Raging bill

Scorsese’s partly finished documentary about Clinton — which once seemed likely to be released as Hillary Rodham Clinton was navigating a presidential run — has stalled over disagreements about control, people briefed on the project said.

Though parts of the film were shot over the last two years, the project is shelved partly because Clinton reportedly insisted on more control over the interview questions and final version than Scorsese was willing to give.

How Clinton’s daughter Chelsea might figure in the film or on the production team was also an open question.

Asked about assertions that the project was stalled over differences about content and control, Matt McKenna, a spokesman for Clinton, described them as “inaccurate”, without elaborating.

A spokesman for Scorsese declined to comment on the project, as did a spokesman for Steve Bing, a Clinton friend and donor who was to be a producer of the film. A spokesman for HBO, which backed the project, said, “It’s not happening soon but that doesn’t mean it’s not going to happen.”

The people who described the project’s disintegration spoke on condition of anonymity because of confidentiality strictures.

Scorsese, an Academy Award-winning director who is 72 years old, still has many cinematic irons in the fire. Currently the filmmaker and his associates are preoccupied with preparations in Taiwan for the filming of Silence, a period piece about Jesuit priests, which stars Liam Neeson and Andrew Garfield.

But Scorsese clearly had a soft spot for the Clinton project. In a 2012 statement, he said the film would “provide greater insight into this transcendent figure”. Clinton at the time said he was pleased to become the subject of a “legendary director”.

Still, neither Clinton nor Scorsese proved able to overcome the complications inherent in an attempt to build entertainment — however informative a documentary might be — around a figure whose wife stands on the verge of another presidential campaign.

Clearly, the film carried the risk that an unflattering camera angle, unwelcome question or even an obvious omission by Scorsese would become a blemish to Clinton’s legacy or provide fodder for Clinton critics. Apparently to avoid such problems, people close to Clinton sought to approve questions he would be asked in the film, and went so far as to demand final cut, a privilege generally reserved for directors of Scorsese’s stature.

Scorsese’s camp rejected those suggestions and the project was shelved. The film now appears to be years away from completion.

Chelsea, who left her lucrative NBC News job in August and works closely with her father, was expected to figure in the documentary in some way, and some in the Clinton circle had speculated that she would be credited as a producer. But a spokesman for Chelsea said any notion that she had sought to join the production was “categorically false”.

In recent months, Clinton’s team has shown increased discipline in keeping the former president on message ahead of his wife’s likely 2016 presidential campaign. Hillary is expected to declare her candidacy sometime this spring.

The former president is often a strong asset for his wife, but Clinton also proved to be a liability during the 2008 Democratic presidential primary when he made comments about then-Senator Barack Obama that many interpreted as racially insensitive.

While Clinton the Musical, a stage satire focused on Clinton administration scandals, is now set for an Off Broadway run beginning in March, other Clinton-themed entertainment projects have faltered.

In the fall of 2013, CNN scrapped a documentary about Hillary in the face of pushback from Clinton aides and the Republican National Committee; NBC dropped a planned mini-series in which Diane Lane would have portrayed her.

Also, Rodham, a planned feature film about the romance between a young Bill Clinton and Hillary Rodham, has been struggling through Hollywood’s development process.

According to people briefed on the status of that project, the proposed director, James Ponsoldt, remains interested in directing Rodham.

But the producers are looking for a prominent, preferably female screenwriter, to revise a script that was originally written by Young Il Kim, a little-known writer who had studied economics at Harvard and wrote Rodham as a passion project. As yet, no star is attached, and no start date has been set.

The people briefed on its status said the project had encountered neither direct interference nor encouragement from the Clinton camp, though both political friends and opponents of the Clintons have privately weighed in with various opinions.

Some allies see the film as a potential plus, while others fret that even a slight misstep in execution may make the Clintons look unappealing. On the flip side, some political adversaries suspect the film will become a promotional tool, while others welcome it as a complicating factor in any Clinton campaign.

Over all, the crackle of media attention and conflicting opinion have made the development process more difficult than usual, one person briefed on it said.

As an unauthorised biography, Rodham does not depend on support from the Clintons, as did Scorsese’s film. But resistance could become a problem when the producers eventually seek out actresses who are represented by a small number of Hollywood agencies. Already, two people said, at least one Hollywood actors’ agent sympathetic to the Clintons has communicated concerns about the possible impact of Rodham.

Bing, a generous donor to Clinton and the Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation, had been a guiding force behind Scorsese’s documentary, and had initially persuaded the 42nd president to cooperate in its making. Bing was a producer of Scorsese’s 2008 documentary Shine a Light, about the Rolling Stones.

Known for its critically acclaimed documentaries, HBO has previously produced films about presidents Ronald Reagan and George H W Bush. Scorsese had earlier worked with HBO on documentaries about George Harrison and Fran Lebowitz