It sure is a gamble to invest in films—but not quite a gamble if you are a billionaire; it's just a game. Just as changing cars or keeping up with the latest yachts or private jets—it sure is a status boost to produce the top film of the year. What if it's a movie with the latest cars, yachts, private jets and the top stars; "The Tourist" tries to just do that—whether it makes a good film; that's a wild ass guess.
11:00 AM ET
Two billionaires are about to go head to head in a box office battle. On Dec. 10 Philip Anschutz's The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader will face off against Tim Headington and his Johnny Depp/Angelina Jolie thriller The Tourist. It is not the first time these billionaires have made big Hollywood bets. The two tycoons have plenty of company. Dozens of billionaires have spent excess cash funding the risky but sometimes glamorous business of Hollywood films. Some have scored big returns; others bankrolled flops.
Tim Headington has experienced both. Headington, who sold a piece of his family's stake in North Dakota's Bakken shale to
XTO Energy for $1.8 billion and has a personal net worth of $2.65 billion, has backed two Martin Scorsese/Leonardo DiCaprio hits: The Aviator (five Oscars) and The Departed (four Oscars, including Best Picture). But he experienced bad timing with The Edge of Darkness, featuring beleaguered star Mel Gibson. That film grossed just $80 million on a budget of $80 million. He'll get another shot for box office bullion with The Tourist. His other Depp film, The Rum Diaries, is set to debut in 2011.In Pictures: Billionaires Bet On The Box Office
Anschutz, who ranks 34th on the 2010 Forbes 400 list with a net worth of $7 billion, earned a Best Picture Oscar for the Jamie Foxx hit Ray. The Ray Charles biopic was a departure from the family-friendly flicks often produced by Anschutz' Walden Media. Besides the Narnia franchise, Anschutz has backed tame films like Holes, Hoot and The Tooth Fairy. Anschutz' fortune stems from investments in the railroad business, fiber optics (with
Qwest Communications ) and entertainment venues throughAEG , which controls 120 sports and entertainment venues, including the Staples Center in Los Angeles.
EBay billionaire and former president Jeff Skoll usually produces films with a social message. His company, Participant Media, funded Al Gore's climate change documentary An Inconvenient Truth. That film won an Oscar for Best Documentary and helped Al Gore score the Nobel Peace Prize. Other influential films include Food Inc. and Waiting for Superman. He had less luck with the clumsy comedy Furry Vengeance, about forest critters getting revenge on a land developer. That movie cost $35 million and grossed $36 million. Skoll, a Canadian who no longer works for eBay, has a net worth of $2.4 billion on Forbes' 2010 World's Billionaires list.Israeli billionaire Arnon Milchan has had his share of hits and misses too. Milchan has produced hits like Fight Club and the classic comedy Pretty Woman, which grossed a robust $460 million on a scant $14 million budget. But he also backed the Tom Green bomb Freddy Got Fingered, which won five Razzie awards and was nominated for the worst film of the decade. Milchan ranked No. 249 on the 2010 Forbes World's Billionaires list with a $3.6 billion fortune. He turned his family's fertilizer business into a company with interests that include agriculture, aerospace, fiber optics and pharmaceuticals.
Other billionaires who have dabbled in the film business include NBA Mavericks owner Mark Cuban (net worth: $2.5 billion), cable king Gary Magness (the movie Precious), private equity boss Tom Gores (net worth $2.4 billion), Jones Apparel cofounder Sidney Kimmel and TV queen Oprah Winfrey.
For billionaires Steven Spielberg and George Lucas, movie-making is not a hobby but the source of their fortunes. Spielberg, a cofounder of
DreamWorks Animation , received a $325 million investment from India's Reliance Industries last year; he also signed a new distribution deal withDisney . His endless string of hits includes ET, Indiana Jones, Star Wars, Jaws, Saving Private Ryan, Schindler's List and Catch Me If You Can--to name just a few. Disney will release his sci-fi film I am number 4 in early 2011.George Lucas is the mind behind the Star Wars franchise and head of special effects firm Industrial Light and Magic. His six Star Wars films have earned more than $4.3 billion worldwide from the box office. Toys, merchandise, videogames and more have grossed more than $20 billion.
No comments:
Post a Comment