|
 In a complaint filed on Tuesday in New York State Supreme
Court in Manhattan, the Weinstein brothers and Miramax LLC said
executives at Warner Brothers and its New Line Cinema unit chose
to split "The Hobbit" as a pretext to deprive them of 5 percent
of the gross receipts from the last two films.
The Weinsteins said they had in 1998 sold New Line the movie
rights to "The Hobbit" and Tolkien's trilogy "The Lord of the
Rings," after having spent more than $10 million to adapt them.
They said New Line had agreed to make payments for the "first
motion picture," but not "remakes," based on the books.
"This case is about greed and ingratitude," said the Weinsteins
and Miramax, which the brothers founded. "Warner takes this
position solely to deprive plaintiffs of their right to share in
the revenues from two of the three filmed installments of 'The
Hobbit.'"
Warner Brothers countered that the Weinsteins simply made a
business mistake when they sold the film rights to New Line.
Paul McGuire, a Warner Brothers spokesman, said the studio filed
for arbitration on November 26 with JAMS Inc, a New York firm
once known as Judicial Arbitration and Mediation Services, to
resolve the dispute.
"This is about one of the great blunders in movie history,"
McGuire said. "Fifteen years ago Miramax, run by the Weinstein
brothers, sold its rights in 'The Hobbit' to New Line. No amount
of trying to rewrite history can change that fact. They agreed
to be paid only on the first motion picture based on 'The
Hobbit.' And that's all they're owed."
[to top of second column] |
 Tuesday's lawsuit is the latest litigation involving
the Weinsteins, who earlier this year battled with Warner Brothers
over the title of one of their films, which was eventually called
"Lee Daniels' The Butler."
The lawsuit over "The Hobbit" was filed three days before the
scheduled December 13 worldwide release of director Peter Jackson's
"The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug," the second of the three
planned "Hobbit" films.
The first film, "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey," was released in
2012 and grossed more than $1 billion worldwide.
David Boies and Motty Shulman, who are partners at Boies, Schiller &
Flexner, represent Miramax and the Weinsteins. They were not
immediately available on Wednesday for comment.
The case is Miramax LLC et al v. New Line Cinema Corp et al, New
York State Supreme Court, New York County, No. 161383/2013.
(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New
York; editing by Grant McCool)
[© 2013 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.] Copyright 2013 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
 |
