Writers Guild is close to a deal with UA
Tom Cruise's independent film company could sign a contract Sunday and get back to work. Other companies may follow.
United Artists, the independent production unit of MGM headed by actor Tom Cruise and his longtime production partner, Paula Wagner, is expected to become the first movie company to cut an interim deal with the Writers Guild of America, enabling the recent start-up to hire union writers despite the continuing strike.
The guild, which has reached a deal with UA that is expected to be signed Sunday, is also in discussions with several other independent companies, including Lionsgate and the Weinstein Co. about similar interim agreements.
The agreement with UA would benefit the company's distributor and majority shareholder Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. in that it would supply the studio with ready-made releases once they are produced.
MGM, which unlike UA is a member company of the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, does not plan to break ranks with the Alliance's other major studios and sign a similar side deal with the guild, according to people close to the situation who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to talk publicly.
The strike, now in its second month, is largely over how much writers will get paid when their work is distributed over the Internet. UA is a relatively small player in Hollywood, and a deal with the company is not expected to have an immediate effect on the larger dispute.
In recent days, Harry Sloan, MGM's chief executive, has attempted to dissuade Wagner and Cruise from making an interim deal with the guild, those sources said. Wagner and Sloan are said to have had a long discussion about the matter on Friday. Sloan ultimately must defer to Wagner, who as chief executive of UA has the final word on how the company operates. They could not immediately be reached for comment.
Some people close to the matter cautioned that the deal between UA and the guild could still fall apart.
Wagner and Cruise, who have been production partners for more than 15 years, jointly own 35% of UA, with MGM and its equity partners controlling the majority shares.
Sloan had recruited Cruise and Wagner to resurrect UA as an independently run, artist-friendly production company that could help fill MGM's annual distribution pipeline. UA's debut film, "Lions for Lambs," a political drama directed by and starring Robert Redford, Cruise and Meryl Streep, bombed at the U.S. box office last year. The company's planned production, "Pinkville," to be directed by Oliver Stone, was derailed by the writers strike in the late fall because it was in need of a script rewrite.
The pending agreement with UA marks the second deal the guild has struck with an independent production company, following a recent agreement with Worldwide Pants Inc., the production company owned by talk show host David Letterman.
Securing such deals is part of a strategy by the guild to demonstrate that it can successfully reach an agreement containing the demands it was seeking with the major studios, including Internet residuals. The alliance broke off negotiations with the writers in December, portraying them as intransigent.
claudia.eller@latimes.com
richard.verrier@latimes.com
