2009 OWA
Scorecard:  Overture through Screen
Gems
by Jason Scoggins
January 19, 2010

Here’s the fifth installment of my look back at the studios’ 2009 open writing
assignment activity, covering Overture through Screen Gems.  I’m powering through the remaining
buyers this week and will post them once or twice daily here at http://blog.itsonthegrid.com.  I’m also pulling all of the scorecards
together in one document, and if you’d like to receive a PDF copy of it,
there’s a sign-up form at the top of the right-hand column.

I explained how and why I’m doing this exercise in Part 1, but here’s what you
need to know in order to understand the below grids: 

·      
I’m taking copies of one big talent agency’s OWA Grid
from six points throughout 2009 and comparing them side-by-side to see the
number of OWAs at each company, as well as which projects were particularly
active last year. 

·      
To keep the below grids concise and consistent, I’m
not differentiating between projects that came off the grid because the assignment
was filled or for some other reason (e.g., the project becoming inactive,
moving to another studio, etc.), which is why I’ve labeled any project that
fell off the grid “Closed” rather than “Filled.”

Part 1 of this series covered CBS Films and Columbia Pictures and is available here.  Part 2 covered Dimension, DreamWorks,
Focus and a few others and is available here.  Part 3 covered the Fox labels and is
available here.  Part 4 covered Gold Circle through New
Regency and is available here.

OVERTURE

Recap:  3 projects on the grid in 2009, 1 of
which closed.

PARAMOUNT

Recap:  85 projects on the grid in 2009, 47 of
which were closed.

Paramount had a staggering number of OWAs in 2009, and most of the activity
happened in the second half of the year after Adam Goodman took over as studio
president in June.  Just 7 of the
38 projects on the grid in April were still open in December, not including two
of April’s projects that went off the grid and came back on later in the year
(Sebastian Knight and Texas Hold ‘Em).

PARTICIPANT

Recap:  9 projects on the grid in 2009, 3 of
which closed, including the one project on the list in April (The Colony).

RELATIVITY

Recap:  4 projects on the grid in 2009, two of
which were closed.

I was surprised by how few OWAs Relativity had in 2009, since I’d thought their
single picture business was broader than the above indicates.  Of course, one explanation could be
that the company stuck with the original writers on their projects.  But that’s ridiculous, right?

SCREEN GEMS

Recap:  9 projects on the grid in 2009, 7 of
which were closed.  All three of
the projects on the grid in April were closed by December.

About The Scoggins Reports:
The Scoggins Reports (Jason Scoggins’ Spec Market Roundup, Spec Market
Scorecard and now this OWA Scorecard) are terribly unscientific analyses of the
feature film development business based on information culled from a variety of
public and non-public sources. These are by no means official statistics,
merely a fairly complete summary. 
Past editions of The Scoggins Reports can be found in the archives of
The Business of Show Institute (http://bit.ly/2HRZ67)
as well as on Scoggins’ website:  http://www.lifeonthebubble.com.  Past editions of the OWA Scorecards can
be found at http://blog.itsonthegrid.com.

Details on each person, project and company in the Reports are also available
at http://www.itsonthegrid.com,
a subscription-supported, web-based database of feature film development
information launched in late 2009 by Scoggins and several other literary
managers.  For daily posts of new
and updated spec script, OWA and ODA information, check out the IOTG blog
here:  http://blog.itsonthegrid.com.

About Scoggins:
Jason Scoggins is a partner at Protocol, a literary management and
production company.  He manages
writers, directors and producers of film and TV alongside Protocol’s founding
partners Brian Inerfeld and John Ufland. 
Follow him here:  http://twitter.com/itsonthegrid.

2009 OWA
Scorecard:  Gold Circle through New
Regency
by Jason Scoggins
January 19, 2010

Here’s the fourth installment of my look back at the studios’ 2009 open writing
assignment activity, covering Gold Circle through New Regency.  I’m powering through the remaining
buyers this week and will post them once or twice daily here at http://blog.itsonthegrid.com.  I’m also pulling all of the scorecards
together in one document, and if you’d like to receive a PDF copy of it,
there’s a sign-up form at the top of the right-hand column.

