With Greatest Days coming out in the UK this Friday (June 16) on 500-plus screens, following a livestreamed premiere the night before that will see the three remaining members of Take That performing live in Leicester Square, Elysian Film Group CEO Danny Perkins is confident his five-year-old company is ready to take a big leap forward after its relatively sleepy start.
The pandemic of course has played its part in stifling company progress. But, adapted from hit stage musical The Band and featuring 18 songs by the durable UK pop group, Greatest Days is Elysian’s biggest play yet, both as an in-house production and a significant return to the UK distribution landscape.
Accompanying his ambitions for the release, Perkins has secured new investment into Elysian’s distribution arm from Jacqueline de Croy’s Dear Gaia Films – a London-based Canadian financier/producer who has been providing development finance in recent years to companies including Goodfellas (formerly Wild Bunch International).
Added to CAA’s minority investment in Elysian’s distribution operation, De Croy’s fresh backing allowed Perkins to return to Cannes this year as an active buyer with negotiations underway for at least two titles from the recent market.
“It was nice to be back in the game [at Cannes], watching films and thinking how to put them out,” he tells Screen.
With Elysian having hit pause on theatrical distribution after small releases in 2021 on a trio of films – Earwig And The Witch, Wendy and Prisoners Of The Ghostland – Greatest Days will be followed by a release for Northern Irish comedy drama Ballywalter later this summer, while it continues to seek new acquisitions. Perkins’ ambitions in distribution align closely with his days at Optimum and Studiocanal, looking to release not just UK and English-language titles but “films from the greatest filmmakers around the world”.
“I want Elysian to be a broad church where we can do the bigger films but also we care about the smaller films. With distribution, we hope that what motivates us can motivate an audience,” says Perkins, who aims for Elysian to release six to eight acquired films per year alongside one or two original productions.
“It’s the same as at Studiocanal – if you’re taking a bigger bet then you want to have more control on it and there’s a lot more control when producing a film and having the benefit of long-term value. [Whereas] distribution increases the volume of what we can do and the range of people we can work with.”
In addition to the Dear Gaia pact, Perkins has also partnered with Anonymous Content for the UK campaign of Greatest Days, with the production and management outfit providing P&A support. Perkins negotiated the deal with Anonymous Content’s Nick Shumaker, who runs the US- and UK-based company’s sales and finance division AC Independent which was launched late last year.
“We’re looking at loads of other things we can do together across distribution and production, they see huge potential in the UK,” says Perkins, adding that the Anonymous Content partnership will exist on a project-by-project basis.
“It’s been a long road but it feels like we’re in the right place now,” he continues. “Greatest Days was always going to be a big moment in that we produced the film and have put the whole release together.”
Making Greatest Days
Greatest Days, which has a budget “around $20m”, was one of the projects Perkins took with him as part of his exit from Studiocanal UK in 2018.
Having explored synergies while he was UK CEO with Universal Music Group, which is part-owned by Canal+ parent company Vivendi, Perkins initially developed the music-based project with Tim Firth, creator of the original stage show who remained on board as screenwriter for the feature adaptation. “I was deeply involved so it made sense to take it with me,” he says.
Working across financing, production, post and delivery, Perkins took his first full producing credit on Greatest Days, although that’s not an ambition for future projects. Instead, Perkins would prefer to collaborate with strong producing houses as he did at Studiocanal, where he steered co-productions with Working Title (Legend) and Heyday Films (Paddington and Paddington 2) among others.
“When it worked best at Studiocanal was when production and distribution worked closely together,” he says. “On Legend, we were very tight with Working Title throughout so we understood the film and the campaign was very strong. On Paddington, we had to be close to [Heyday] because we started the marketing campaign before the film was finished.”
Financing on Greatest Days was completed at the virtual Cannes market in 2020, but challenges around insuring the film during the pandemic meant a 12-month delay to the production start date and the loss of original cast members including Rosamund Pike.
