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DWA Revamps Production Output |
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Monday, 29 January 2007 |
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The studio already has plans to keep those franchises alive in other ways. It is planning a spin-off of "Shrek" called "Puss in Boots," based on the swashbuckling cat voiced by Antonio Banderas. A "Shrek" Christmas TV special is in the works, as well as a Broadway musical for next year. It also is developing a TV series with Viacom Inc.'s Nickelodeon based on the penguins from "Madagascar."
But the real bucks are in feature films. DreamWorks President Lew Coleman says: "What we're really doing here is looking for sequels." While sequels are more expensive than the originals, they are less risky and usually more successful, he says. Because of the higher costs involved in luring back the talent, sequels can cost anywhere from $150 million to $170 million, versus $130 million for an original movie.
Among upcoming candidates for sequels, the storyline of "Bee Movie," about a disillusioned bee, doesn't particularly lend itself to a sequel, executives say (although Mr. Seinfeld himself might prove to be an animation franchise). "Kung Fu Panda" does, however. The tale of an ancient Chinese panda forced out of his armchair to learn kung fu to protect his village, it is being released the year of the Olympics in Beijing. In a show of confidence in the story, DreamWorks already plans to spin it off into a Nickelodeon TV series sometime after the movie comes out.
DreamWorks is working on two original movies for 2009: "Monsters vs. Aliens" and "How to Train Your Dragon," both potential franchises. "Monsters vs. Aliens" is B-movie style comedy about a squad of monsters who emerge from a secret military base to save the planet. "How to Train Your Dragon" is based on the book by Cressida Cowell about the son of a Viking who is on a mission to capture a dragon.
Those two movies will be the first to fully benefit from the extra year of work, which will stretch their production time to 41/2 years. Mr. Katzenberg says the extra year will be spent largely on developing the story of its movies, a relatively inexpensive exercise. He notes that if they had had the extra time on movies like "Madagascar," they could have worked on strengthening the final act, which wasn't as sharp as the first two acts of the movie.
"We've been getting the job done but we felt we could do better if we had more time," Mr. Katzenberg says. "It's a very small investment for a very high return."
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