Drabinsky May Soon Make Bid for Cineplex

Nearly three months after losing a power struggle with his largest shareholder, Cineplex Odeon Chairman Garth H. Drabinsky appears ready to make a bid for the movie theater concern, but he is making little headway with the directors’ group charged with auctioning the firm.

“It’s the committee’s decision to treat Garth the same as any of the other interested parties. Garth already has more information than anyone else, and the committee has an obligation to manage a fair and equally accessible process,” said Charles S. Paul, a Cineplex director and vice president of MCA Inc., which owns 49% of Cineplex.

To assemble a bid, Drabinsky has enlisted the help of New York investment adviser Roy Furman, who helped Cineplex acquire the Plitt theater chain earlier this decade. The Drabinsky-led group apparently has been unable to meet with the seven directors charged with soliciting bids.

Furman did not return a reporter’s call Monday, but the Toronto Globe & Mail quoted the investment banker as saying: “We have been prepared for quite a while to sit down with them and meet, but we have not had that meeting.”

Alienated MCA

According to the Canadian newspaper, Furman did not divulge the nature or timing of his clients’ bid.

Hollywood and Wall Street executives have wagered that Drabinsky would have difficulty raising money for a bid. The aggressive Cineplex chairman has waged highly publicized fights with nearly half of the major film suppliers, and his management’s financial reporting practices have come under attack.

Drabinsky alienated MCA by plotting to buy a block of Cineplex stock from the Charles R. Bronfman family without offering a similar price to other shareholders. MCA was enraged, and Canadian regulators eventually sided with the U.S. entertainment giant to block the transaction in April.

Since his failed coup, Drabinsky has been forced to share the chairman’s office with MCA’s Paul and a Bronfman representative.