The film finally shot in London, Clitheroe in northwest England and Athens, Greece in Q2 2022 with a new cast led by Aisling Bea, Jayde Adams, Amaka Okafor and Alice Lowe and director Coky Giedroyc at the helm. Other producers are former Zurich Film Festival heads Karl Spoerri and Viviana Vezzani through their production financing outfit Zurich Avenue, Jane Hooks and Kate Solomon, an early Elysian hire for Perkins who returned to independent producing last year.
The UK tax credit and Greece’s EKOME incentive helped round out the final budget, while Amazon boarded early for SVoD rights in the UK with the film receiving a 60-day theatrical window before it lands on Prime Video.
Perkins’s relationship with Amazon dates back to his Studiocanal days and he describes them as “good partners”. “They gave us a longer window on theatrical because they see that the film really plays with a crowd and exhibition have been very supportive on that too – they see the potential,” he says.
Perkins hopes the release of Greatest Days can also galvanise Elysian’s development slate, including projects housed under the Mews Films banner, the comedy production venture he set up with Kris Thykier’s Archery Films in 2020. The aim is for the first feature from Mews to start shooting before the end of the year – a period comedy based on an original idea by comedian Jimmy Carr that is being cast now.
Other projects in the Elysian pipeline include The Magic Faraway Tree, an adaptation of the Enid Blyton novel written by Simon Farnaby which is a co-production with Neal Street Productions and also a project Perkins brought over from Studiocanal.
The road to release
As well as the UK, the film will open on June 16 in Germany through Capelight, where Take That also have an avid following. Capelight will livestream the Thursday-night premiere on 150 screens and expand into more cinemas for the opening weekend.
Other markets where the band isn’t as well known or popular are taking longer to pin down. Deals have been concluded for Benelux (Studiocanal-owned Dutch FilmWorks), Scandinavia (Scanbox) and Australia (still unannounced), and Italy is in negotiation, but several big markets remain open.
“I think people are looking to see how the UK goes,” says Perkins.
International sales are being overseen by former Protagonist head of sales Vanessa Saal for Upgrade Productions; CAA Media Finance is handling the domestic sale.
Citing music-led, broad-appeal films like Mamma Mia!, Rocketman and Elvis, Perkins is feeling confident that a robust UK audience – in particular, 35-plus female moviegoers – will turn out for Greatest Days.
“Take That have a massive audience in the UK; there was the coronation in May where they performed – we’ll see how it goes but we’ve put a strong release together.
“Post-pandemic, everything’s changed massively, the way you engage with an audience is totally different,” he adds. “It’s the same job – getting an audience interested in a film – but the way it’s done, it’s much more digital and much more late-breaking. It’s kind of nerve-wracking.”
What’s also changed is Perkins’ own approach to theatrical distribution. Having been CEO of Studiocanal UK for eight years, the executive was used to working with a large in-house team on the release of its titles including the aforementioned Paddingtons, The Imitation Game and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy.
At Elysian, Perkins leads a team of four including head of acquisitions and development Jed Benedict, Stephen Murphy for business affairs and head of distribution Nick McKay. The latter helped drive the Greatest Days campaign supported by freelance and agency consultants including former Studiocanal colleagues Mikey Ellis, who led on marketing, and DDA film and TV president Neil Bhatt, who spearheaded the PR campaign.
“There’s probably 200 people working on the release of Greatest Days; it’s great to have this flexible model where you can have a small team and then expand and contract as required,” says Perkins. “That’s the right approach for right now.”
Perkins is hopeful for a great box-office result for Greatest Days although doesn’t want to put a number on it, but notes that Elysian’s future isn’t riding on the outcome. “There’s enough going on in both production and distribution,” he says.
“Greatest Days is demonstrative of what we can do as a company,” he concludes. “If we can create British events, there’s not that many people doing that. It’s trying to cater for audiences that are underserved, and try to make big British films that can be local hits.
“The UK is a tough market but there’s an opportunity as well because there’s less players than before. There’s an audience for theatrical releases that can be served with a wider range of product, and that’s what I feel we can fill.”
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