Production duo at Sony Pictures’ Columbia label splits up
In a move that surprised Hollywood, Columbia Pictures’ long-running tag team of production heads Doug Belgrad and Matt Tolmach is breaking up. Tolmach, who has served as co-president of Sony Pictures’ Columbia label for the last eight years, is moving on to become a producer at the studio while Belgrad stays as sole president.
Since they were named to their posts in 2002, the pair have been heavily promoted to the creative community and media as equals and Sony Pictures co-Chairman Amy Pascal’s top production lieutenants.
Insisting that she did not want to break up the partnership, Pascal said the move was prompted by Tolmach’s desire to change his role. “Matt has wanted to be a producer forever.”
Tolmach echoed that, acknowledging that he may be better suited for his new role: “I love being an executive, but I’ve always longed to be on the other side. I like staying in the creative conversation more than taking another meeting or returning another phone call.”
People close to the studio noted that Pascal, who has been in a senior creative role at Sony since 1996 and co-chair since 2006, appears unlikely to relinquish her role any time soon, leaving little room for either Belgrad or Tolmach to move up the ranks in the near future.
Tolmach’s background is in creative development and production, making it a natural segue for him to become a producer, whereas Belgrad began his career at the studio working in strategic planning and business development.
“It wasn’t my dream to become chairman of the studio,” Tolmach said.
Tolmach, 46, has been given a three-year production deal at the studio and will become a producer along with Laura Ziskin and Avi Arad on the reboot of “Spider-Man,” a franchise he oversaw while he was an executive. The movie, which will restart the Spider-Man saga with a new cast and lower budget, begins production in December for release in July 2012.
To help relieve the burden on Belgrad, Sony also named Hannah Minghella president of production for Columbia, a position that hasn’t existed for several years. Minghella, daughter of the late filmmaker Anthony Minghella, was named president of production for Sony’s struggling animation division in 2008 after working for several years as a creative executive for Pascal. The appointment surprised many at the time given the then-29-year-old’s lack of experience in animation.
Columbia has been on a roll at the box office this year with such hits as “The Karate Kid” and Adam Sandler’s “Grown Ups.” That performance, however, hasn’t been enough to offset financial losses at the studio. In its most recent fiscal quarter ending Sept. 30, the studio’s revenue rose 6% to $1.7 billion while it posted an operating loss of $58 million. In the year-earlier period, the studio lost $71 million on revenue of $1.5 billion.
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