The Scoggins Report: March 2012 Pitch Sales Scorecard

The Scoggins Report is a compilation of sales and trends in the industry. Archive editions can be found at The Business of Show Institute and on www.thewrap.com. Details on every person, project, and company covered by the Report can also be found at www.ItsontheGrid.com. The Report is reprinted at ScriptMag.com by permission of the authors.

The Scoggins Report
by Jason Scoggins & Cindy Kaplan

March 2012
Pitch Sales Scorecard

Let’s get this out of the way right up front: The pace of pitch sales definitely slowed over the past month, and by the end of March we’ll see 2012 start to lag behind 2011 for both pitch and spec sales. The drop was to be expected, though, since February and March 2011 were such huge months (with 21 and 28 combined sales, respectively).

Here’s the silver lining: The 2012 Spring selling season has barely begun, and fewer than half of the studio buyers who bought pitches in the first half of 2011 have picked one up so far in 2012. We hate to go all Effie Trinket on you, but think about that from the “glass is half full” point of view -- there’s still lots of buying yet to be done in the coming couple of months.

Here’s are the highlights since the last Pitch Scorecard:

• Columbia Pictures went on a buying spree, picking up 2 pitches and 3 specs in the past four weeks. The studio has purchased 8 pieces of original material so far in 2012 (5 pitches + 3 specs), twice as many as the number two buyers (Universal and Warner Bros., with 2 pitches + 2 specs each).

• WME maintained its commanding overall lead among the agencies (5 pitches + 9 specs), but CAA had the best month: Its 3 pitch and 1 spec sales jumped the agency into a convincing 2nd place (4 pitches + 3 specs in total). Paradigm had a very good month as well -- its 2 pitch and 1 spec sales (3 pitches + 1 spec in total) put it into a tie for third with UTA (1 pitch + 3 specs).

Overall Pitch Numbers:

Here are overall pitch sales numbers through March 10 on their own ...

... and here are combined spec and pitch sales numbers for the same period.

Pitch Sales By Genre:

Pitch Sales By Buyer - Studios:

Here are the combined pitch and spec purchase numbers for studios that have bought at least one of each:

Pitch Sales By Buyer - Other Buyers:

Each of the following production companies has been attached to at least one pitch sale so far this year. Companies in bold are new since the last scorecard.

1stAveMachine

JC23 Entertainment

Captivate Entertainment

LBI Entertainment

Overbrook Entertainment

Original Film

Palermo Productions

Panay Films

Roth Films

Strange Weather Films

Vertigo Entertainment

The Walsh Co.

Pitch Sales by Seller - Agencies:

Here are the combined pitch and spec sales numbers for agencies that have sold at least one of each:

The following 23 agents have been involved with at least one pitch sale in 2012. People in bold are new or sold an additional pitch since the last scorecard.

Two:

Ida Ziniti (Paradigm)

Rowena Arguelles (CAA)

One:

Billy Hawkins (CAA)

Brett Loncar (CAA)

Brian Kend (CAA)

Bryan Besser (Verve)

Christopher Smith (Paradigm)

Danny Gabai (WME)

David Karp (WME)

Elia Infascelli-Smith (WME)

Emile Gladstone (ICM)

Jason Burns (UTA)

Jay Baker (CAA)

Kevin Huvane (CAA)

Mark Ross (Paradigm)

Matt Rosen (CAA)

Mike Esola (WME)

Rob Herting (Verve)

Sarah Self (WME)

Scott Greenberg (CAA)

Sharon Jackson (WME)

Trevor Astbury (Paradigm)

Valarie Phillips (Paradigm)

Pitch Sales by Seller - Management Companies:

Here are the combined pitch and spec sales for management companies that have sold at least one of each in 2012.

The following 12 managers have been involved with at least one pitch sale in 2012. People in bold are new or sold an additional pitch since the last scorecard.

Two:

Britton Rizzio (Circle)

Guymon Casady (Mgmt 360)

One:

Aaron Kaplan (K/P)

Alex Lerner (K/P)

Darin Friedman (Mgmt 360)

E. Brian Dobbins (PYE)

Jeremy Platt (Generate)

Michael Lasker (Mosaic)

Paul Young (PYE)

Peter McHugh (Gotham)

Rich Demato

Sean Perrone (K/P)

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.

Details on every person, project and company covered by the Report can also be found at www.ItsontheGrid.com, a proud division of The Wrap News, Inc. IOTG is the only place mere mortals can find listings of Hollywood’s active open writing and directing assignments, not to mention comprehensive spec market data; active film development information; and relevant credits for released movies going back to 1988.

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