Dreamworks Skg

The much-ballyhooed trio has already lined up $2 billion in financing, put more than 560 employees to work, made creative deals all over Hollywood and announced plans to build a new 100-acre studio on the west side of Los Angeles. This year, however, we get our first glimpse at what all this activity has wrought. That is the challenge for DreamWorks SKG and the partnership of, below from left, David Geffen, 52; Jeffrey Katzenberg, 45, and Steven Spielberg, 48. On Tuesday, ABC will unveil DreamWorks' debut TV series, "Champs," starring Timothy Busfield.

Steven Spielberg's struggling DreamWorks Studios has gotten a new lease on life thanks to a $200-million investment from its primary financier, India's Reliance Entertainment, said a person with knowledge of the matter unauthorized to speak publicly. Dreamworks' shortage of cash since late last year has left many in Hollywood nervous about its future. The company, led by Chief Executive Stacey Snider, sharply cut back on its development and production spending. The independent studio has only two movies set to come out this year - the low-budget drama "People Like Us" and the Spielberg-directed biopic "Lincoln" - compared with six in 2011, the first year that it released films in its current incarnation.

DreamWorks SKG in Universal City has agreed to acquire Pacific Data Images of Palo Alto for an undisclosed sum, the company said. The move follows the decision of PDI founder Carl Rosenthal to step down as chairman. DreamWorks acquired a 40% interest in PDI in 1996 in an exclusive deal to produce a series of animated films. PDI will continue to operate as a stand-alone business unit of DreamWorks. The new company will be called PDI/DreamWorks.

As Paramount Pictures moves to create an in-house animation division, its longtime partner DreamWorks Animation will be looking for a new home. With the expiration of the studios' distribution agreement looming at the end of 2012, the relationship between the two companies has become increasingly strained over financial issues including how much DreamWorks would pay Paramount to release its films. On Wednesday, it became apparent that negotiations had broken down and that the companies would almost certainly be going their separate ways, ending a partnership that began in 2006 when Paramount acquired DreamWorks Animation's live-action sibling studio, DreamWorks SKG. To emphasize the schism, Paramount, owned by Viacom Inc., announced that it planned to start making its own slate of animated movies beginning in 2014.

Ending an extended executive search and months of speculation about who would head its television division, DreamWorks SKG on Monday named Dan McDermott, an executive vice president at Fox Broadcasting Company. The appointment surprised some television executives because of McDermott's modest experience in development and because the new studio had seemed interested in attracting a marque talent.

Taking on yet another high-tech partner in its quest to become the model movie studio for the digital age, DreamWorks SKG said Tuesday it will work with International Business Machines Corp. to adapt the computer giant's "digital library" technology to the specific needs of the entertainment industry.

Financier and supermarket mogul Ron Burkle has expressed interest in becoming a partner in the troubled Playa Vista real estate project where DreamWorks SKG wants to build a studio, according to people close to the project. Burkle's interest is the latest twist in the saga of the much-hyped, $8-billion mixed-use project that each day teeters closer to unraveling altogether.

General Electric Co. directors Friday gave NBC Universal permission to move forward with negotiating a potential acquisition of the DreamWorks SKG live-action movie studio, according to three sources close to the matter. Approval from the media company's corporate parent, which came at a regular GE board meeting in New York, was needed before formal talks could start. The two sides are expected to negotiate exclusively. Executives from NBC Universal and DreamWorks declined to comment.

A proposal to lure DreamWorks SKG to Los Angeles with a massive package of tax breaks and other incentives drew an enthusiastic welcome from City Council members Tuesday, but a band of environmental activists promised to fight the development of 100 acres near Marina del Rey every step of the way.

Parties in the troubled, $8-billion Playa Vista real estate project where DreamWorks SKG wants to build its studio lot said Wednesday that they have reached a preliminary agreement to develop the property, a move that would halt foreclosure proceedings and lay the foundation to possibly get the stalled development off the ground by year's end.

