The Lost City of Z Still - Publicity - H 2016
Aidan MonaghanA week after Amazon Studios picked up North American rights to the hotly contested Charlie Hunnam starrer The Lost City of Z, the streaming giant has closed a deal with Bleecker Street to release the film theatrically.
Sources peg the overall deal, which was brokered by CAA, at a whopping mid-eight figures.
Amazon is putting the finishing touches on the deal with Andrew Karpen’s Bleecker Street to release the James Gray-helmed film in spring 2017 — though the rollout plan is still being worked out. Amazon’s Bob Berney will spearhead the marketing and distribution alongside the Bleecker Street team.
The film, which also stars Tom Holland, Robert Pattinson and Sienna Miller, is produced by Brad Pitt’s Plan B.
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The project, based on David Grann’s best-selling book of the same name, originally was set up at Paramount, where Pitt has a first-look deal. But the studio stalled on getting the drama off the ground, and Gray took back the rights. CAA, which reps Gray, then assembled independent financing from MICA Entertainment.
Set in 1925, the true-life drama centers on British explorer Col. Percival Fawcett (Hunnam), who disappeared while searching for a mysterious city in the Amazon.
Sierra/Affinity, which introduced the project in Berlin, is selling remaining territories here in Toronto, where the Bleecker Street deal was hammered out.
Bleecker Street, the upstart distributor behind Eye in the Sky and Captain Fantastic, is expected to be an active buyer at Toronto.
The long-gestating Lost City of Z originally was developed as a Pitt-starring vehicle. Benedict Cumberbatch also was previously set to star but bowed out to headline Marvel’s Doctor Strange movie. But the finished film became a hot commodity, before Amazon took it off the table in the run-up to Toronto.
Lost City of Z will make its world premiere at the New York Film Festival on Oct. 15 in the prime closing-night spot.
Pitt, Dede Gardner and Jeremy Kleiner are producing via Plan B alongside Dale Armin Johnson and Anthony Katagas. Marc Butan is executive producing, as are MICA Entertainment’s Julie B. May and Glenn Murray.
