Rupert Murdoch flew off the handle over the Brad Pitt movie Fight Club, a former studio boss says.
Bill Mechanic, the former chairman and CEO of Fox Filmed Entertainment, revealed Murdoch’s displeasure at the cult classic in a candid interview with Business Insider. At the time, the entertainment company was a division of Murdoch’s News Corp.
Mechanic was keen to bring Chuck Palahniuk’s mind-bending novel, which he described as “brilliant” and “darker than s--t,” to the big screen but worried it would be difficult to adapt.
The process of making the film was full of hurdles, Mechanic explained, but one of the biggest challenges was getting Murdoch on board.
Murdoch, now 95, criticized the film at a News Corp meeting that Mechanic attended. “He starts attacking, and he said, ‘What kind of sick f---ing human being would make a movie like this?’” Mechanic recalled. “I said, ‘Me. [Director] David Fincher. We’re not embarrassed.’”
“I knew he hadn’t seen the movie yet,” he added.
Fight Club performed abysmally at the box office, earning $100.8 million worldwide against a $63 million budget. Starring Pitt and Edward Norton, the film is now considered a cult classic.
“That’s probably the nexus of when he wanted to get rid of me,” Mechanic said of the film’s commercial failure.
The 20th Century Fox executive resigned after “a period of growing discord” between him and Murdoch, as the New York Times put it in 2000. “The relationship between Mr. Murdoch and Mr. Mechanic began to sour after Fight Club,” the paper reported.
Mechanic said that, in reality, he was fired.
The relationship between him and the media magnate had deteriorated to the point that Mechanic asked director David Fincher to include the Fox Plaza Tower in the final scene of Fight Club, where a line of skyscrapers is blown up. Many at the time, Business Insider alleges, believed the inclusion of the Fox building was at the behest of Fincher. It was Mechanic, as he himself admitted, paying a “tribute” to Murdoch.
“David took me through the sequence. I think I was up in the actual building talking to him, and I asked David if he would put the Fox building in there for my tribute to Rupert,” Mechanic said.
“I just realized I went to work for the wrong person,” he said of Murdoch. “I think I got movies made that wouldn’t have been made, and there’s a price to pay.”
But, despite the professional outcome, he doesn’t regret making Fight Club. “It’s one of the best experiences I had.”
Fight Club is being honored with a 4K Ultra HD re-release in cinemas on April 22, ahead of a Blu-ray re-release.
