Battle Of The Bugs

By KIM MASTERS/LOS ANGELES

Sometimes it really is a small, small world. Next week DreamWorks--the studio founded by Steven Spielberg, Jeffrey Katzenberg and David Geffen--opens its first cartoon feature, Antz. The computer-animated story of life in an ant colony, Antz features the voices of Woody Allen, Sharon Stone, Sylvester Stallone and Dan Aykroyd. In November Pixar, the creator of Toy Story, and Disney, the studio where Katzenberg was chairman for 10 years, plan to release A Bug's Life, which also happens to be the computer-animated story of life in an ant colony. It features the voices of NewsRadio's Dave Foley, Julia Louis-Dreyfuss, Kevin Spacey and Denis Leary.

Coincidence? That depends on whom you ask. Pixar head Steven Jobs was said to be "furious" when he found out that DreamWorks was working on a movie about ants. It is an open secret that in background sessions with reporters at numerous publications, he has been complaining that Katzenberg swiped the idea for Antz on his way out the door from Disney in 1994 or sometime thereafter. Katzenberg's camp angrily denies that he ever heard of the Bugs project while at Disney and says that in fact the idea for Antz was pitched to Katzenberg by a DreamWorks executive named Nina Jacobson, who subsequently, as it happens, went to work for Disney. Jacobson confirms this.

The battle of the bugs is part of a larger web of Hollywood intrigue involving all sorts of moves, countermoves and, well, bites and stings. Antz was originally supposed to open in March 1999. Meanwhile, DreamWorks planned to make its animated debut in November with The Prince of Egypt--the story of Moses, a project very dear to Katzenberg's heart. Katzenberg is hoping his Bible epic will be enough of a critical and commercial success to prove he actually did play a crucial role in the making of such Disney animated hits as Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King--all released while he ran the Disney roost.

Disney, however, buzzed into Katzenberg's plans by slotting A Bug's Life for November, directly against Prince of Egypt. Disney had completely underestimated the phenomenon Toy Story would be, but it was expecting great things from A Bug's Life. It had its McDonald's meals and its merchandise deals all lined up. Pixar has alleged that Katzenberg was so intimidated that he offered to cancel Antz if Disney would move A Bug's Life away from Prince of Egypt. DreamWorks denies that, but Katzenberg eventually shifted Prince of Egypt to what he thought would be a safer date: Dec. 18.

Disney then promptly moved its remake of Mighty Joe Young, the story of a giant ape on the loose in New York City, out of summer and head to head with Prince in December. Although Disney is known for hardball scheduling tactics (it rereleased The Little Mermaid against Fox's Anastasia, for example), it insisted it had decided to move the ape well before DreamWorks switched Prince of Egypt. Late last week Disney moved Mighty Joe Young back a week, to Dec. 25.

Months earlier, though, Katzenberg had decided to give Disney a taste of its own medicine. He put Antz on a rush schedule to get it out five months early--beating A Bug's Life by several weeks. Katzenberg insists that he has "not a scintilla" of interest in tweaking Disney by upstaging Bugs but that he hurried his film merely because "the movie's great, and we could get it done."

Disney studio chief Joe Roth insists he isn't bugged by the DreamWorks strategy. "I think Antz will come out and do fine, and I think Bug's Life will come out and do fine," he says. But Disney and Pixar apparently are not speaking with one voice on this topic. In fact, Jobs has irked his Disney partners by speaking to reporters without consulting them. Roth has asked Jobs to tone down his anti-DreamWorks rhetoric, without much luck. Jobs declines to comment.

Ironically, Disney's toughest competition may not come from Antz. The studio is pushing A Bug's Life back from Nov. 20 to Nov. 25--not, according to Roth, to move another week away from Antz but to avoid going mano a mano with Paramount's Rugrats, the movie version of the popular children's TV show, which opens Nov. 20 and is expected to be a powerful contender in the intense holiday family-entertainment race. But that move to Nov. 25 puts A Bug's Life in direct competition with Universal's sequel to the popular pig movie, Babe.

There is precious little breathing room for any of the family features this holiday season. Says Paramount motion-picture-group vice chairman Rob Friedman: "The movies are going to cannibalize one another. All you can hope is that parents during the holidays take their children to multiple movies." Or as any bug can tell you, the trick will be to avoid getting squashed.