a creative environment," sang out MGM's written announcement regarding the deal today.
Article comments
1 - Joan Hunt
I'm tellin' ya, Cruise's split with Paramount was a bold and calculated move on his part. Up the crazy and watch 'em fire you, come back with a huge deal allowing you greater latitude and creative control. Who wins in this equation? Cruise.
It's a payoff on a plan set in motion a couple years ago and only recently accelerated to coincide with his dnarrowing window of opportunity.
2 - Silas Kain
There goes the stock prices. UA will be bankrupt within 24 months.
3 - Eric Olsen
crazy like a fox, eh?
UA is just a unit of MGM now - actually, from a purely business standpoint, Cruise's record is pretty good.
4 - Dave Nalle
Charlie Chaplin is spinning silently in his grave.
Dave
5 - Marcie
Wha tif Tom made a movie and nobody came?
6 - darlene sammarco
I'm creating a video documentary on psychiatric
forced institutionalization, forced drugs, video of psychiatric abuse, including Clozaril death of my grandson Jona, use of my daughter in ECT/ Clozaril Research without her consent, causing a seizure disorder and heart attack, and videos of other victims of psychiatric torture. I have been friends with Scientology staff for years.[Holly, Carley, Brenda in Minneapolis. I can send you a Video trailer of :Swimming With Sharks in Minnesota if you are interested.
If interested,I'll send you a video "trailer".]
7 - darlene sammarco
I'm creating a video documentary on psychiatric
forced institutionalization, forced drugs, video of psychiatric abuse, including Clozaril death of my grandson Jona, use of my daughter in ECT/ Clozaril Research without her consent, causing a seizure disorder and heart attack, and videos of other victims of psychiatric torture. I have been friends with Scientology staff for years.[Holly, Carley, Brenda in Minneapolis. I can send you a Video trailer of :Swimming With Sharks in Minnesota if you are interested.
If interested,I'll send you a video "trailer".]