Paramount Exec Is Kept in Suspense

When Paramount Pictures Chairwoman Sherry Lansing wooed producer Donald De Line to become her top production executive last year, she promised that one day her job would be his. For De Line, who was reluctant to join the studio’s executive ranks, that prospect was the clincher.

But now that Lansing’s time at the helm of Paramount is drawing to a close, it turns out there are no guarantees.

The choice of who will succeed Lansing rests with her boss, Viacom Inc. Co-President Tom Freston.

Paramount executives say Freston has been impressed with De Line, who holds the title of production president at the studio. But some Hollywood insiders wonder whether Freston, who has been brutally critical of Paramount since taking charge of the troubled studio this summer, might favor a clean break with current management. He has vowed to change Paramount’s culture from being risk-averse, tightfisted and indecisive in the hopes of attracting hot talent and bigger audiences.

Freston may opt for a “top-to-bottom reformation,” said a senior executive at a rival studio. Freston, Lansing and De Line declined to be interviewed.

For more than a year, amid a prolonged box-office slump, Paramount has struggled through a management shake-up in its production, marketing and home video divisions. Executives are hoping that the studio’s current hit, “The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie,” is the beginning of a reversal of fortunes that will continue with the coming Christmas release “Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events.”

For now, Freston isn’t talking about whom he wants to replace Lansing, whose contract expires late next year. He has told associates that he wants to take time to consider his options.

Yet he has confided to some that those options appear to be limited. Several potential candidates, such as NBC Universal’s movie chief Stacey Snider and Fox Searchlight’s Peter Rice, are under contract elsewhere. During the last month, a number of names have been floated, including HBO chief Chris Albrecht, former 20th Century Fox movie boss Bill Mechanic and Columbia Pictures head Amy Pascal.

Then there’s De Line, whose many allies inside and outside Paramount have been giving Freston an earful. Lansing and other high-profile Hollywood players have urged Freston to promote De Line, perhaps teaming him with someone who has broader experience in business, marketing and distribution. Besides Lansing, De Line’s most powerful supporters inside the Paramount circle include the likes of producer Scott Rudin, director Cameron Crowe and actor Tom Cruise and his production partner Paula Wagner.

Once president of Disney’s Touchstone Pictures, De Line, 46, is known as a seasoned executive with creative smarts, strong talent relationships and a management style that favors conciliation over combat. In recent months, Lansing has delegated more responsibilities to De Line.

De Line has let Freston know that he wants the job and that he would want to return to being a producer if he doesn’t get it, sources close to both men said. Before becoming Paramount’s production chief, De Line was on the studio lot for five years producing such films as “The Italian Job,” “Without a Paddle” and “Domestic Disturbance.”

Those with business at Paramount say the studio is easier to negotiate with and quicker to make decisions these days because of efforts undertaken by Lansing and De Line’s influence.

“In a place where you couldn’t get any traction, you can now pick up the phone and call Donald and in 30 seconds come up with a battle plan as to how to buy a book, hire a movie star or nab a director,” said Rudin, Paramount’s most prolific producer. His relationship with De Line dates to the mid-1980s at Touchstone, when Rudin made “Sister Act.”

Some of De Line’s success flows from his ability to navigate Hollywood’s delicate egos with a soft management touch. He knows, producer Wagner said, how to say no in a way that lets folks down easily so hard feelings don’t linger. “He’ll say, ‘I like you a lot and we’ll find a project to do but this isn’t the one that you and I should work on -- and here’s why.’ ”

Among De Line’s strongest outside supporters is David O’Connor, a partner at Creative Artists Agency. One of De Line’s greatest strengths, O’Connor said, is his ability to simultaneously serve the interests of the talent and the studio, even when they’re in conflict.

Although CAA and Paramount have been battling over the budget of the long-in-the-works film project “Benjamin Button,” which includes several A-list CAA clients, O’Connor says De Line has been “a real advocate” for getting it made.

He also helped nail down such high-priority projects as “The Longest Yard” by making sure Paramount swiftly struck a deal with star Adam Sandler, with whom he first worked on Touchstone’s 1998 comedy hit “The Waterboy.” De Line also nabbed “The Bourne Supremacy’s” hotly pursued director, Paul Greengrass, for Paramount’s big-budget movie “The Watchmen,” scheduled for release in 2006.

Born in Los Angeles and raised in La Jolla, De Line began his career after graduating UCLA in 1980 as a production assistant at Witt-Thomas-Harris Productions, working on the popular series “Soap.” In 1982, he segued into casting for shows including NBC’s series “Family Ties,” starring Michael J. Fox. He then joined ABC Entertainment as West Coast executive manager of talent and casting before being hired by Disney as a TV executive. He left two years later to head Michael J. Fox’s company.

De Line rejoined Disney in 1988 as a film executive and, at age 35, he became Touchstone’s president, overseeing such hits as “Pretty Woman,” “Armageddon” and “What About Bob?”

Director Crowe, the man behind such acclaimed films as “Jerry Maguire” and “Almost Famous,” is now working with De Line for the first time on a movie called “Elizabethtown,” starring Orlando Bloom and Kirsten Dunst. After Paramount lost its co-financing partner on the project, putting it in jeopardy, De Line helped persuade the studio to pick up the entire tab.

“He’ll grab the flag, wave it and rally the forces to back him up,” Crowe said. “Plus, he says ‘awesome’ a lot. And you’ve got to love that.”