The 1990s were the financial apogee of Hollywood, a period when billions in fresh capital flowed into the coffers of the studios in the expectation that the world had an infinitely expanding need for American entertainment. With new cable networks launching to fill the multi-channel universe and huge multiplexes sprouting in shopping centers across the country, the demand for a steady supply of TV shows and movies to fill the pipeline was projected to be limitless. It was a happy time to be a movie producer.

Nearly a year after embarking on plans to relaunch DreamWorks as an independent studio, Steven Spielberg finally has the financial means to greenlight his own movies. DreamWorks said Monday that it had finalized the first phase of a long-in-the-works funding deal that paves the way for the production company to be fully operational. The funds, which will enable DreamWorks to make 18 to 20 films over the next three years, include $325 million in bank debt and a matching equity investment from Spielberg's 50% partner, India's Reliance Big Entertainment.

Walt Disney Co., looking to bolster its movie operation, is close to making a distribution pact with Steven Spielberg's new DreamWorks studio. The surprise development comes after DreamWorks and Universal Studios failed to reach final terms on a distribution agreement announced in October. Despite months of negotiations in the home stretch, Universal was unwilling to grant DreamWorks and its partner, India's Reliance Entertainment, all the cash and concessions they demanded.

Meg Whitman, the former chief executive of EBay Inc., has resigned from the board of directors of the online auction company and two other corporations, fueling speculation that she is preparing for a 2010 run for California governor. The resignations, which were effective Wednesday, from EBay, Procter & Gamble Co. and DreamWorks SKG were made for personal reasons, Whitman spokesman Henry Gomez said Monday. Gomez declined to comment "on anything having to do with the governor's race."

In a move that brings Steven Spielberg closer to reestablishing his independence, Universal Pictures will distribute the movies produced by the filmmaker's new DreamWorks studio. However, Spielberg and partner Stacey Snider's ambitious plans to fund their venture have been slowed by the global credit crisis. The new DreamWorks is seeking to raise about $1.2 billion in equity and debt to operate the company and fund movie production.

Ending a short-lived and bitter relationship, DreamWorks SKG, the movie studio founded by Steven Spielberg, and Paramount Pictures said Sunday that a deal had been struck to part ways. The pact, resembling an amicable divorce settlement with joint custody of about 40 movie projects, came rather smoothly and faster than expected in light of the tense relations between the two studios. Paramount's parent, Viacom Inc., acquired DreamWorks for $1.6 billion in 2006.

The giddy high point in fledgling DreamWorks SKG's short history came a month ago when it scored a best picture Oscar for "American Beauty." Just five days after the applause died down, the studio slammed back to Earth when its animated feature film "The Road to El Dorado" opened. Anemic ticket sales assured their expensive animated movie would be a big money loser. For most studios, a single animated dud would be a short, painful event soon forgotten.

Viacom Inc.'s year-old acquisition of DreamWorks SKG's live-action studio has been, at times, more of a nightmare than a dream. A year after David Geffen, Steven Spielberg and Jeffrey Katzenberg sold the studio for $1.6 billion to Viacom's Paramount Pictures, simmering tensions, backbiting and internal power plays between the co-founders and the new owner suggest a case of sellers' remorse. The self-described "Dream team" seems to be having trouble adjusting to its new home. And that comes as little surprise to Hollywood.

Reliance Entertainment of India and DreamWorks SKG are close to finalizing a deal to set up a new film company, three people familiar with the negotiations said, allowing Steven Spielberg and others to split from Viacom Inc.'s Paramount Pictures subsidiary. The group has been looking to raise as much as $1.7 billion for the new venture, one person said on condition of anonymity because negotiations are continuing. The deal would end an acrimonious relationship between DreamWorks and Paramount, which bought the moviemaking machine behind "Transformers" and "Dreamgirls" for $1.6 billion in 2006.

With divorce between DreamWorks SKG and Viacom Inc.'s Paramount Pictures a given, the only issue now is who gets custody of the children. Like custody battles anywhere, this one could get nasty. In the coming weeks, DreamWorks will begin the complicated business of dissolving their bitter 2 1/2 -year union, leaving in limbo hundreds of movie projects, employees, talent and producers who work for the company.