Outgoing Alliance Communications cofounder and ceo Robert Lantos opened the Rogers Industry Forum yesterday morning, with a keynote address outlining his objectives and reasons for returning to creative production and away from corporate responsibilities.

The charismatic Lantos stressed that his new production company Serendipity Point has no plans for going public. ‘Absolutely not,’ Lantos said firmly but with a smile. ‘No shareholders. No partners.’

Lantos’ desire to return to his producing roots was the major catalyst in the Alliance/Atlantis Communications merger tabled in May that will see ex-rival Atlantis ceo Michael MacMillan take over the combined entity along with an Atlantis-dominated management team.

Lantos has a slate of projects with Serendipity. ‘I have taken all my favorite projects with me,’ Lantos said, including eXistenZ, Taste of Sunshine, Denys Arcand’s 15 Moments, Barney’s Version, In the Skin of the Lion, Power Play (ctv) and Cover Me (cbc).

With a Wednesday shareholder meeting looming that is expected to rubber-stamp the merger, the 49-year-old Hungarian-born Canadian entertainment king sat down for an interview with Brian D. Johnson, Maclean’s film critic to discuss all things Lantos.

In discussing the merger, Johnson said because he’s a film critic and not a business writer, he still didn’t quite understand the concept of a friendly reverse takeover. ‘It sounds like the plot synopsis of a Canadian movie,’ he said, drawing laughter from the audience.

Lantos said that when he approached then Atlantis president MacMillan about merging in order to ‘do battle’ with the Disneys and Viacoms, ‘I felt we were too small, and I said to Michael, `You’re way too small.’ ‘

He says MacMillan was most interested in running the company, but ‘that wasn’t the most important thing for me. I did not want to spend my life in quest of money and power. It’s a seductive pursuit. The power to run a company comes with an enormous amount of responsibility. The power to enjoy the fruits of it is severely limited.’

Another audience member expressed concern about encouraging diversity and ‘real creativity,’ but Lantos didn’t share the questioner’s concern. ‘The great thing about real creativity is that you can’t keep it down,’ he replied. ‘The fact that there’s a bigger company in this country than there was before is not a burden. The creativity doesn’t have to come from the individual management of a company. It comes from the grassroots, the people who are creating. So Alliance Atlantis is a well-financed home for creativity.’