The Media Critic on Hamlet2, coproduced by Leonid Rozhetskin

Focus Features Acquires Hamlet 2

Written by on January 22, 2008 – 2:35 pm –

Focus Features has acquired worldwide rights to Andrew Fleming’s comedy Hamlet 2, a world premiere at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. Focus Features CEO James Schamus and president Andrew Karpen made the announcement today.
Directed by Andrew Fleming (Dick, Threesome) from an original screenplay he wrote with Pam Brady (”South Park,” Team America: World Police), Hamlet 2 is produced by L+E Pictures’ Eric Eisner & Leonid Rozhetskin and Aaron Ryder (Memento, The Prestige). The movie was executive-produced by Bona Fide partners Albert Berger & Ron Yerxa (Election).

In the irreverent comedy, a failed actor-turned-worse-high-school-drama teacher (Steve Coogan of Night at the Museum) rallies his Tucson, AZ students as he conceives and stages a politically incorrect musical sequel to Shakespeare’s “Hamlet.” The film also stars David Arquette (the “Scream” movies), Melonie Diaz (soon to be seen in Be Kind Rewind), two-time Academy Award nominee Catherine Keener, Amy Poehler (”Saturday Night Live”), and Elisabeth Shue as herself.

Schamus and Karpen commented, “Andrew Fleming and an extraordinary filmmaking team have brought everyone at Focus an amazing New Year’s present. We can’t wait to share this riotously inventive movie with the whole world.”

Eisner said, “We’re extremely excited to work with the talented Focus group on ‘Hamlet 2,’ and we look forward to a bright future for the movie after what was an exceptional response at Sundance.”

Rozhetskin added, “‘Hamlet 2? is the most auspicious imaginable launch for L+E Pictures.”

L+E Pictures was formed in 2007 by Eisner and Rozhetskin with a mission to finance and develop feature-length films. L+E Pictures provides equity financing for films with budgets in the range of $5 to $30 million dollars.

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Leonid Rozhetskin via BuzzCheck

Sundance BuzzCheck™:

The festival’s top seller, ‘Hamlet 2′

Jan 23, 2008, 07:48 PM | by Pop Watch

Categories: Sundance Film Festival 2008

To sell or not to sell? That has been the question dogging every fledgling filmmaker at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, where sales have been remarkably slow. But it wasn’t a concern for the producers of Hamlet 2 — the bizarro comic farce about an about an eccentric high school drama teacher (Steve Coogan, pictured) who tries to save his drama program and his marriage to his fed-up wife (Catherine Keener) with his production of a sequel to Shakespeare’s masterwork. Their quandary was more about how much to sell their movie for, and to whom.

The raucous comedy had been the subject of tremendous buzz coming into Sundance…before it was even completed, and without a mere mention in the event’s catalogue. Indeed, the unfinished film was such a late entry into the festival that Park City’s primary premiere location, the Eccles Center, was fully booked. But that didn’t stop Hamlet 2 from knocking Sundance out of its mid-festival doldrums with a rowdy debut screening Monday night at the Library Center theater. The room erupted in hysterics about two minutes into the show, and things stayed that way for nearly two hours.

Afterward, Harvey Weinstein hovered by the door, ready to kick off the deal-making. He was far from alone. Producer Eric Eisner and Leonid Rozhetskin, whose L+E pictures financed the film, fielded offers “from all the usual suspects,” including Fox Searchlight and Lionsgate. But it wasn’t until after he spent the whole night hashing things out at the bargaining table in his condo that he finally settled on a deal to sell the worldwide rights to Focus Features for an astronomical $10 million — one of the highest sums ever fetched by any movie in the history of Sundance. Eisner insists it wasn’t simply Focus’ deep pockets that helped that distributor win the bidding war. “We love their whole overall approach to marketing and filmmaking,” say Eisner and Rozhetskin, who will confess that Hamlet 2 outperformed even his high expectations. “It’s been quite a ride. Now it would be nice to get some sleep.” —Christine Spines (with additional reporting by Missy Schwartz)

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Leonid Rozhetskin on Hamlet2 via Eonline.com

Sundance, Day 7:

Why Hamlet 2 Is Hot, Hot, Hot

Categories: sundance, hamlet 2

Finally, there’s a huge sale at Sundance. Hamlet 2 is a satirical comedy about a failed actor turned high school teacher (Steve Coogan) who stages a musical sequel to Hamlet. And it screened so well that Focus Features snapped it up for $10 million. That’s the second-biggest sale in history, the first being Little Miss Sunshine.

So, what are the ingredients to the most appetizing Sundance spread?

1. Set the Table with Mickey Mouse-Themed Place Mats! Hamlet 2 producer Eric Eisner has a dad named Michael Eisner. You might have heard of Michael? He worked for some company called Disney or something. Anyway, Eisner didn’t make the deadline for Sundance. But he used his pull to secure a last-second screening of the rough cut so that the film could be shown. Well done, Eric.

2. Break Open a Bottle of Superexpensive 1787 Château Lafite! Hamlet 2 is classy. Even common folk moviegoers will hear the title and think, Dang, Shakespeare, that’s probably good.

3. Open Up a Box of Twinkies! Hamlet 2 sends up Dangerous Minds. Phew. It’s not all about Shakespeare.

4. Garnish with Eight Packs of NutraSweet! Everyone at Focus should send a fruit basket as a gesture of gratitude to Paris Hilton. The reformed party girl has been ditzing about, helping remind buyers we need Shakespearean-themed entertainment to distract us from, well, Paris.

5. Laugh So Hard That You Spit the Wine All over the Twinkies! Hamlet 2 star Elisabeth Shue had this to say to the New York Times: “I just got the script and it said, ‘A famous actress who’s a has-been, lives in Tucson and is a nurse.’ I had to do it.” Ha.

6. Light Estrogen-Scented Candles! Catherine Keener costars, which is reason enough to think seriously about buying or seeing any movie. Plus, Hamlet 2 is cowritten by South Park vet Pam Brady. And while less than 30 percent of the WGA is women, fortysomething percent of this year’s Oscar-nominated screenwriters are women. Neat!

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