LIBERTY Media saved one struggling company this year with the bailout of Sirius XM Satellite Radio, and now it may reprise its role as the white knight for The Weinstein Co.
During a break in the action on the first official day of Allen & Co.’s annual mogulfest in Sun Valley, Idaho, Liberty Media CEO Greg Maffei, Harvey Weinstein and Vivi Nevo, an investor in The Weinstein Co., were seen sitting at a table in the resort’s Lobby Lounge for just shy of an hour.
Sources familiar with the situation later told The Post that Maffei was cozying up to Weinstein because Liberty is interested in further investment in the movie industry beyond its tiny independent art house studio, Overture Films.
Overture, which is run by former Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer executive Chris McGuirk, thus far has been a moderate success for Liberty, releasing critically acclaimed films like “The Visitor” while also churning out flops like “Righteous Kill.”
Adding to the intrigue about yesterday’s meeting, Liberty Chairman John Malone conceded to The Post that, “We haven’t found the right jar yet” as far as movie investments are concerned.
Asked if Weinstein might be the right jar, Malone laughed and said, “Harvey’s a big jar,” which was less about Weinstein’s girth than his still sizable stature in Hollywood.
Liberty’s interest couldn’t come at a more opportune time for The Weinstein Co., where rumors about its depleted cash reserves have been swirling for months. Many in Tinseltown took the studio’s recent hiring of investment bank Miller Buckfire as a sign that The Weinstein Co.’s days as an independent studio were numbered.
Sources close to The Weinstein Co. insist that it has plenty of cash and that Miller Buckfire was hired to help restructure its debt and lower interest costs. These sources also point out that Lionsgate and MGM have taken similar steps as the global recession has hit independent studios particularly hard.
For Liberty, an investment or outright acquisition of The Weinstein Co. would provide its Starz/Encore pay TV service with higher-profile movies such as Quentin Tarantino’s upcoming flick “Inglourious Basterds,” which in turn could help drive subscribers to DirecTV, which Malone controls.
But before that can happen, Weinstein would have to extricate himself from the output deal he struck with Showtime last year.
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Ari Emanuel has Hollywood, but at least Jim Wiatt still has Sun Valley.
Like the heads of the Five Families, the CEOs of every major Hollywood talent shop are here in Sun Valley with the obvious exception of Emanuel, who has never been invited and was widely expected to show up given he’s now CEO of the newly formed William Morris-Endeavor.
Sources were divided on the reasons for Emanuel’s absence.
One source chalked it up to a lack of relationship with Allen & Co: “Ari didn’t get invited because he doesn’t do any business with Allen,” this source said.
But others said Emanuel’s absence was owed to gentlemanly deference to Wiatt, who has been coming to the conference for more than a decade. “This is Jim’s thing; Ari didn’t want to steal his thunder,” said a second source.
The notion that Emanuel would step aside to give Wiatt his moment in the sun is not entirely unbelievable.
Though the two have a history of bad blood — Wiatt fired Emanuel when they worked together at ICM and Emanuel got his revenge by stripping Wiatt of his power at the new William Morris-Endeavor — sources said the pair have found common ground and have been getting along rather well lately.
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Speaking of Liberty Media, John Malone must be a great boss to work for if you can bring your company to the brink of bankruptcy and still get a raise, as Sirius XM Satellite Radio CEO Mel Karmazin just did.
Malone gave Karmazin’s stewardship of Sirius XM a hearty endorsement yesterday despite the fact that Liberty had to save the satellite radio operator from a Chapter 11 filing earlier this year.
“He spent two years trying to put those companies together and as soon as he did the economy collapsed,” Malone said of Karmazin. “You can’t blame him for that.”
Perhaps, but is that sort of thing one is rewarded for with a $250,000 pay raise and 120 million new stock options, especially after Sirius XM posted its first-ever quarterly subscriber loss?
Malone seems to think so.
“Of course I think [Karmazin] deserves a raise, I voted for it,” Malone said.