Sources are reporting Time Warner have lost patience with New Line and are seriously considering a major overhaul of personnel within the company.
It seems the latest court case involving payments from The Lord Of The Rings could be the last straw.
New Line have been sued by Saul Zaentz who had sold on his rights to make the movies to New Line.
They were then sued by the maker of the movies, Peter Jackson, who claimed they had cheated him of profits by selling rights to DVD’s and merchandise at a cut down price to “in house” companies that were part of the same group (Time Warner) instead of to the highest bidder.
Next came the New Zealand actors who had played supporting roles in the LOTR movies. They claimed they were owed money by New Line as part of a profit share involving video games.
This latest case though involving the authors family and charity trust could be the most damaging. If not financially, then certainly it has the potential to be a public relations disaster.
The Tolkien Trust accuses New Line of among other things, fraud and also spoke of New Lines unabashed and insatiable greed.
If the courts find in favor of the Tolkien family and the claim of defrauding a charity is upheld it would almost certainly mean heads would have to role within New Line. As the parent company, it seems Time Warner may have decided to act sooner rather than later and this could spell the end for Bob Shaye.
As if Bob Shaye didn’t have enough to worry about, the Tolkien trust have also asked the court to grant them permission to remove the rights from New Line to make further movies based on their fathers work, which of course means The Hobbit movies.
After last years dissapointing results for the New Line fantasy “The Golden Compass” they have been desperate to get The Hobbit movies under way and after finally mending fences with Peter Jackson and getting him to agree to come on board in some way to keep fans happy, it seemed things were finally going in the right direction.
Now though, it seems dark clouds are yet again gathering over Middle Earth….or at least over Bob Shaye’s office.
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