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American Morning

'Rosie' Lawsuits

Aired November 10, 2003 - 07:16   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: The civil lawsuits pitting Rosie O'Donnell against her former publisher have been anything but civil. They are suing each other over the failure of "Rosie" magazine. The case has been full of courtroom drama. O'Donnell spent the last two days on the stand last week. Testimony resumes this morning.
Here's CNN's Mary Snow.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARY SNOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It's not often a contract dispute gets this much attention. But add a celebrity, a big publisher, peppered with brash behavior, and Rosie O'Donnell versus Gruner and Jahr gets top billing.

G&J is suing O'Donnell for $100 million for the demise of "Rosie" magazine, saying she breached her contract by quitting.

DAN BREWSTER, CEO, GRUNER + JAHR USA: And the fundamental question is: Did she one day in a fit of tantrum simply walk away? And that's what she did, and that is what we're demonstrating.

SNOW: O'Donnell says G&J executives staged a coup d'etat by seizing editorial control promised to her. O'Donnell is countersuing for 125 million, saying, keep the magazine, give me back the name "Rosie."

ROSIE O'DONNELL, ENTERTAINER: No corporation in America can tell a human being that they own their name and that there's nothing you can do about it. And that if you try to do anything about it that they'll ruin you.

SNOW: The beginning of the end was the hiring of Susan Toepfer as editor-in-chief, whose first decision was to choose this photo as a potential cover. O'Donnell called it horrific. This cover was the final product. It was just the start of an ugly battle -- so ugly that at one point G&J executive Cindy Spengler, who is a breast cancer survivor, testified that O'Donnell told her people who lie get cancer. In a deposition, O'Donnell testified under oath she had never made that statement. On Friday, O'Donnell admitted that was a lie.

And then there's the matter of financials. The contract states either party could walk away if the magazine lost more than $4.2 million by the end of June of 2002. O'Donnell's lawyers accused G&J of inflating the numbers so as to show the publication didn't lose that much; thus preventing O'Donnell from leaving.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

This trial could wrap up as early as today, and then it will be for a judge to decide who breached the contract. Rosie O'Donnell told reporters on Friday that she believes she will win, but she said if she does not, she will not appeal this case -- Soledad.

O'BRIEN: Hey, Mary, if it's going to wrap up today, who do you expect is going to be on the stand for the rest of the day?

SNOW: It's possible the CFO of G&J will be called to the stand. Today, primarily the lawyers are planning to focus on the financials of the company. And these will be the final witnesses.

O'BRIEN: All right, CNN's Mary Snow for us this morning. Mary, thanks.

O'BRIEN: Carolina Buia is a correspondent for the TV show, "Celebrity Justice." She's been covering the O'Donnell case, and she joins us this morning. Nice to see you back. Thanks.

CAROLINA BUIA, CORRESPONDENT "CELEBRITY JUSTICE": Nice to see you.

O'BRIEN: So, Rosie O'Donnell, two days on the stand, really Thursday she just sort of got under way, but Friday was the bulk of the testimony. How did she do? Some people were predicting that her volatile temper might work against her on the stand.

BUIA: And quite the contrary. She was wonderful the stand. She was direct. She was emotional at times. At one point, she got misty- eyed when she was talking about her business manager and brother-in- law. He's the one that sort of cemented this magazine deal together. And once everything imploded, they didn't talk for about three months. And when she was asked why she didn't speak to him for three months, she started breaking down. And she said, you know, I love him. I needed some time apart, but I love him very much.

She was also funny on many instances, and she was deferential to the judge. She kept calling him "sir" instead of "your honor."

O'BRIEN: What do you think was the strongest testimony, you know, that, I guess, would directly impact the case?

BUIA: What her defense team is trying to do is show not one major instance where there was a breach of contract -- because I don't believe it exists, this one major glaring incident -- but various small incidents that sort of add up to a whole to try and prove their case that Gruner and Jahr breached their contract. And this includes the firing and hiring employees. The art director from the magazine was fired without Rosie even knowing about it.

And also, her defense team claims that certain financials were massaged. There was an out clause where if financials were under 4.2 million, either party could walk away within 10 days.

O'BRIEN: A couple things we heard from Mary Snow were that Rosie said she's not going to appeal no matter what happens. That seems kind of unusual, before, you know, the case has even really gone to the judge...

BUIA: Yes.

O'BRIEN: ... to go out and make a big press statement that you're not. What do you think is underlying this statement?

BUIA: I think she's confident. I'm not saying that she's going to win or necessarily that she has the best case. But I think that she feels very confident. Also, she wants to put this behind her. She's got many new projects going on, and the latest of them being this Boy George musical called "Taboo," which opens up this week, Thursday.

O'BRIEN: And new projects and new problems it sounds from the early word on...

BUIA: From some of the reports, yes.

O'BRIEN: ... "Taboo" does not sound like it's going to be leaving the gate in really great shape.

BUIA: Yes. No, it seems Rosie is the kind of person that when she gets involved in a project, she just doesn't loan out her name or sell her name. I mean, she is in there in the mud working side by side.

O'BRIEN: Give me a little sense of G&J's strategy on the stand on Friday. I know that obviously they were cross-examining Rosie O'Donnell. How did she do under that? Was it testy? I mean, obviously she loathes the G&J executives so much. Was she sort of nasty on the stand...

(CROSSTALK)

BUIA: No, she wasn't. She held it together. She was very composed. She honestly did a great job.

O'BRIEN: Carolina Buia, we're going to, of course, check in with you again to see how this case is going.

BUIA: Perfect.

O'BRIEN: Thanks so much.

BUIA: All right.

O'BRIEN: As always, we certainly appreciate it.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.







