MUMBAI: A year after Reliance Big Entertainment announced it would flirt with Hollywood filmmakers, the Anil Ambani company has greenlit a slate of 20 projects outside its Spielberg deal.
“We have invested $10-15 million in the past one year in the developmental process of these Hollywood projects. We are now geared up for the next phase,” says a source in Reliance Big Entertainment.
The projects, involving nine Hollywood talents, have been approved and have entered various stages of script development. Reliance will provide a development fund silo for each of the production entities and it may also co-finance projects that emanate from these development deals.
Reliance will fund Nicolas Cage‘s Saturn Films action title Voodoo Child with writer John Collee and Jim Carrey‘s JC 23 Entertainment for the comedy O‘Gunn with writers Ed Cannistraci and Fred Seton.
Besides these, Reliance will also provide seed finance to three projects, to be produced under the Chris Columbus‘ 1492 Pictures banner. These are Things They Left Behind (based on Stephen King short story about 9/11 survivor), The Last Campaign (an adaptation of Thurston Clarke‘s book) and David Dorfman‘s script It‘s A Miserable Life.
Reliance will further fund Brett Ratner‘s Rat Entertainment to develop Youngblood, based on Rob Liefeld‘s iconic graphic novel ‘Infinity‘, with writer John Collee. The company will also develop John Delorean‘s project with James Toback. Meanwhile, Julia Roberts‘ Red Om Films will develop Dan Eldon‘s.
Says Reliance BIG Entertainment chairman Amit Khanna, “It has been a very active and satisfactory first year and we have been delighted by the quality of the individual projects being presented to us for development financing. There are many others in the evaluation/ negotiation stages and I‘m confident of moving into the filmmaking stage on several projects before the end of the year.”
Adding further Khanna says, “These creative partnerships call for Reliance to co-finance production for the US Studios where existing first-look deals are in place. From the conversations to date, we know that the respective studios welcome our development silos and our subsequent co-financing ability. We have broken completely new ground by empowering some of the best talent in Hollywood.”
Part of its long term strategy for media investments in Hollywood to build a fully integrated movie company with substantial holdings in production, distribution and exhibition, Reliance Big Entertainment sees these development deals as the first major building block in the creation of a virtual studio for Hollywood.
The deals also secure Indian rights for the films which Reliance co-finances. Additionally, through these deals, Reliance expects to attract suitable productions with appropriate incentives to India.
Creative Artists Agency (CAA) was instrumental in brokering the deals and is advising Reliance Big Entertainment on its Hollywood strategy.
Meanwhile, Reliance has already stiched a deal with Steven Spielberg to set up a $1.5 billion company that would finance 32 movies over six years.
Leave a Reply