‘Geisha’ caught in new turmoil

Ever since director Rob Marshall’s “Chicago” won six Academy Awards earlier this year, Hollywood has been rife with speculation about when the filmmaker will step behind the cameras again. Now Marshall himself is beginning to ask the same question.

For more than a month, Marshall and three studios -- Miramax, Sony and DreamWorks -- have been caught in a battle involving “Memoirs of a Geisha,” the long-delayed, much-anticipated adaptation of Arthur S. Golden’s bestselling novel. Marshall wants to direct the film as his next movie, but “Chicago” producer Miramax, to whom Marshall owes a film, has not been willing to release the director from that contractual obligation without getting something in return.

The resulting stalemate has left Marshall furious at Miramax, several colleagues say, and stalled production on a film that already has passed through three directors’ hands. The skirmish reveals the behind-the-scenes wrangling that happens on many movie deals, and helps explain why it often takes so long to bring even coveted projects to the screen.

That Miramax would clash with Marshall might seem odd since “Chicago” is among the biggest hits in the studio’s history, with a worldwide theatrical gross exceeding $300 million. But Miramax has a long -- and, to some rival studios, unpopular -- history of aggressively enforcing its contractual rights. Miramax has an unmatched track record unearthing talented young actors and directors. As part of its deal making, the studio often hires these unknowns on condition they pledge future jobs to Miramax. Such was the case with the 42-year-old Marshall.

The “Geisha” fray is not unlike several other recent skirmishes involving Miramax and options, as these rights are often called. An option Lasse Hallstrom owed Miramax prevented the Swedish filmmaker from directing DreamWorks’ “Catch Me If You Can.”

Sony’s Columbia Pictures and DreamWorks, the two studios co-producing “Geisha,” have offered Miramax a variety of inducements to help spring Marshall from his Miramax pact, including, of all things, Sony’s U.S. theatrical rights to “Rambo: First Blood Part II.” Both sides have discussed if DreamWorks, which is distributing “Geisha” overseas, could give Miramax distribution rights to the film in two major foreign territories. DreamWorks absolved Miramax of an earlier obligation to share the production of a future, unspecified Miramax film.

Finally, Marshall personally promised two weeks ago that he would make his very next film after “Geisha” for Miramax, but Miramax still refused to budge, as the studio believes it already is legally entitled to that obligation. Miramax is now asking that it become a one-third partner in “Geisha,” an ultimatum Columbia and DreamWorks say they cannot accept. Even though preliminary “Geisha” casting has already begun, there is no scheduled start of production. Since late 1997, when it pledged nearly $1 million for movie rights to Golden’s novel about a girl sold into slavery, Columbia has been unable to get the film on track.

DreamWorks co-founder Steven Spielberg initially was going to direct the film but left to pursue other projects, although he remains as one of the film’s producers. Then “Being John Malkovich” filmmaker Spike Jonze briefly flirted with the film, followed by “Boys Don’t Cry” director Kimberly Peirce. Ron Bass (“Entrapment”) and Akiva Goldsman (“A Beautiful Mind”) have written drafts of “Geisha’s” screenplay.

Marshall, a theater director and choreographer who made his film directing debut with “Chicago,” surfaced as the latest director in June, three months after his movie musical won the best picture Academy Award (the film won five other Oscars, and was nominated for 13 overall).

But problems with Miramax surfaced almost immediately. As part of his pact to direct “Chicago,” Marshall promised to Miramax that he would direct one more movie for the Disney-owned studio. Whether that film had to be the very next film Marshall made is in dispute.

Some people have interpreted Marshall’s contract to mean that as soon as another studio offered him a film to direct, Miramax had the right to offer Marshall a directing job on a specific film that was poised to start production. Whether any such Miramax film exists is unclear, but Miramax currently has nothing Marshall is interested in directing. Marshall declined to comment, as did Columbia and DreamWorks.

Miramax says letting Marshall walk without getting anything in return would be akin to the San Francisco Giants’ giving the New York Yankees a free loan of superstar slugger Barry Bonds. “We are trying to work it out so that all sides are happy,” a Miramax spokesman said.

Thanks to its options, Miramax has become partners on a number of films it did not develop; in return for allowing actors and directors who owed the studio future projects to work with other studios, Miramax gets to co-produce a variety of other studios’ movies. Those films currently include Universal’s tennis story “Wimbledon” and DreamWorks’ period romance “Tulip Fever.” That latter film is directed by John Madden, who owed Miramax future work as part of his “Shakespeare in Love” pact. To get Madden to direct “Tulip Fever,” DreamWorks said it would co-produce the film with Miramax, and Miramax promised to share a future movie with DreamWorks. But DreamWorks surrendered rights to that future movie as part of the “Geisha” negotiations.

Miramax is not the only studio to get and enforce options, although it tends to use them more assertively than anyone else. Paramount recently forced Ed Norton against his will to act in “The Italian Job” to fulfill an option the studio had on the actor dating from 1996’s “Primal Fear.”

Even with “Geisha” in limbo, casting agents are looking to find actors for the film’s lead roles. In New York last month, some 200 Asian and Asian American women, including people who had never acted, turned up at an open casting call.

“There are such few lead roles given to Asians,” said Lily Suhs, among the many showing up in the Etoile Grand Ballroom.

Said Susan Kim, another person looking for a potential role in the film: “I really wanted to audition so that I’d be able to speak extensively about my understanding and experience of the character and why I would want to do the role.” Instead, she had a brief meeting in which she was asked about her age, her ethnicity, her bust size and -- because the novel contains nudity -- if she is willing to go topless if chosen for the part.

Freelance writer Fiona Ng contributed to this story from New York.