7 Times Movie Studios And Directors Went To War

To work in the movie business requires a lot of skill but also a huge amount of patience and endurance. However, that goes tenfold for directing. As a film director, you are under unfathomable pressure since you are expected to have a singular vision for a production that is worth millions of dollars but you must also rely on hundreds or thousands of workers. Some of these workers work above you. Some of them may work against you.

There are many reasons why a film may fall apart: maybe the script wasn't tight enough or the acting wasn't very good or the story lacked focus. Fundamentally, nobody makes a movie wanting it to fail - you can have the best director and crew and yet, it just doesn't work.

In some cases, it's just down to everything being a bad fit. Productions can sometimes become so troubled that the director has to be literally taken out of the picture. Whether that actually helps remains to be seen, because results have been... varied, let's just say...

And directors don't always take being told what to do - especially when it's "go away" - by studios, which can lead to all-out (and often very public) war between the parties...

When American History X director Tony Kaye showed a rough cut to the producers, they hated it and demanded a recut, leading to star Edward Norton revising scenes and dialogue, much to Kaye's frustration. As he became more erratic, Norton had no choice but to direct as much as the film as he could.

Kaye was so unreasonable, he was locked out of the editing room while Norton was forced to cut the film together and got so frustrated one day that he punched a wall and broke his hand. Not only that, Kaye bought 40 full-page ads in Variety and Hollywood Report, accusing the producers of stealing his film.

But he didn’t stop there. Kaye brought a rabbi, a priest, and a Tibetan Buddhist monk with him to a meeting with the producers so he could cut the film the way he wanted. When they refused, he had his name removed from the credits. Kaye said he would be credited under the pseudonym, Humpty Dumpty. When the studio said no (obviously,) Kaye strongly considered changing his name to Humpty Dumpty.

He then tried to sue the studio for a staggering $275 million. American History X was delayed by nearly a year due to Kaye’s interference.

When the film was released, it received much praise and Edward Norton was Oscar-nominated for his performance. Due to its reputation, you would think Kaye was happy with how the film turned out, right?

Not at all. To date, he still believes that Norton's performance is poor and the film is terrible. He is currently working on a documentary that details how the film's studio screwed him over. And what is this doc called? Humpty Dumpty.