Dobson wrote: ↑

April 28th, 2019, 12:43 pm

With a 2.5x multiplier, which isn't ruled out, this would make $3b, even beating Avatar

Eight years after its launch, Annapurna Pictures has retained a law firm to explore bankruptcy protection, multiple sources tell The Hollywood Reporter.

The company, founded in 2011 by Megan Ellison, had evolved over the years from a production-finance entity to include a full-scale distribution arm whose films included Vice and Sorry to Bother You. But rumors of Annapurna's imminent demise have persisted for the past year. Ellison's company was said to have lost so much money — thanks to a string of soft box office performers, including The Sisters Brothers and Destroyer — that it could no longer sustain the hemorrhaging.

"The Ellison family is in negotiations to restructure their deals with the banks. They remain in full support of the company and are dedicated to Annapurna’s future," an Annapurna spokesperson says. Megan Ellison is the daughter of Oracle Corporation billionaire Larry Ellison. Her brother, David, founded Skydance Media, which produces the Terminator sequels and is behind the forthcoming Tom Cruise starrer Top Gun: Maverick, among other titles.

Red flags abounded as the company scrapped two high-profile previously greenlit films last year: Jay Roach's untitled Roger Ailes drama and Jennifer Lopez's heist pic Hustlers. Those moves coincided with the departures of two high-level executives, domestic marketing president Marc Weinstock and film chief Chelsea Barnard, and were followed by an announcement earlier this year of a new joint distribution venture with MGM that some saw as Ellison relinquishing power.

But perhaps the biggest looking question is the fate of the James Bond franchise. Annapurna has at least a 50 percent stake in United Artists Releasing. Bond 25, which has been plagued by setbacks including a director switch, star Daniel Craig's ankle injury and at least two peeping tom incidents involving hidden cameras in a bathroom, is scheduled to be released April 8 by UAR (Ellison is also a board member of the UAR). How Annapurna's cash flow issues will effect the MGM tentpole's release will be determined. An MGM source says there would be no impact on the release of any its titles including Bond.

Currently, Annapurna has a staff of 80 and a number of film projects in development including the Emily Blunt starrer Not Fade Away, which David O. Russell and John Krasinski are producing and which is based on a 2015 memoir by Rebecca Alexander; and a drama about Harvey Weinstein's epic fall, based on the Pulitzer Prize reporting of The New York Times' Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, that Brad Pitt's Plan B is producing.

On the immediate horizon is Richard Linklater's Where'd You Go, Bernadette?, which Annapurna will release on Aug. 16.