UPDATE: Video of Harvey Weinstein and all the attorneys involved in this mess of a case, talking about it on CBS This Morning, has surfaced, and is embedded at the bottom of this post. Within it, you’ll find a short clip from the film that we haven’t seen yet.
First, Sergio’s original post immediately below…
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It
should be obvious to anyone, of course, that this legal fight between Warner Bros and The Weinstein Company over the use of the title The Butler by TWC, is really about something else.
However what that “something else” might be has been
a mystery. Although it now seems that it’s finally becoming clearer what that is.
When two leading film studios act like spoiled little
children, something has to be is up, and it turns out it’s likely a squeeze play by Warners.
According to the New
York Post, all this is about Warner Bros trying to wrestle financial control
from another property that the Weinsteins have partial rights to.
And that property is The
Hobbit franchise.
In addition, Harvey Weinstein and attorney David Boies appeared on CBS This Morning to talk about the fight over the title to The Butler, when Harvey asserted that Warner Bros. is retaliating because of his rights to The Hobbit dating back to his and brother Bob’s early ownership of Lord of the Rings.
Of course Warner Bros. says it isn’t true.
According to lawyer David
Boies, who TWC has hired to defend their title battle, Warner is “holding
a major civil rights film hostage to extort unrelated concessions from TWC. And
that Warner Bros. is trying to use the title dispute as leverage to get the
Weinstein Company to give up their investment in an unrelated film.”
Both Harvey and Bob Weinstein own 2.5 percent of the over billion dollars that The Hobbit made worldwide, due to a rights deal that they made years ago involving the property.
And there has been an ongoing simmering dispute for some
time between the Weinsteins and Warner over what their stake would be from the
two Hobbit sequels that are being made.
All this has resulted in a squeeze power play by Warner to
force the Weinsteins, perhaps, to either give up their share, or to take a huge
reduction in their percentage, in the form of this legal battle over The Butler title.
Another reason why Hollywood is a cutthroat business…
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Here’s the CBS This Morning video:
