The Hollywood Reporter - 21.08.2019

Deal

of the

Week

7 Days of DEALS

Who’s inking on the dotted line this week

The Report

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 22 AUGUST 21, 2019

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Case dismissed? Not quite.
The Writers Guild of
America dropped its
California lawsuit against
the Big Four talent agencies
Aug. 19 and refiled similar allegations and
more in federal court against the top three
firms, expanding an already bitter fight.
The new filings include antitrust claims
and allegations of racketeering under a law
that is more commonly deployed against
organized crime.
Dropping ICM Partners as a defendant,
the new WGA filings also respond to and
deny the antitrust claims brought against
the guild by WME, CAA and UTA.

A Guest of the Reich (PANTHEON, SEPT. 24)

BY Peter Finn AGENCY ICM Partners

The true story of an heiress turned spy who was captured by Nazis

and witnessed the collapse of Hitler’s Third Reich. As big-name

directors continue to mine World War II for stories, Finn’s novel is

a chance to portray the rare female perspective.

Each Tiny Spark (KOKILA, AUG. 6)

BY Pablo Cartaya AGENCY UTA, Foundry Literary & Media

A sixth grader who suffers from ADHD and her father, recently

back from military deployment, bond over a love of auto repair

and welding in the middle grade book. Like The Hate U Give or

Love, Simon, the novel tackles larger social and cultural issues.

Rights Available! Hot new books with Hollywood appeal BY MIA GALUPPO

FILM

Henry Golding (Paradigm,

Megan Silverman, Stone

Genow) is in talks to star in

G.I. Joe spinoff Snake Eyes

for Paramount.

Kevin Hart (UTA, 3 Arts,

Schreck Rose) will star in

and produce STX super-

hero comedy Night Wolf.

Awkwafina (UTA, Artists

First, Schreck Rose) will

star in an adaptation of

fantasy novel The Last

Adventure of Constance

Verity for Legendary.

Gabrielle Union (CAA,

Atlas, Felker Toczek) will

star in and produce an

untitled rom-com at Screen

Gems, with writer Chester

Tam attached to direct.

Sydney Park (Paradigm,

Hansen Jacobson) will star

in James Wan and Shawn

Levy’s Netflix horror movie

There’s Someone Inside

Your House.

WGA Takes Its Talent Agency Fight to Federal Court

The federal suit — technically a trio of

counterclaims by the guild and eight indi-

vidual writer plaintiffs — seeks a declaration

that packaging fees are unlawful and an

order that the agencies provide an account-

ing of all packaging fee deals involving

guild members and also disgorge all profits

generated from packaging fees.

The expansion of the litigation and addi-

tion of claims under RICO, the Racketeer

Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act,

represents a further hardening of the WGA’s

position. UTA called the new RICO and

antitrust claims “ill-considered, vitriolic and

baseless”; the firms previously filed motions

to dismiss the WGA from its own state court

suit on the grounds that it lacked standing

and had consented to packaging for 43

years. The agencies are likely to reassert

those positions in opposition to the WGA’s

federal filing, as well as

make additional arguments

concerning the antitrust and

RICO claims.

“The major agencies have

repeatedly broken federal

antitrust law by conspiring to

fix the price of packaging fees,” says WGA

West president David A. Goodman. “We are

simply asking the court to stop these agen-

cies from illegally enriching themselves.”

— JONATHAN HANDEL

SONY STRENGTHENS SPIDER-MAN TIES

W ITH V IDEO GAME STUDIO BU Y

Sony is expanding its web around everyone’s favor-

ite superpowered wall crawler.

Sony Interactive Entertainment announced

Aug. 19 that it has acquired Insomniac Games, the

Burbank-based developer of Marvel’s Spider-Man

and the Ratchet & Clank series, for an undisclosed

amount. The two companies have long had a close

relationship, dating back to the launch of Spyro the

Dragon on the original PlayStation console in 1998.

While Insomniac has worked with Sony on a num-

ber of exclusive franchises over the past two decades

(Ratchet & Clank, Resistance), the studio had until

now remained independent, allowing for multiplat-

form releases such as 2016’s Song of the Deep or the

2014 Microsoft exclusive Sunset Overdrive.

Insomniac delivered a major hit for Sony in

September with Spider-Man, an exclusive title for

PlayStation 4 that set launch records on the console

(more than 3 million units sold in its first three days

of release) and is currently the console’s second-best

seller with 13.2 million copies sold worldwide. SIE

chairman Shawn Layden isn’t shy about crediting the

game’s performance with sealing the deal. “Spider-

Man underscores how consequential Insomniac is

to gaming in the overall,” he says. “There are just a

clutch of studios in the independent sphere who are

at Insomniac’s accomplishment level. ... We felt that

this was the time to formalize the relationship.”

Now officially under SIE’s Worldwide Studios

banner, Insomniac is the 14th studio in a roster

that includes Guerrilla Games, Media Molecule

and Sucker Punch Productions. The success of

Worldwide Studios’ exclusive releases has boosted

the PlayStation 4 to more than 100 million consoles

sold, the best of any current-generation system.

“Looking at Insomniac, an acquisition of a studio

of that caliber and size was really a way for us to

continue our strength in innovation and quality

with a heavy leaning toward the power of narrative,”

says Layden. “If you look across our catalog, these

are things that we do a lot.” — PATRICK SHANLEY

Gabrielle

Union

Big

Deal

WIth 3.3 million copies sold in its first three days of release,

Spider-Man is the fastest-selling title in PlayStation 4 history.

Layden

Goodman