MUMBAI: Rupert Murdoch has canceled the award season party of Ang Lee‘s Life of Pi because of the death of his mother Dame Elisabeth Murdoch aged 103 on Tuesday.
The cocktail party was scheduled to be held Wednesday night at Murdoch‘s Fifth Avenue home in New York.
Guests were to have included Lee and Fox Filmed Entertainment chairman-CEO Jim Gianopulos, as well as several awards tastemakers and Hollywood insiders.
Life of Pi was produced and financed by 20th Century Fox, the studio owned by Murdoch‘s News Corp. "Life of Pi masterpiece movie released last night. All at Fox rightly proud. Congrats to Liz Gabler [president of Fox 2000]," tweeted Murdoch following the film‘s 21 November opening.
Fox is waging an aggressive awards campaign for Lee‘s film, which has grossed north of $51 million domestically since opening during the long Thanksgiving holiday. Life of Pi is doing big business in Asia, where it has raked in roughly $53 million in China alone. All told, the movie has brought in $81 million internationally from only 11 markets.
Several studios are throwing similar parties and receptions touting their awards-season films.