That’s the way things have been going for Tartikoff these days. Five months into the job, the man hired to bring Paramount back to glory can’t shake his image as an interloping upstart, a “TV guy” with a knack for offending many of Hollywood’s leading players. What’s the problem? Some insiders say Tartikoff brought it on himself-sounding off in the press, ruffling egos and ignoring Hollywood basics such as building relationships with actors, producers and directors. That could be harmful to Paramount, since Tartikoff may be turning away the people he’ll need to revive the troubled studio. “At the network Brandon was emperor, but dealing with movie players is a whole new game,” says one Hollywood lawyer. Tartikoff, meanwhile, insists the sniping is “jealousy”–business as usual in Hollywood. In an industry starved for hits, he points to Paramount’s “The Addams Family,” which grossed $44 million through Friday night, as a sign he’s off to a promising start. Says Paramount’s chief operating officer Stanley Jaffe: “Anyone who wants to judge him on the basis of five months is an idiot.”
Certainly Paramount has nowhere to go but up. The studio dominated the industry for much of the 1980s, but its market share slipped from 22 percent to 15 percent in five years. In fact, the studio lost money on 12 straight films in 1990 and 1991. Political backstabbing and defections have wounded the studio, too. Jerry and David Zucker, directors of “Ghost” and “The Naked Gun 2 1/2,” abandoned Paramount last July for Columbia Pictures. Frank Mancuso, who oversaw the decline, was squeezed out last March by Paramount Communications Inc. chairman Martin Davis.
Tartikoff seemed the ideal replacement. At NBC he’d rejuvenated the dead-last network with hugely popular sitcoms (“The Cosby Show”), innovative dramas (“Hill Street Blues”) and pulp (“The A-Team”). By last fall, Tartikoff was restless. “I didn’t want to be some guy 50 years old, keeled over a set of programming squares, trying to fix Friday night at NBC,” he says over a bagel at a Beverly Hills noshery. In April agent Michael Ovitz brought Jaffe and Tartikoff together at the Bel Air Hotel; three meetings followed. Jaffe told friends that hiring Tartikoff was “one of the most important days” in Paramount’s history.
Despite the early missteps, Tartikoff has clearly brought new energy to Paramount. One priority was to smooth relations with Eddie Murphy, who had an exclusive deal with Paramount but, says Jaffe, “didn’t want to work on this lot.” Tartikoff put a romantic comedy starring Murphy, “Boomerang,” into production, Murphy’s first film in more than a year. “Paramount is showing enthusiasm about Eddie–thanks to Brandon,” says his manager Mark Lipsky, who claims the studio had previously given Murphy few ideas. Tartikoff also moved decisively to “green-light” bigbudget movies that were in development, including the $43 million “Patriot Games,” based on Tom Clancy’s novel and starring Harrison Ford. He has brainstormed with writer-producers he nurtured at NBC.
Yet the defining moment of Tartikoff’s first months was the Nov. 8 release of “All I Want for Christmas,” a $12 million kids’ movie shot without big stars and on a short production schedule. To many Hollywood players, the film confirmed their suspicion that Tartikoff was a TV hack; they were irate that he sermonized loudly about his cut-rate strateENSON gy. “Everybody in town was rooting for the film to fail,” admits one top producer. They may get their wish. The film has taken in $11.5 million and is fading; Tartikoff says it needs to gross $18 million at the U.S. box office to break even. Tartikoff defends the movie as one part of an eclectic slate and says agents, producers and directors are threatened because if “Christmas” works, “[studio] owners will say, ‘Why are we spending $90 million on “Hook”?”’ He says the film community has to face reality that costs must come down: “[Director] Rob Lieberman for ‘Christmas’ cost one tenth of what Mike Nichols cost on ‘Regarding Henry,’ and I’ll bet Mike Nichols couldn’t have done a better job.”
That’s the kind of attitude, critics say, that hasn’t endeared him to the film community. Another rap: his pattern of not returning phone calls for days or even weeks–a cardinal sin in Hollywood, where seven studios are competing for the same handful of hot properties. Says one agent: “Tartikoff was bad at NBC, and he’s worse here.” Steve Tisch, producer of “Risky Business,” says he’s “frustrated” by Tartikoff ’s detachment but adds, “I want him to succeed.” Some agents, annoyed by Tartikoff, say they’ve gone over his head to Jaffe’ Tartikoff admits he’s been neglectful, explaining he’s consumed by story meetings and other matters. “I’m embarrassed by it,” he says. He insists he’ll improve.
Sometimes it seems Tartikoff just can’t get a break. Last winter Harrison Ford agreed to make a $45 million action film, “Night Ride Down,” taking himself off the market for six months while the script was reworked. In August, Ford withdrew because he didn’t like the third revision. Tartikoff then announced in a press conference he was pulling the plug on the film, citing budget concerns. Tartikoff’s published comments made it sound as though he was yanking the project out from under Ford. “It was a slap in the face,” says one Ford associate, who blames Tartikoff ’s inexperience. Tartikoff says his remarks were “mis-interpreted by reporters.” In any event, Ford’s anger soon passed: he agreed to do “Patriot Games” for a reported $9 million.
His demeanor in meetings has deepened the impression that he doesn’t yet grasp the movie business. In November Tartikoff met with Scott Rudin (producer of “The Addams Family”) and his lawyers and agents to negotiate the terms of hiring Rudin as his president of film production. Tartikoff was detached. He showed ignorance of basic movie finances, such as the percentage of revenues produced by domestic sales. Others at the meeting were surprised. Tartikoff says, “if I seemed uninvolved, it was because [they wanted] to gouge me, not close the deal.” (John Goldwyn, a Paramount vice president, got the job last week.) Tartikoff has also displayed a TV mentality that, critics say, often doesn’t mesh with movies: last summer he proposed a second sequel to “Beverly Hills Cop,” the 1984 hit starring Eddie Murphy. Tartikoff’s concept: Axel Foley arrives on assignment in Australia, steps in a taxi and finds himself face to face with his driver…Crocodile Dundee.
Is Tartikoff in real trouble? Nearly everyone in Hollywood agrees it’s far too early to judge, and Tartikoff has plenty of champions. Paramount’s Martin Davis insists: “We’re very, very satisfied.” In addition, Tartikoff’s TV contacts and costcutting approach could rejuvenate an industry reeling from megabudget flops. But churning out more low-budget schlock like “Christmas” clearly isn’t going to work, nor is antagonizing the Hollywood establishment. Remember David Puttnam? The iconoclastic British producer was appointed chairman of Columbia Pictures in 1986 and proceeded to alienate many top stars and agents-albeit for championing highbrow projects like “The Cory Aquino Story.” One year later, Puttnam was gone. Hollywood will be watching to see if history repeats itself.
