Warners Makes 7-Figure Spec Deal For Japanese Novel ‘All You Need Is Kill’

H/T to Nate Winslow for tracking this announcement on DH:

In a deal that might get writers and their reps to reconsider the value of writing on spec, Warner Bros paid low-seven figures against a purchase price near $3 million for a Dante Harper-scripted adaptation of All You Need Is Kill, a Japanese novel by Hiroshi Sakurazaka. Warners execs Jon Berg and production president Greg Silverman moved preemptively for the property and made a deal late Friday that has an aggressive progress to production clause that will likely get the film before the cameras within 12 months.

This is interesting:

Jason Hoffs, the former DreamWorks exec who is head of production at VIZ Media, got the project to 3 Arts’ Erwin Stoff and Tom Lassally. They optioned the book last fall and involved the writer. Harper and his reps at CAA and Management 360 decided he should do it on spec, instead of pitching it… By putting in the work and writing several drafts he honed with the producers, Harper — who most recently wrote the Paramount project Black Hole for Plan B and David Fincher to produce — bypassed the pitch morass, made his first seven-figure payday, and has likely improved his six-figure quote by presenting Warners with a movie that can be made quickly.

Bypass pitching to go the spec route. Unusual with a book attachment.

I believe that’s the biggest spec script sale of the year — and #11 by my count. More tomorrow when the trades cover it.

Comment Archive