Aired November 10, 2003 - 07:16   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: The civil lawsuits pitting Rosie O'Donnell against her former publisher have been anything but civil. They are suing each other over the failure of "Rosie" magazine. The case has been full of courtroom drama. O'Donnell spent the last two days on the stand last week. Testimony resumes this morning.
Here's CNN's Mary Snow.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARY SNOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It's not often a contract dispute gets this much attention. But add a celebrity, a big publisher, peppered with brash behavior, and Rosie O'Donnell versus Gruner and Jahr gets top billing.

G&J is suing O'Donnell for $100 million for the demise of "Rosie" magazine, saying she breached her contract by quitting.

DAN BREWSTER, CEO, GRUNER + JAHR USA: And the fundamental question is: Did she one day in a fit of tantrum simply walk away? And that's what she did, and that is what we're demonstrating.

SNOW: O'Donnell says G&J executives staged a coup d'etat by seizing editorial control promised to her. O'Donnell is countersuing for 125 million, saying, keep the magazine, give me back the name "Rosie."

ROSIE O'DONNELL, ENTERTAINER: No corporation in America can tell a human being that they own their name and that there's nothing you can do about it. And that if you try to do anything about it that they'll ruin you.

SNOW: The beginning of the end was the hiring of Susan Toepfer as editor-in-chief, whose first decision was to choose this photo as a potential cover. O'Donnell called it horrific. This cover was the final product. It was just the start of an ugly battle -- so ugly that at one point G&J executive Cindy Spengler, who is a breast cancer survivor, testified that O'Donnell told her people who lie get cancer. In a deposition, O'Donnell testified under oath she had never made that statement. On Friday, O'Donnell admitted that was a lie.

And then there's the matter of financials. The contract states either party could walk away if the magazine lost more than $4.2 million by the end of June of 2002. O'Donnell's lawyers accused G&J of inflating the numbers so as to show the publication didn't lose that much; thus preventing O'Donnell from leaving.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

This trial could wrap up as early as today, and then it will be for a judge to decide who breached the contract. Rosie O'Donnell told reporters on Friday that she believes she will win, but she said if she does not, she will not appeal this case -- Soledad.

O'BRIEN: Hey, Mary, if it's going to wrap up today, who do you expect is going to be on the stand for the rest of the day?

SNOW: It's possible the CFO of G&J will be called to the stand. Today, primarily the lawyers are planning to focus on the financials of the company. And these will be the final witnesses.

O'BRIEN: All right, CNN's Mary Snow for us this morning. Mary, thanks.

O'BRIEN: Carolina Buia is a correspondent for the TV show, "Celebrity Justice." She's been covering the O'Donnell case, and she joins us this morning. Nice to see you back. Thanks.

CAROLINA BUIA, CORRESPONDENT "CELEBRITY JUSTICE": Nice to see you.

O'BRIEN: So, Rosie O'Donnell, two days on the stand, really Thursday she just sort of got under way, but Friday was the bulk of the testimony. How did she do? Some people were predicting that her volatile temper might work against her on the stand.

BUIA: And quite the contrary. She was wonderful the stand. She was direct. She was emotional at times. At one point, she got misty- eyed when she was talking about her business manager and brother-in- law. He's the one that sort of cemented this magazine deal together. And once everything imploded, they didn't talk for about three months. And when she was asked why she didn't speak to him for three months, she started breaking down. And she said, you know, I love him. I needed some time apart, but I love him very much.

She was also funny on many instances, and she was deferential to the judge. She kept calling him "sir" instead of "your honor."

O'BRIEN: What do you think was the strongest testimony, you know, that, I guess, would directly impact the case?

BUIA: What her defense team is trying to do is show not one major instance where there was a breach of contract -- because I don't believe it exists, this one major glaring incident -- but various small incidents that sort of add up to a whole to try and prove their case that Gruner and Jahr breached their contract. And this includes the firing and hiring employees. The art director from the magazine was fired without Rosie even knowing about it.

And also, her defense team claims that certain financials were massaged. There was an out clause where if financials were under 4.2 million, either party could walk away within 10 days.

O'BRIEN: A couple things we heard from Mary Snow were that Rosie said she's not going to appeal no matter what happens. That seems kind of unusual, before, you know, the case has even really gone to the judge...

BUIA: Yes.

O'BRIEN: ... to go out and make a big press statement that you're not. What do you think is underlying this statement?

BUIA: I think she's confident. I'm not saying that she's going to win or necessarily that she has the best case. But I think that she feels very confident. Also, she wants to put this behind her. She's got many new projects going on, and the latest of them being this Boy George musical called "Taboo," which opens up this week, Thursday.

O'BRIEN: And new projects and new problems it sounds from the early word on...

BUIA: From some of the reports, yes.

O'BRIEN: ... "Taboo" does not sound like it's going to be leaving the gate in really great shape.

BUIA: Yes. No, it seems Rosie is the kind of person that when she gets involved in a project, she just doesn't loan out her name or sell her name. I mean, she is in there in the mud working side by side.

O'BRIEN: Give me a little sense of G&J's strategy on the stand on Friday. I know that obviously they were cross-examining Rosie O'Donnell. How did she do under that? Was it testy? I mean, obviously she loathes the G&J executives so much. Was she sort of nasty on the stand...

(CROSSTALK)

BUIA: No, she wasn't. She held it together. She was very composed. She honestly did a great job.

O'BRIEN: Carolina Buia, we're going to, of course, check in with you again to see how this case is going.

BUIA: Perfect.

O'BRIEN: Thanks so much.

BUIA: All right.

O'BRIEN: As always, we certainly appreciate it.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.