DreamWorks Pictures


DreamWorks Pictures is an American film studio and distribution label of Amblin Partners. The studio was originally founded on October 12, 1994, as a live-action and animation film studio by Steven Spielberg, Jeffrey Katzenberg, and David Geffen, of which they owned 72%. From 1997 to 2005, DreamWorks formerly distributed its own and third-party films, with Universal Pictures handling worldwide home video distribution. It has produced or distributed more than ten films with box-office grosses of more than $100 million each.
DreamWorks Pictures was sold to Viacom, parent of Paramount Pictures in February 2006. In 2008, DreamWorks announced its intention to end its partnership with Paramount and made a deal to produce films with India's Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group, re-creating DreamWorks Pictures as an independent entity. The following year, DreamWorks entered into a distribution agreement with Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures, wherein Disney would distribute DreamWorks films through the Touchstone Pictures label; the deal continued until August 2016. Since October 2016, Universal Pictures has distributed most of the films produced by DreamWorks Pictures. Currently, DreamWorks operates out of offices on the Universal Studios Lot.
DreamWorks is also different from its former animation division of the same name. Following the massive success of Shrek, which won the first Academy Award for Best Animated Feature at the 74th Academy Awards ceremony, the animation division was spun off into its own separate company in 2004 and was later acquired by Universal's parent NBCUniversal in 2016. Spielberg's company continues to use the original DreamWorks trademarks under license from its animation counterpart.

History

Founding and Universal distribution (1994–2005)

The original company was founded following Jeffrey Katzenberg's resignation from the Walt Disney Company in 1994. Katzenberg approached director Steven Spielberg and music executive David Geffen about forming a live-action and animation film studio, which had not been done in decades due to the risk and expense, but all three were very successful. They agreed on three conditions: They would make fewer than nine movies a year, they would be free to work for other studios if they chose, and they would go home in time for dinner. They officially founded DreamWorks SKG on October 12, 1994, with financial backing of $33 million from each of the three partners plus $500 million from Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, and $300 million from CJ Group heiress Miky Lee, giving the CJ Group an 11% stake in DreamWorks; the deal was also initially understood to include distribution rights to DreamWorks films across Asia excluding Japan, although CJ ultimately handled rights for only China, South Korea and Hong Kong, with all other international territories handled by United International Pictures. Their new studio was based at offices on the Universal Studios Lot, in the same bungalow as Amblin Entertainment. Despite access to sound stages and sets, DreamWorks preferred to film motion pictures on location. Usually, however, the company would film in a soundstage or set in a major studio. Shortly after DreamWorks was founded, the media dubbed Spielberg, Katzenberg and Geffen as "the three amigos". Despite Geffen's initial investment, it was reported in October 1994 that DreamWorks would only produce live-action and animated films, television programs and interactive entertainment. There were rumors that Warner Bros. Records CEO Mo Ostin might collaborate at DreamWorks with Geffen, who himself was still contracted to work at Geffen Records. The company eventually expanded into music once Geffen stepped down from Geffen Records in April 1995, and Ostin would be hired as leader of DreamWorks' music operations that October. By 1998, DreamWorks was labelled as "multifaceted entertainment", with the company describing its ambition in 1997 as being to nurture creative breakthroughs in "every field" of entertainment.
In December 1994, DreamWorks Television was formed after DreamWorks agreed to a $200 million seven-year television production joint venture with Capital Cities/ABC. The company was set up to produce series for broadcast networks, cable channels and first run syndication, with no first-look guarantee for ABC, but financial incentives favored the network. Their first show, Champions, was scheduled as a mid-season replacement for ABC. Dan McDermott was named the division's chief executive in June 1995. DreamWorks Television's first success was Spin City on ABC, the parent company of which was bought by The Walt Disney Company in February 1996. In 2002, the DreamWorks joint venture agreement with ABC ended. That agreement was replaced by a development agreement with NBC, with a first look clause. In September 2013, DreamWorks Television merged with Amblin Television.
