Asset or liability?

Those questioning the maturity of the Canadian filmed entertainment industry need look no further than the auspicious production deal Robert Lantos has negotiated for himself with Alliance Atlantis.

The colorful and always quotable Lantos is now in a position unique to virtually all other Canadian producers in that he has a funding pool equal to more than five times what Telefilm spent via its Feature Film Fund last year with which to finance his projects. In aac, he has a guarantee of worldwide distribution and a profit-sharing package, which means that if those projects do well at the box office, Lantos does even better. Not a particularly harsh position in which to find oneself.

This is a $100 million deal that only Lantos could have asked for and received. And despite all that talk on the street – ‘If Robert keeps this up he’ll be able to buy back his company in five years’ – the synergies will most likely pay off for both Lantos and aac, and by proxy, the rest of the entertainment industry. Another Sweet Hereafter would be good for everybody.

But what of Lantos’ other proven track record? The one that finds him always willing to be outspoken for what he thinks is fair and just and the one leading to widespread scuttlebutt that a Lantos unrestrained by shareholders is a liability for Michael MacMillan and aac.

‘I am unwilling to be conned, bribed or coerced into silence,’ he said earlier this month in a speech given upon the acceptance of the J. Stuart Mackay Communicator of the Year Award from Ryerson Polytechnic University.

‘Even as ceo of a publicly traded company, I never worried about the consequences of speaking the truth. Can you imagine how free I feel now to tell it the way it is?’

The way it was that day, according to Lantos, was a pointed attack on CanWest Global, and its ceo Izzy Asper in particular, with not subtle allusions to ‘rebroadcasters. . . walking around with the ‘Order of Canada in their lapels.’

Lantos’ contempt for CanWest is no secret. Alliance shareholders never expected the company to sell drama series to Global, and through the course of its life span it never did. But shareholders of Atlantis did expect their company to do business with CanWest, and those holding stock in the new company expect the same, and the real question is whether Lantos’ comments will be interpreted by the industry and the public at large as a reflection of aac.

Those CanWest folk have both a long memory and ownership of Fireworks Entertainment, which produces industrial Cancon in the family of Psi Factor and Outer Limits. Since cbc isn’t in that game and ctv is vowing to move away from it, alienating Global isn’t ideal.

For his part, MacMillan says Lantos’ public position doesn’t impact aac, although the events of the last two weeks are already requiring a degree of damage control. In a speech to the Canadian Club a week after the now infamous Order of Canada diatribe from Lantos, MacMillan referred to ‘those self-loathing cynics and defeatists who say only Americans can make entertaining television. . . the naysayers whose free-market worship is so dogmatic that it fails to notice that there are some things in this world that are not the natural result of market forces.’

To think that he is referring to certain Canadian broadcasters is an ‘incorrect interpretation,’ says MacMillan. ‘I was referring to those who say Canadian content is not culture it’s just a commodity – it’s more a shot at [MPAA head] Jack Valenti. I wasn’t talking about broadcasters at all.’

Fair enough, but one can see how Lantos’ words might lead some to misinterpret MacMillan.

‘He [Lantos] doesn’t speak for the company,’ says MacMillan. ‘He used to, but he doesn’t anymore.’

Interesting times, these.