After 11 years of trying to be a "big" independent movie studio, Paramount Pictures has agreed to purchase DreamWorks SKG. While the sale was no surprise, its who bought them that sent a ripple through Hollywood last week. Universal Pictures had been courting DreamWorks for over six months, reported the LA Times and it was assumed because Universal had long been DreamWorks distribution arm and working relationship with Steven Speilberg they would put in the winning bid.
But all that came to end when Paramount bought the studio for $1.5 billion. Paramount chairman Brad Grey would gain control of DreamWorks' live-action movie production facilities and its previously produced films, including Academy Award winners Gladiator and American Beauty. Paramount would also gain distribution rights to DreamWorks Animation films, but not to the film profits themselves, since Jeffrey Katzenberg-headed DreamWorks Animation became independent last year and would not be included in the purchase.
Back in 1994, Spielberg, Katzenberg and music mogul David Geffen formed DreamWorks SKG in hopes of making a mark in the music, television, films and internet with a new digital facility to be built near Los Angeles. But the music label was eventually dropped, as it was losing money and the studio all but shuttered its TV distribution and abandoned the video game business and all the plans they had for the internet as investors went elsewhere.
Meanwhile, this will now put all and any further attempts to revive the Star Trek franchise on indefinite hold. While Rick Berman has said that an 11th feature is in development, expect Paramount not to go forward with any film -or new TV series- for some time. This purchase has affected all of Paramount’s products, which includes the startrek.com web site, which is expected to go dark by years end and the magazine, Star Trek Communicator.
However, Larry Nemecek, the managing editor of The Star Trek Communicator, said he was confident that the official Star Trek fan club would continue in the wake of Decipher's announcement that the company would cease publication of the magazine.
"The recent note by Decipher on its website is a follow-up to essentially what happened when it closed out its Publishing division July 1," Nemecek wrote to The Trek Nation. "I hope fans can separate the Official Fan Club and Communicator magazine as a longtime entity from Decipher the company, since Decipher has only been the licensee since 2001." Nemecek explained that the company founded by Dan Madsen, who ran the official fan club and magazine from 1980 through 2001, sold the Star Trek properties to Decipher.
Nemecek explained that the Viacom-CBS split that has affected Paramount Digital Entertainment and has left the future of StarTrek.com in limbo is affecting the relaunch of the fan club and magazine. The editor had said at the Las Vegas Creation convention in August that he expected a new licensee within a few months, but it is taking longer because of the corporate restructuring. "My own sticking with the project - the magazine - has been based on a scenario that still seems to be working out, hopefully soon to be announced," he said.
It is still very much true, as you quoted me from August, that 'Paramount will not let the Fan Club and Communicator die,'" Nemecek added. "I am certain that there is plenty of Star Trek to cover, both old and new, fan and pro, to make this worthwhile and exciting, or I would not have staked my immediate future to it." He said that he was confident that StarTrek.com would find a new home as well.
But in the end, Star Trek is not a top priority for Paramount at this time, and with the box office and critical failure of the last big screen film, Nemesis, and the troubled four season long and now canceled Star Trek: Enterprise, expect Brad Grey not to go forward with anything new with the franchise for a few more years.
While Trek will be back -and God knows, it will - the fans will just have to sit back and wait. As I posted some days ago, the franchise can be saved if it does not kow-tow to the lowest common denominator. Fans want a great action adventure show, but they also want shows and movies that follow in Roddenberry’s original intent.
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