Is John Lasseter Teaming Up With The Makers Of ‘Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug & Cat Noir’?
Is John Lasseter a pariah in Hollywood?
If the Instagram account of Jeremy Zag, founder and CEO of Paris and Glendale-based Zag, is any indication, the answer is a resounding ‘NO!’ Zag, whose company is responsible for the global hit Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug & Cat Noir posted a photo last week of himself and Lasseter, with fawning praise that credited the disgraced Disney and Pixar executive as being responsible for “the animated movies of my life.”
The third man in the photo is Skip Brittenham (of Ziffren Brittenham LLP), a power attorney in Hollywood who has served on Pixar’s board, suggesting that there could be more to this meeting between Zag and Lasseter than just a random photo op. Zag has been moving toward feature production for quite a few years, and recently partnered with Skydance Media for live-action features based on Miraculous.
Zag continued praising Lasseter on his Instagram Stories, posting a photo of Lasseter from the same meeting, and adding various emojis like a heart, a folded-hand thank you, and a starstruck face.
Besides the possible business implications of this meeting, it is a reminder of Lasseter’s status in Hollywood: Disney may not be able to work with Lasseter, but there’s plenty of Disney competitors that would be thrilled to have him on their team. Even if Lasseter doesn’t end up working with Zag, we now have our first good clue that he’s actively taking meetings and will likely land somewhere soon – perhaps as a film director, if not an executive role.
It hardly matters that Lasseter physically and verbally harassed countless women at not just one but two different studios over the course of a decade.
Or that he derailed the single feature film directed by a woman at his studio.
Or even that his collaborators refuse to work at the company he built because it has “a culture where women and people of color do not have an equal creative voice.”
The bottomline is that Lasseter’s films have generated billions of dollars in profit – and in Hollywood, money talks above all else.