Drumline drama / possible lawsuit
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: 12/16/02
Two-year-old indie drama similar to 'Drumline'
Producer troubled by missed chance
By RODNEY HO
Atlanta Journal-Constitution Staff Writer
It's a movie about freshman students struggling to join a black college marching band. It's set in Atlanta and was created by an Atlanta media producer. It culminates in a battle of the bands-type competition.
But it's not "Drumline," the 20th Century Fox movie produced by Atlanta music mogul Dallas Austin. That film landed in 1,800 theaters Friday and generated an estimated $13.1 million in gross revenue during its opening weekend.
This more modest film is "Pay the Price," directed and produced by Darryl Lassiter, a former Alabama State University Marching Hornets trumpet section leader and choreographer.
Unlike "Drumline," which was budgeted at nearly $20 million and features midlevel stars such as Orlando Jones and Nick Cannon, "Pay the Price" is an independent film. Lassiter conceived the idea in 1991, but it took eight years before he was able to make it, with a budget of $200,000. He entered "Pay the Price" in the New York International Independent Film & Video Festival in 2000, where it won an award for best family drama.
But the movie's sole funder, gospel singer Robert Gough, couldn't get a distribution deal; "Pay the Price" lacked major stars. It languished until this month, when it came out on video the same week "Drumline" hit theaters. Gough says the timing was coincidental.
Lassiter, 39, says he met with Jordan Bratman, an assistant to Austin, several times between June and October 2000. He says he gave Bratman his screenplay and film, proposed to him that Austin help finance its distribution, and asked that he be the director of "Drumline."
Austin, who has worked with TLC, Boyz II Men and Pink, was a drummer in a marching band in high school, and he says he came up with a movie idea in the early 1990s based loosely on those experiences. His friend and songwriter Jody Gerson corroborated his account. "He said, 'This is something that needs to be presented to the world. This is so cool in my life,' " Gerson said.
Austin said he signed a deal for "Drumline" with Fox way back in 1995 but wasn't happy with the hired screenwriter's treatment. As a result, the project sat around in "development hell" for several years. In 1999, Austin met with a Fox executive to get his film rights back. Instead, he got a green light. He hooked up with producer Wendy Finerman ("Forrest Gump," "Cast Away"), who helped shepherd the film to production.
In 2000, as Austin was doing research on "Drumline," Don Roberts, who heads the South DeKalb High School marching band, told him about "Pay the Price." Though Austin saw some movie posters for the film, he said he never saw it.
"I'm not going to sit and say that this guy didn't do his film first or didn't have the idea," Austin said, "but it's one of those topics like an army or football film. A lot of people experienced this. It's not a surprise that other people thought of this."
Austin said his assistant never passed any information about "Pay the Price" to him and never met Lassiter. "If you want to give me stuff, you have to pass it through lawyers or a manager," Austin said. "We get a million packages."
Lassiter has seen "Drumline" and saw enough similarities that he says he plans to file a lawsuit claiming copyright infringement. Both movies used Clark Atlanta University and Morris Brown College bands. Both include J. Anthony Brown, comic sidekick to radio personality Tom Joyner, and the same stunt coordinator.
"Mine's a true story; theirs is not," Lassiter said. "I'm a little bitter, because I came to him for help. At least give me a chance to prove myself. 'Drumline' would have a lot more validity in the black college world if a black college band director directed it. Austin and none of his producers marched in black college bands."
Brown, who plays a father in "Pay the Price" and a band director in "Drumline," said each movie has its merits. "I told Darryl to get over it," Brown said. "It's not who does it first but who makes it sing."
Indeed, the story lines are not identical. "Pay the Price" is an ensemble film built around several characters, including a black female (nicknamed "Miss Thang") and a white male (nicknamed "White Boy") trying to make the cut in an all-black, male marching band. "Drumline" is a coming-of-age story focused on a Harlem hotshot who learns discipline, teamwork and love.
For the relatively small number of people who are aware of "Pay the Price," there was some confusion over "Drumline." Yolanda McKinnon, a Long Island engineer, saw "Pay the Price" in New York City in 2000. "The story line was good, but it was rough around the edges," she said. "They could have done more with more money."
When McKinnon recently caught a trailer for "Drumline," she thought Lassiter had sold the rights to his film to a major studio to do just that. She was disappointed to hear that Lassiter had nothing to do with "Drumline." "I just feel he should get credit where credit was due," McKinnon said.
ON THE WEB:
www.paytheprice.com, www.drumlinemovie.com
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