CEO Says Sony Pictures 'Did Not Capitulate,' Is Exploring Options

Transcript

MELISSA BLOCK, HOST:

And now we're going to hear from the CEO of Sony Pictures Entertainment, Michael Lynton. Mr. Lynton, welcome to the program.

MICHAEL LYNTON: Hello.

BLOCK: And, first, your reaction when you heard President Obama say that your company, Sony, made a mistake in canceling the release of this movie.

LYNTON: Well, at first I was surprised by the remark. But, you know, I think actually the president and I are coming from the same place. We're obviously both strong proponents of the First Amendment. I think that the issue here is that there's been a general misunderstanding with the press and the public about how these events unfolded, and the fact that we have been absolutely diligent about making certain that this movie gets out into movie theaters. And it was only when the movie theaters themselves that said that they couldn't take the movie, that we had to say that we couldn't release it on the 25 of December.

BLOCK: I want to get back to that in a moment. But let me ask you also about what the president said. He said he wishes you had spoken to him first before you decided to cancel the release. Why didn't you?

LYNTON: It really, frankly, didn't come to mind. I had been in touch with advisers inside the White House days previous, not about the actual release pattern of the picture, but about looking for increased help in terms of security, which they were very helpful with. And, you know, when these things happen, they happen very, very quickly and so you're making your decision in the moment.

BLOCK: Well, this has been brewing for several weeks though now, right?

LYNTON: Well, no. Actually the decision on the part of the theater owners came all over the course of, sort of, six or eight hours.

BLOCK: The threat from what is now believed to be North Korea was deemed not to be credible by the Department of Homeland Security. So the question really is why capitulate? Aren't you, effectively, giving in to blackmail?

LYNTON: We did not capitulate. We don't own movie theaters, and we require movie theater owners to be there for us to distribute our film. We very much wanted to keep the picture and release. When the movie theaters decided that they could not put our movie in their theaters, we had no choice at that point but to not have the movie come out on the 25 of December. This was not our decision.

BLOCK: Wouldn't there be other avenues, though? Video-on-demand, for example?

LYNTON: Yes. Those are other avenues and we are actively exploring them.

BLOCK: Actively exploring - do you have any takers on that?

LYNTON: Well, to date, we don't have any takers, neither on the video-on-demand side nor on the e-commerce side. You know, people have been generally fearful about the possibility of their systems being corrupted, and so there've been a lot of conversations about the robustness of various systems to be able make sure that they're not hacked if and when we put the movie out digitally.

BLOCK: Could you make the movie available through...

LYNTON: I shouldn't say if - when.

BLOCK: Oh, when - you're going to go on the record as saying it will be released?

LYNTON: Well, we would very much like that to happen.

BLOCK: Or made available.

LYNTON: We would very much like that to happen. But we do need partners to make that happen. We ourselves do not have a distribution platform to put the movie out.

BLOCK: Could Sony PlayStations be that distribution platform?

LYNTON: That can be explored. I think, in general, we need to bring together a coalition of platforms to make this operate properly.

BLOCK: I want to ask you about the hit that the company has taken here, Sony Pictures, not just financially, but also to your reputation through the information that was leaked and then everything that's happened since. How much do you hold yourself responsible for this?

LYNTON: Well, I think that there was a decision made to make the movie. I was certainly participating in that decision, and it was very much my decision to keep the movie in release. So and we struggled for the last three-and-a-half weeks while we were subject to the worst cyber attack in U.S. history. And that was my decision as well. It was supported by our senior management to move forward. So to the extent to which we kept going with this, and are continuing with our efforts to get the movie out, I do need to take responsibility for that, yes.

BLOCK: Shouldn't Sony have been better prepared with cyber defenses? The company has been the target of multiple hacks, right, going back to something like 2005.

LYNTON: We were extremely well-prepared for conventional cyber security. What the FBI and Mandiant, who was the expert who we hired to come in and do the forensics on this, has come out in public and said is that 90 percent of all U.S. corporations would not have withstood the cyber attack that we experienced.

BLOCK: You've seen a lot of outrage or heard a lot of outrage from actors, directors, many in Hollywood who say this is pure, craven capitulation - sends a terrible message to writers, producers, anybody else who might want to do films about topics that could be seen as sensitive.

LYNTON: I - this is the reason why we at Sony felt so strongly that the movie needed to be released. And, as I mentioned earlier, to do that in theaters, we needed movie theaters to be prepared to do that. Now that that's no longer a possibility for the 25 of December, we have to look to other avenues to happen - for that to happen. It is very important and we really would like the American public to see this movie.

BLOCK: Do the directors - do the folks who were behind the movie, in particular Seth Rogen, feel like you had their back on this? I mean, you're saying you really wanted this movie to be released. I wonder whether, if I were talking to Mr. Rogen, if he would feel the same way.

LYNTON: Yes. I've spoken with Seth and my feeling is that they - that we were all in this very much together. He was aware of the situation as it was unfolding, not exactly when the movie theaters pulled out, because he was in transit, actually, at the time.

BLOCK: I do wonder, Mr. Lynton, whether, you know, even the strongest proponents of the First Amendment might wonder who thought it was a great idea to make a movie that shows the assassination of a head of state and treats that as comedy.

LYNTON: You know, we saw this as a comedy. And political satire has a long tradition in film, and we saw it in that vein. So, you know, that's an editorial decision that we made.

BLOCK: Last question for you, Mr. Lynton. How much of a black eye is this for Sony pictures, and how do you try to rebuild the reputation of your company?

LYNTON: Well, I think we can recover from this. I think we have fantastic employees and strong relationships with the creative community. And we've demonstrated ourselves over the years to be very brave filmmakers with a number of different films and have strong partnerships in the community. And I feel very confident that over the next six months - year - we will be able to recover going forward.

BLOCK: OK. Mr. Lynton, thank you for your time.

LYNTON: You're welcome. Thank you.

BLOCK: That's Michael Lynton. He is the CEO of Sony Pictures. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.