The directors and stars who usually jet into Cannes to talk up glitzy projects to international distributors will be hard to glimpse this year as a number of top-tier sellers confirmed they were pausing high-wattage buyer presentations due to a combination of talent schedules, new ways of operating since the pandemic, and the restraints of the US writers’ strike.
As the Writers Guild of America (WGA) work stoppage enters its third week, pre-sales on projects with locked scripts can proceed, but WGA strike rules prohibit writers and their reps from discussing or negotiating incomplete or future projects.
The WGA is known for playing hardball and has warned members they face disciplinary measures ranging from fines to expulsion if they break the rules.
Given that the strike is likely to impact production schedules the longer it goes on, some sellers are even wary of getting too deep into talks on projects with finished scripts that might end up not going ahead.
On the festival side talent is fully expected to support world premieres of US films including Martin Scorsese’s Killers Of The Flower Moon at Apple (Paramount handles the theatrical release), Wes Anderson’s Asteroid City at Focus Features, and Indiana Jones And The Dial Of Destiny starring Harrison Ford at Disney/Lucasfilm.
And a small number of talent attending Cannes with festival selections, such as Johnny Depp for tonight’s opener Jeanne Du Barry, are understood to be participating in buyers’ pitches for their upcoming projects.
Depp will be talking to buyers here on the Croisette about Modi, the project about Italian sculptor and painter Amedeo Modigliani which he is directing and The Veterans represents for sales.
Al Pacino, Italy’s Riccardo Scamarcio, and Pierre Niney are lined up to star and production has been earmaked for Budapest, Hungary, later this year.
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