The Scoggins Report – June 2011 Edition
The May spec market wrapped up with another set of respectable numbers, especially considering the town basically went dark mid-week last week in the run-up to Memorial Day.
May 2011 Spec Market Roundup
The May spec market wrapped up with another set of respectable numbers, especially considering the town basically went dark mid-week last week in the run-up to Memorial Day. Five different studios picked up original material last month (CBS Films, Fox, Paramount, Relativity and Warner Bros.), and two other new buyers got into the game as well (Crime Scene Pictures and Skydance Productions).
WME had a great month, with the agency's Jeff Gorin involved with two of the company's three sales in May. That puts WME in the lead for the year with eight spec sales so far, followed by UTA's seven, including two last month, both of which went out from Charlie Ferraro and Emerson Davis (along with Barbara Dreyfus on The Hitman's Bodyguard).
UTA's team spirit apparently influenced Industry's Andrew Deane and Jess Rosenthal - the two managers collaborated on a couple of sales of their own last month, which makes the company number one amongst management companies so far this year. That's the best showing by far for Industry since we started tracking in 2009; their current total would have tied the firm for second last year with Anonymous, which got on the board for the first time in May as well.
Here are May's numbers:
1 - This number is a tally of every script that sold in May.
2 - This percentage only takes into account scripts that came out and sold in May.
Weekly Activity Breakdown
Week of May 2:
- 10 scripts hit the tracking boards, 2 of which sold (“Father Daughter Time” and “The Hauntrepreneur”).
Week of May 9:
- 7 scripts hit the boards, none of which sold.
- 2 additional sales were reported (“Inside the Machine” and “From Mia With Love”).
Week of May 16:
- 7 scripts hit the boards, none of which sold.
- 2 additional sales were reported (“Everly” and “Tipping Point”)
Week of May 23 (run-up to Memorial Day Weekend):
- 2 scripts hit the tracking boards, none of which sold.
- 1 additional sale was reported (“The Hitman's Bodyguard”).
Genre Breakdown*
*May's numbers only; sales from previous months are in parentheses
Spec Sales (alphabetical by title)
Everly
Writer: Yale Hannon Reps: Anonymous Content (Luke Rivett) Buyer: Crime Scene Pictures Genre: Action/Thriller Attachments: Crime Scene's Rob Paris and Adam Ripp will produce alongside Anonymous' Rivett. Crime Scene's Head of Business Affairs Philip Elway will executive produce, as will Rizal Risjad. Joe Lynch will direct. Notes: Script originally went out in January 2010 and made that year's Black List. The plan is to shoot in New Orleans this winter.
Father Daughter Time
Writers: MatthewAldrich Reps: CAA (Stuart Manashil) and Silent R Management (Jewerl Ross) Buyer: Warner Bros. Genre: Drama Attachments: Matt Damon is reportedly attached to direct, star, and produce with Ben Affleck and Chris Moore through their Pearl Street banner alongside Drew Vinton.
From Mia With Love
Writer: Kevin Chesley, Seth Grahame-Smith, David Katzenberg & Bryan Shukoff Reps: WME (Jeff Gorin, Cliff Roberts, Jennifer Rudolph Walsh, Daniel Shear) Buyer: Fox Genre: Comedy
Attachments: Grahame-Smith (“Pride & Prejudice & Zombies”) and Katzenberg will produce through their Katsmith Productions; Katzenberg will direct.
The Hitman's Bodyguard
Writer: Tom O'Connor Reps: UTA (Emerson Davis, Barbara Dreyfus, Charlie Ferraro) and Industry Entertainment (Andrew Deane, Jess Rosenthal) Buyer: Skydance Productions Genre: Action Attachments: Skydance's David Ellison will produce.
The Hauntrepreneur
Writer: Scott Rosenberg Reps: WME (Adriana Alberghetti and Ari Greenburg) Buyer: Paramount Genre: Comedy Attachments: Platinum Dunes' Michael Bay, Brad Fuller, and Andrew Form will produce.
Inside the Machine
Writer: Marc Maurino Reps: UTA (Emerson Davis, Charlie Ferraro) and Circle of Confusion (Zach Cox) Buyer: CBS Films Genre: Thriller Attachments: Contrafilm's Tripp Vinson and Beau Flynn to produce. Notes: Mark Ross and Ryan Conroy will oversee for the studio.
Tipping Point
Writer: Todd Stein Reps: WME (Jeff Gorin) and Industry Entertainment (Andrew Deane, Jess Rosenthal) Buyer: Relativity Genre: Sci-Fi Attachments: Temple Hill's Wyck Godfrey and Marty Bowen will produce with Industry's Deane and Rosenthal and Relativity's Ryan Kavanaugh. Notes: Script went out in March 2011; Daniel Herther will oversee for the studio.
About The Scoggins Report:
The Scoggins Report is a terribly unscientific analysis of the feature film development business based on information assembled from a variety of public and non-public sources. The numbers in the reports are by no means official statistics. Past editions of The Scoggins Report can be found in the archives of The Business of Show Institute and will soon have a beautiful new home on www.theWrap.com.
Details on every person, project and company covered by the Report can also be found at www.ItsontheGrid.com, the only place mere mortals can find listings of Hollywood’s active open writing and directing assignments, not to mention comprehensive spec market data and active film development information.
The IOTG Blog has a new home on the site: www.ItsontheGrid.com/news It includes daily highlights of recent database updates and individual posts on every spec that hits the market. You’ll find buttons to subscribe to the blog’s feed right where you’d expect them, and you can follow the site’s Twitter feed here: http://twitter.com/itsonthegrid.
The Scoggins Report, by Jason Scoggins & Cindy KaplanSpec Market Roundup - May 2011 - June 1, 2011 Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License.
Reprinted with permission.
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