Award Winning Music Creators in Court Battle Fri December 5, 2003 06:54 PM ET
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Hans Zimmer and Jay Rifkin, two childhood pals who created the award-winning film score for "The Lion King" have fallen out over what Rifkin described in a $10 million lawsuit as Zimmer's plot to take over their famed Santa Monica, California music studio.
In the lawsuit, filed on Thursday in Los Angeles Superior Court, Rifkin accused his longtime partner in Media Ventures Entertainment Group of plotting with the company's resident composers to hijack the business "in a textbook example of breach of fiduciary duty."
According to the company's Web site, Media Ventures is home to more than a dozen composers, a support staff of nearly 100 and a 40,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art studio campus.
Zimmer, whose 100th film is "The Last Samurai," allegedly encouraged the other composers through a series of "secret e-mails" to stop working with Rifkin and join him "in a new paradigm or 'fraternity' of composers," the lawsuit said.
As a result, composers stopped honoring their contracts with Media Ventures and ceased cooperating in ongoing and future projects, the lawsuit said.
Zimmer, who has received major awards nominations for "Rain Man," "The Lion King," "The Prince of Egypt," "The Thin Red Line," and "Black Hawk Down," could not immediately be reached for comment.
Rifkin and Zimmer met as teenagers in Brighton, England, through their guitar teachers. They performed in a rock band together and operated a music studio from the mid- to late 1970s with Rifkin acting as engineer and producer and Zimmer taking on the creative composing duties, the lawsuit said.
The partners collaborated in Hollywood for the first time on the soundtrack for the 1988 film, "Rainman," which was nominated for an Academy Award.
Award Winning Music Creators in Court Battle Fri December 5, 2003 06:54 PM ET
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Hans Zimmer and Jay Rifkin, two childhood pals who created the award-winning film score for "The Lion King" have fallen out over what Rifkin described in a $10 million lawsuit as Zimmer's plot to take over their famed Santa Monica, California music studio.
In the lawsuit, filed on Thursday in Los Angeles Superior Court, Rifkin accused his longtime partner in Media Ventures Entertainment Group of plotting with the company's resident composers to hijack the business "in a textbook example of breach of fiduciary duty."
According to the company's Web site, Media Ventures is home to more than a dozen composers, a support staff of nearly 100 and a 40,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art studio campus.
Zimmer, whose 100th film is "The Last Samurai," allegedly encouraged the other composers through a series of "secret e-mails" to stop working with Rifkin and join him "in a new paradigm or 'fraternity' of composers," the lawsuit said.
As a result, composers stopped honoring their contracts with Media Ventures and ceased cooperating in ongoing and future projects, the lawsuit said.
Zimmer, who has received major awards nominations for "Rain Man," "The Lion King," "The Prince of Egypt," "The Thin Red Line," and "Black Hawk Down," could not immediately be reached for comment.
Rifkin and Zimmer met as teenagers in Brighton, England, through their guitar teachers. They performed in a rock band together and operated a music studio from the mid- to late 1970s with Rifkin acting as engineer and producer and Zimmer taking on the creative composing duties, the lawsuit said.
The partners collaborated in Hollywood for the first time on the soundtrack for the 1988 film, "Rainman," which was nominated for an Academy Award.
David, did you get a "secret" email?
