Abu Dhabi's Big Man in Hollywood

Foreign financing of American movies certainly isn’t a new concept, but the Abu Dhabi Media Company’s keen interest in Hollywood (to the tune of a $1 billion investment over five years) has raised more than a few eyebrows — not to mention questions about whether or not the government-owned media company has some kind of hidden agenda by getting into the American movie business.

To answer some of those questions, ace Hollywood reporter Sharon Waxman scored an interview with ADMC’s CEO Edward Borgerding. Some highlights from the interview:

On why the Abu Dhabi government wants to make movies:

We’re a media company. We create and distribute content, so it’s natural to invest in the creation of content. The goals are nothing more than that. We’re a commercial company. We operate for profit, but it’s more like the BBC. You don’t necessarily notice that we’re a government company. The opportunity we see is to invest in global content.

On what Abu Dhabi hopes to accomplish with its investment:

A lot of what we hope to achieve is to help develop the skills required to build a film industry here. You can hire a few directors. But if you teach people the basic skills to produce content, then the industry can sustain itself in Abu Dhabi for 50 or 100 years…It’s part of a lot of things going on in Abu Dhabi. It’s a meritocracy now. Not patronage. The success of Abu Dhabi has to be based on productivity, and best of class business practices.

On whether or not religious restrictions will limit the kind of movies ADMC will make:

We’re not going to do anything that’s insulting to the culture that we come from. But 99.9% of movies made in Hollywood are released here in Abu Dhabi and don’t insult anybody. I don’t think that’s an issue. For the kinds of stories we want to make, we’re not going to have to go there (to R rated territory). Most successful movies in the financial sense have been G and PG: ‘Star Wars,’ ‘Gandhi,’ ‘Lord of the Rings.’

Head over to Waxword for the full interview.