Bob Shaye Prediction Comes True

Published on: 29th February, 2008

Bob Shaye Prediction Comes True  | read this item

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The Bob Shaye outburst “Peter Jackson will not make The Hobbit while I’m in charge” came back and bit out the seat of his pants last night after New Line was folded by parent company Time Warner.

How different things would have been without those time and money sapping court cases is anyone’s guess but it couldn’t have been worse, that’s for sure.

His stubborness to back down from the confrontation with Peter Jackson, the maker of his most successful works, the LOTR franchise, set The Hobbit movies back years. Only when cornered with the threat of losing the rights to the movies did he finally back down.

The very public and expensive argument left New Line and Shaye in particular, looking very much the bad guy. LOTR fans worldwide sided with Jackson and demands for him to be involved in The Hobbit spread from the fan base to the stars of the movies who one by one stated they would “love to return for The Hobbit but only if Peter were to be involved.”

Having finally swallowed his pride just a few months ago by settling with Jackson to get him on board in some capacity, he was hit by yet another lawsuit, this time by the authors children and charitable trust.

Seeing another public slanging match on the horizon, this time with a highly regarded charity ‘The Tolkien Trust’ was probably the final nail in the coffin for New Line as far as Time Warner were concerned.

The bad press may have been ridden out had New Line been rolling out the winners but since the final installment of the LOTR the company has struggled. The success of Hairspray, Wedding Crashers and the recent Rush Hour 3 have been the exception rather than the norm.

A lot of Tolkien and Jackson fans will probably be happy to here of Shaye’s fall from power and I for one believe his stubborness has been a major stumbling block of The hobbit movies, it should be remembered though that the Lord Of The Rings movies would probably never have been made without him.

He shared Jackson’s vision when major players baulked at the costs involved. Remember, Peter Jackson had yet to make a hit and his dream of bringing Middle Earth to life was rejected time and again by the big studios. Only Bob Shaye was moved enough by Jacksons desire and vision to take a massive gamble and bank roll an unprecedented 18 month shoot in New Zealand. The gamble paid off and New Line became a big player and Shaye a millionaire. The rest as they say his history and will go down in movie making folklore.

We are told by Warner that The Hobbit will be unaffected by the closing of New Line and I see no reason to believe it would be shelved. Hopefully, cases can be settled out of court and once Jackson has finished with his “The Lovely Bones” project, writing will begin and with Del Toro in the directors seat, the planned 2010 Christmas release will be met.

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