In 1995, traditional animation artists from Amblimation joined the new studio, which led to DreamWorks buying part of Pacific Data Images, a company specializing in visual effects, and renaming it PDI/DreamWorks in 2000. Both were software divisions and would merge later on. By then, DreamWorks had the traditional animators working for their animation department, and the computer animators worked on CG films. Amblimation shut down in 1997 and all 250 of Amblimation's crew members went on to join DreamWorks Animation. The same year, DreamWorks Interactive, a computer and video game developer and joint venture between DreamWorks and Microsoft, was founded. DreamWorks Interactive was intended to eventually form synergies with the animation, film and television divisions of DreamWorks, with Geffen speculating in April 1995 that it could also possibly form synergies with DreamWorks' upcoming music division. With DreamWorks losing interest in maintaining a video game division, Electronic Arts acquired the Los Angeles studio of DreamWorks Interactive from DreamWorks and Microsoft on February 24, 2000, acquiring the intellectual property and rights of the acclaimed series Medal of Honor from Microsoft/DreamWorks.
In June 1995, DreamWorks announced that it had signed a $1 billion deal with MCA Inc. to distribute its theatrical releases in other countries and its home video releases worldwide over 10 years, while DreamWorks itself would distribute them for the company as a film production label in America. MCA also bought a 2% stake in the company for $54 million.
In 1996, the company's record label, DreamWorks Records, was founded, the first project of which was George Michael's album Older. The first band signed to the label was eels, who released their debut album Beautiful Freak that year. DreamWorks Records went on to sign established artists for their label, including the alternative rock act Morphine, comedian Chris Rock and Henry Rollins. The label helped launch the careers of artists such as Alien Ant Farm, Elliot Smith, Nelly Furtado and Papa Roach. Once the main film division officially commenced in 1997, the label started releasing numerous soundtrack compilation albums for live-action and animated DreamWorks films, including American Beauty, Road Trip, Shrek, Small Soldiers and The Prince of Egypt, among others. These albums mostly consisted of songs from artists signed to DreamWorks Records, with the films themselves also using songs from DreamWorks artists; an example being American Beauty, which had eels' song "Cancer for the Cure" and Elliot Smith's song "Because" in both the soundtrack album and the film. The label's most commercially successful release was Papa Roach's Infest, which sold 7 million units on the back of the rap rock movement, while some of the label's highest-charting songs included Nelly Furtado's "I'm Like a Bird" and Alien Ant Farm's cover of Michael Jackson's "Smooth Criminal". Commercially, the record company as a whole never lived up to expectations, and was sold in November 2003 to Universal Music Group, who closed it at the beginning of 2005. Until September 1, 2005, UMG continued to operate DreamWorks Nashville, a country-focused division of DreamWorks Records which was founded in June 1997. That label was shut down when its flagship artist, Toby Keith, departed to form his own label.
In 1997, DreamWorks Pictures released its first three feature films, The Peacemaker, a film about terrorism; Amistad, Spielberg's first film for the studio about an African slave rebellion and the aftermath of the massacre; and Mouse Hunt, the studio's first family film about two brothers trying to fight a mischievous mouse. All three of these films were relatively successful, managing to outgross their budgets by moderate margins, with Mouse Hunt being the most profitable of the three. Amistad's score was composed by John Williams, a frequent Spielberg collaborator who also composed the music used for DreamWorks Pictures' opening logo. This logo debuted in The Peacemaker, the first of the three films to be released, and has appeared on all live-action DreamWorks releases since, as well as on all DreamWorks Animation releases between 1998 and 2003. Williams' score for Amistad and Hans Zimmer's score for The Peacemaker were both released on albums by DreamWorks Records in 1997, although starting in 1998, the label usually only released background score albums for DreamWorks' most high-profile titles, such as Thomas Newman's score for American Beauty and Williams' score for Saving Private Ryan. DreamWorks Interactive did not create video game tie-ins for The Peacemaker, Amistad or Mouse Hunt, and 1998's Small Soldiers was the only DreamWorks title to ever be directly adapted into a video game by DreamWorks Interactive.
