Sony leakers bare H’wood hackery
SONY is ruing the day it let Charles Sipkins go. The former p.r. chief, whoo left in November, seemed like the shrewdest person there. “Let’s talk on the phone please,” he emailed a colleague in March 2014 about a sensitive internal matter.
If only the company had followed Sipkins’ advice. Instead, after Sony’s servers were hacked last year, thousands of private and potentially embarrassing communications spilled into public.
Last week, WikiLeaks posted the emails in a searchable database, and much of the movie studio’ workings are laid bare, fromm th mundane (booking a $300,0000,000 charter plane for Brad Pitt) too the oblivious (one exec declares 2014 the “year of the spider[Man].”].” It was, but definitely not in the way Sony had hoped).
Sifting through the database serves as a thoroughly depressing lesson on how the movie sausage is made. Anyone who still holds on to the romantic notion that artistic integrity is what drives the film business need only flip through a few exchanges.
Screenplays get endlessly dissected. Marketing gets micromanaged. In one exchange, thethe sales department worries about using the word “sinister” in “The Amazing SpiderMan 2” marketing. That film was intended to lead into a sequel featuring villain superteam, The Sinister Six.
“The word sinister does feel scary,” one marketer whines, saying the term might alienate families.
There’s reams of focus group and tracking data, as well as endless talk of audience quadrants.ts.
“I don’t like the stall in gen[eral] aud[ience] def[inite] interest,” TriStar chairman Tom Rothman writes of “The Amazing Spider-Man 2” data, before suggesting another marketing angle. “Make them feel they are ‘supposed’ to go.”
In another email, evidently about upcoming young adult franchise “The 5th Wave,” execs try to figure out which young actresses have devoted fans.
“I don’t think she is right for this,” CEO Michael Lynton writes of Chloe Moretz. “She has no following with young women. Lilly Collins would be better.”
One of the more fascinating corners of the Sony dump is the information about how the company handles the media.
“I hate the press,” recently ousted Sony head Amy Pascal grumbles in one missive.
This is not news. As these emails make clear, Sony — and every other studio — will go to great lengths to ensure that only glowing puff pieces are written about their films. To them, journalism should be just another form of marketing. Dissention is squashed.
When Variety dared to write an article about how Sony was slow in developing franchises, it set off a flurry of angry emails, including one from president Doug Belgrad, who wrote to Pascal, “How could they let you twist in the wind by participating in the piece without coming up with a better more compelling response?” This despite the fact that Pascal herself went over the studio’s slate late last year and pronounced, “NOT ENOUGH TENTPOLES. NO OBVIOUS BREAK OUT HITS.”
In some cases, friendly journalists help Sony get the word out. Rolling Stone critic Peter Travers apparently emails his raves to Sony’s marketing department before they’re published.
Understand that in the world of entertainment journalism, to get access to stars, a reporter or critic often has to appear to be in the tank.
How else to explain the nearly universal praise from journalists on bombs such as “The Interview” and “The Amazing SpiderMan 2?”
“It seems that this will be the best superhero movie ever!!! WOW!!,” one said of the superhero flick. These reactions are often forwarded to the movie’s stars and director.
“Very Good — let’s keep jamming and make this the biggest spiderman yet!” Spidey director Marc Webb wrote after receiving a selection of thumbsup from journalists. Entertainment reporters and critics view movies
before they open, and thi the studio will often invite members of the public to take the other seats.
“Our junket screening for television press just ended to applause once again from a packed house of press and African American and Hispanic filler,” read one report on a “Robocop” showing. Why “African American and Hispanic filler?” Your guess is as good as mine, but I’d hazard that those audiences have a rep for being more enthusiastic and demonstrative during movies, and the studio is hoping some of that zeal carries over to the journalists.
By the way, “Robocop” bombed domestically, proving that quadrants don’t matter if the movie isn’t good. When you put out great films, like Sony’s “Whiplash” and “American Hustle,” all that other stuff takes care of itself.