I explained how and why I’m doing this exercise in Part 1, but here’s what you
need to know in order to understand the below grids: 

·      
I’m taking copies of one big talent agency’s OWA Grid
from six points throughout 2009 and comparing them side-by-side to see the
number of OWAs at each company, as well as which projects were particularly
active last year. 

·      
To keep the below grids concise and consistent, I’m
not differentiating between projects that came off the grid because the assignment
was filled or for some other reason (e.g., the project becoming inactive,
moving to another studio, etc.), which is why I’ve labeled any project that
fell off the grid “Closed” rather than “Filled.”

Part 1 of this series covered CBS Films and Columbia Pictures and is available here.  Part 2 covered Dimension, DreamWorks,
Focus and a few others and is available here.  Part 3 covered the Fox labels and is
available here.

GOLD CIRCLE FILMS

Recap:  7 projects on the grid in 2009, 4 of
which closed.  Four of the six
projects on the grid in April were closed by December.

LIONSGATE

Recap:  16 projects on the grid in 2009, 11 of
which closed.  All 6 from April
were closed by December.

Technically, there were only 14 projects on the grid for Lionsgate in 2009,
since Nurse and God And California went off the grid in the first half of the
year and popped back up in the second half.

 
MANDATE

Recap:  4 projects on the grid in 2009, three
of which closed.  Just Another Love
Story was the one project on the grid in April that didn’t close by December.

MGM

Recap:  6 projects on the grid in 2009, just one
of which closed (no surprise).  War
Games was the project on the grid in April that wasn’t closed by December. 

MIRAMAX

Recap:  5 projects on the grid in 2009, 4 of
which closed.  Indignation was the
project on the grid in April that wasn’t closed by December.

1/19/2010 Update:  I had lunch today with a motion picture
lit agent from one of the big four agencies who told me Disney intends to re-launch
Miramax as a label for projects written and/or directed by the parent studio’s
up-and-coming talent that don’t fit the rest of their brands (Bruckheimer,
Disney, DreamWorks, Marvel, Touchstone). 
This would explain those rumors from last Fall about former Fox Atomic exec
Debbie Liebling leaving Fox to join the Disney label.  (She ended up President of Production at
Universal.)

NEW LINE

Recap:  18 projects on the grid in 2009, 12 of
which closed.  All 10 from April
were closed by December.

NEW REGENCY

Recap:  20 projects on the grid in 2009, 10 of
which closed.  All 7 from April
were closed by December.

About The Scoggins Reports:
The Scoggins Reports (Jason Scoggins’ Spec Market Roundup, Spec Market
Scorecard and now this OWA Scorecard) are terribly unscientific analyses of the
feature film development business based on information culled from a variety of
public and non-public sources. These are by no means official statistics,
merely a fairly complete summary. 
Past editions of The Scoggins Reports can be found in the archives of
The Business of Show Institute (http://bit.ly/2HRZ67)
as well as on Scoggins’ website:  http://www.lifeonthebubble.com.  Past editions of the OWA Scorecards can
be found at http://blog.itsonthegrid.com.

Details on each person, project and company in the Reports are also available
at http://www.itsonthegrid.com,
a subscription-supported, web-based database of feature film development
information launched in late 2009 by Scoggins and several other literary
managers.  For daily posts of new
and updated spec script, OWA and ODA information, check out the IOTG blog
here:  http://blog.itsonthegrid.com.

About Scoggins:
Jason Scoggins is a partner at Protocol, a literary management and
production company.  He manages
writers, directors and producers of film and TV alongside Protocol’s founding
partners Brian Inerfeld and John Ufland. 
Follow him here:  http://twitter.com/itsonthegrid.