In 1998, the United States 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lawsuit against DreamWorks for trademark infringement by Dreamwerks Production Group, Inc., a company mostly specializing in Star Trek conventions. Michael Jackson's brother Jermaine Jackson subsequently claimed in 2003 that DreamWorks' icon of a boy fishing and sitting on a moon crescent was plagiarized from the entrance to Jackson's Neverland Ranch. Spielberg was a friend of Jackson during the 1980s and appeared in his "Liberian Girl" music video. In 1998, DreamWorks Animation produced its first two full-length animated features, Antz and The Prince of Egypt, which were distributed by DreamWorks Pictures. DreamWorks Pictures continued to distribute DreamWorks Animation productions through their distribution name until 2004. DreamWorks Animation films were generally targeted towards younger audiences, in contrast to the more adult-oriented live-action DreamWorks films, including films with strong sexual elements such as American Beauty and Road Trip/''EuroTrip, which shared the same branding through to 2004. DreamWorks also had another division called DreamWorks Television Animation, which in 1998 produced Toonsylvania and Invasion America. However, it quickly folded and the later animated show Alienators: Evolution Continues was instead handled by the main DreamWorks Television division, in association with DIC Entertainment and other parties. This was among the only animated content that Paramount Pictures acquired from DreamWorks when its parent company Viacom purchased the live-action film division and television division in 2006.
At the 71st Academy Awards in March 1999, DreamWorks Pictures' film Saving Private Ryan was the overwhelming frontrunner for the Best Picture Oscar. Directed by company co-founder Steven Spielberg, the film had received critical praise for its authentic portrayal of World War II, and was a commercial success. However, in one of the most famous upsets in Academy history, the award was instead given to romantic comedy Shakespeare in Love, from Disney-owned Miramax, a studio which won numerous other Oscars in the 1990s and 2000s. The loss is widely attributed to an aggressive and unprecedented awards campaign by Miramax and its head, Harvey Weinstein. It included a reported "whisper campaign" to downplay the merits of Saving Private Ryan. Ironically, Shakespeare in Love and Saving Private Ryan both ended up becoming part of the same corporate umbrella via Paramount Pictures' acquisition of the live-action DreamWorks film library in 2006, and its acquisition of the Miramax library in 2020.
Following its defeat to Miramax, DreamWorks won three consecutive Academy Awards for Best Picture between 2000 and 2002, for American Beauty, Gladiator and Beautiful Mind. By this point, DreamWorks were considered to be the first new major Hollywood motion picture studio since RKO Pictures was founded in 1928. Go Fish Pictures, a division of DreamWorks with the objective to distribute art-house, independent and foreign films, was founded in 2000. The division experienced success with the anime films Millennium Actress and Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence, respectively, which led them to venture into releasing live-action films, with the release of The Chumscrubber. However, The Chumscrubber was a commercial and critical failure, which led DreamWorks to shut down the division in 2007 shortly before the release of the Japanese film Casshern. The library of Go Fish Pictures was included when Paramount Pictures acquired DreamWorks' live-action film library in 2006, even though it mainly consisted of the American distribution rights to the aforementioned anime titles.
In 2000, DreamWorks was planning on building a studio backlot after buying 1,087 acres of land in the Playa Vista area in Los Angeles. It was to be complete with 18 sound stages, with many office buildings and a lake. There would also be new homes, schools, churches, and museums. The project was to be completed in 2001, but was canceled for financial reasons.
In April 2001, DreamWorks and Universal Pictures announced that they had extended their distribution agreement for an additional five years, following the commercial successes of Gladiator and Meet the Parents the year prior, both of which were co-produced by DreamWorks and Universal.
In January 2002, DreamWorks signed a deal with In Demand. For the period beginning October 1, 2004, to January 31, 2006, DreamWorks Pictures distributed its films in the North American domestic theatrical and worldwide television market, with international theatrical and worldwide home entertainment distribution by Universal Pictures. On October 27, 2004, DreamWorks Animation was spun off into a separate public company.
David Geffen admitted that DreamWorks came close to bankruptcy twice. Under Katzenberg's watch, the studio suffered a $125 million loss on the 2003 animated film Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas, and also overestimated the DVD demand for Shrek 2, with 5 million unsold DVDs. In 2005, out of their two large budget pictures, War of the Worlds was produced as a joint effort with Paramount Pictures which was the first to reap a significant amount of profits, while The Island'' bombed at the domestic box office but turned a profit internationally through Warner Bros. Pictures.