I think I would involve Harry. From your story it seems he is unable to intercede because he doesn't know how, so if you give him a hand, I would think he could be instrumental since he is friends with June and she trusts him. Otherwise they would not be in this together. Could you confirm that this is true? I really want to find a solution now and am really curious how you pulled it off. Interesting problem to say the least (less fun if you are in this situation).
I can confirm that making a run at Harry was definitely part of my solution. In order to "soften up" June for my eventual move it was necessary to switch Harry's allegiances from "I don't want to make trouble" to "If someone doesn't make trouble we're all sunk." It took an hour on the phone to turn Harry around to the point where he was useful, at which point I think he called June, who called me, which allowed me to fix everything.
I've very curious as to what you said to June to resolve this (and I really enjoyed this mystery story-esque approach of giving a hard problem and asking what the solution was). If I had to guess, I'd say you brought up the independent sales agent and the sync problems as part of the same discussion. I don't know enough about film to say whether it would be cheaper to pay out your contract clause or to have a new edit done, but either way she's out a fair bit of money. My suspicion is that you first brought up the independent sales agent issue, and convinced her that there was too much to do for him to be a viable option. Once you'd conveyed that fact, you claimed his dismissal as a savings, then brought up the new sync-ing costs so that everything stayed effectively cost-neutral for June. Having done this, you've solidified your rapport with June by defining your team (the exclusion of the sales agent solidifies a sense of "us" for the rest of you), then offering her a way out of the sound problem that doesn't increase her total expenses. You've also talked her out of a bad decision by highlighting that there are hurdles she didn't know about, without insulting her. This brings you on as a planning member of the team fairly naturally, and allows you to segue into "There was one more thing I wanted to get your thoughts on..." while guiding her to keep things afloat. Close?
Since you asked: 1) Broach the same subject to everyone First Dick, then Harry, then Tom got the "it's a shame things are too muddled because we aren't properly coordinating things. In the same discussion, Dick and Tom were reminded that June and Harry are nice people, they just don't know what they're doing and Harry was reminded that Tom and Dick are nice people, they're just doing what they're doing because they don't want Harry and June to get burned. In the same discussion, establish with Tom and Dick that if June doesn't pull it together, June busts out of the industry and everybody loses and establish with Harry that Tom, Dick and I all agree that if June plays her cards exactly wrong this is an Extinction Level Event. Everyone is hearing the same thing and the focus shifts from "he/she is trying to cheat me" to "if we don't figure this out we are all fucked, individually and together." 2) Pick a villain that can't fight back It's much easier to get people behind a "global war on Terror" than "let's shoot Osama bin Laden." This would all be much easier if we were just talking to each other instead of playing telephone was said to each participant, followed by I'm going to call X to let them know what we just talked about. In this way, the problem isn't the edit, the problem isn't Tom or Dick, the problem isn't June or Harry, the problem is miscommunication. Further, kleinbl00 is setting forth to slay the dragon. 3) Congratulate June on her successes while shoring up her abilities I'd been fortunate in that I'd made a call to June before the sync issue came to light, which meant when she was calling me back, it was to discuss other things. And, since I'd already had a good, long conversation with Harry, he immediately relayed that I was proactively doing something about it. As a result, June was really thankful to get me on the phone, rather than trying to dodge me. I was meticulous not to throw anyone under the bus but quick to point out that when communications have been sullied it's hard to get things across the right way (to my advantage, June had been sending emails to Dick for weeks... to the wrong address). I inquired about Poky Stick II (pretending I hadn't heard about the trainwrecks, to which she was decidedly oblivious) and discussed deadlines related to the problem, rather than funding related to the problem, which allowed me to determine what the impetus was. 4) Put the problems in real terms Rather than focus on the fact that June shouldn't be going off half-cocked, I focused on the fact that any editor given two days to cut a trailer is not going to cut a good trailer and the fact that any sales agent who wants rush trailer work likely isn't paying for it themselves. Rather than focus on the fact that June is in danger of racking up tens of thousands of dollars in charges against the film, I pointed out that any work anyone wanted done on the film could be quoted ahead of time so that June would know what she was looking at. And rather than pointing out that Tom and Dick's prices weren't lining up with the quotes she was getting from somewhere else, I pointed out that Tom and Dick aren't interested in getting into the finishing business and the only reason they're doing it is to keep June's fat out of the fire... and that Tom often over-volunteers to do stuff rather than delegate because he sucks at confrontation and that neither of them really wanted to do it in the first place. 5) Demonstrate that the working relationship is not working I highlighted the fact that June retained Tom and Dick for these services not because they advertised them to her, but because she trusted them enough to ask and that if she is no longer trusting them, it's not because of anything anyone has done, but because the relationship has been clouded by money. Further, if June can't trust Tom and Dick to do this stuff, June needs to employ someone as knowledgeable as Tom and Dick to advocate for the project against all comers (including Tom and Dick, if need be) such that the project's wallet is protected from pickpockets. 6) propose a pump-fake punitive step Suggest that if Tom and Dick don't want to be a finishing agency, and if June doesn't want Tom and Dick to finish the film, the best move would be to 'fire' Tom and Dick as the finishing agents and 'hire' them as independent consultants to manage the process rather than provide the deliverables. The end job is exactly the same - Tom and Dick are doing precisely what they were doing - only now they're doing it for a pre-negotiated flat fee. This removes June's distrust, it puts money in Tom and Dick's pockets, and it allows Tom, Dick and June to be on the same side of the table in any discussion, rather than staring uncertainly at each other. And that's about the size of it. The sync issues still haven't been solved, but I'm going to call June in a few minutes to let her know that me and Dick have spent serious time on it only to discover that not only do we think the file we got is weird, but that it doesn't matter anyway because the director is still playing "final cut" games with the Edit so we can't even figure out what's up until she attacks that other villain that isn't us and that none of us like. So far, I'm pleased... even if it did take 6 hours on the phone and an hour on two separate edit suites.
The best part is, I found out about Hubski because a friend on here mistook you for an account of mine. Now I'm here to usurp your position!