NEWS - Ultima ora! Darabont da orbi: l'ex ideatore di "The Walking Dead" ha denunciato AMC per i profitti di licenza del "suo" serial
Notizia tratta da "
Variety"
“
The Walking Dead” creator
Frank Darabont and his agent CAA
have filed suit against
AMC Networks, claiming that they are owed tens
of millions of dollars for the runaway hit, one that the cabler claims
is running a deficit.
The suit, filed on Tuesday in the Supreme Court of the State of New
York, contends that
AMC has been engaged in “the improper and abusive
practice of ‘self-dealing.’”
“One AMC affiliate produces ‘
The Walking Dead’ and then licenses the
show for an artificially low fee to another AMC affiliate that televises
the show to the public,” the suit states. “The sole goal of this sham
transaction is to enhance profits of the parent company by minimizing
the revenues that go into the ‘pool’ of funds for the show’s profit
participants.”
The suit states that Darabont is entitled to profits based on the
success of the show under a formula in which he receives a percentage
from a ‘pool’ of modified adjusted gross receipts. CAA, which packaged
the series, also is a profit participant, the suit states.
Their suit claims that the biggest source of gross receipts, the
license fees, are being “manipulated” as AMC controls the entity
producing the show and shows it on its AMC channel.
But rather than pay “fair market value,” as Darabont’s contract
required, he and CAA contend that the AMC created a “license fee
formula” that “guarantees that the series will remain grossly in
deficit.” The suit states that the formula “imputes” a license fee
“millions of dollars lower” than what AMC would have to pay a
non-affiliated studio like Lionsgate or Warner Bros. Darab0nt’s suit
also says that he “has not received and may never receive one dollar in
profits for developing the series.” The series, his attorneys contend,
had a $49 million deficit as of September 2012.
Darabont was dismissed from the series in 2011.
AMC declined to comment.
Stu Segall Prods. also is named as a defendant, which Darabont and
CAA claim was “simply used” as a signatory to the network’s agreement
with Darabont to comply with guild requirements.
Dale Kinsella, one of Darabont’s representatives, said that the suit
is distinctive in part because “the success of this particular series is
somewhat unprecedented because it has obliterated the distinction
between cable and network TV.”
The suit contents that under AMC’s imputed license fee formula, the
license fee for the show is 65% of the costs of producing the series or
$1.45 million per episode, whichever is lower. That means there “would
be a significant deficit on every episode” during the life of the
series. The formula provided for a 5% bump in the license fee for each
season, regardless of how successful it was. That means that the license
fee for season five of the show was capped at $1.76 million per
episode, and $2.2 million in season 10. By contrast, the suit points
out, AMC paid Lionsgate “at least” $3 million per episode for season
five of “Mad Men, even though it gets “less than 25% of ‘
The Walking
Dead’s’ viewership.”
The suit also notes that while the term of licensing deals between
unaffiliated networks and studios is typically four years, AMC’s imputed
license fee is a perpetual one.
Darabont and CAA also contend that AMC has not properly accounted for
the 30% tax credits they received for filming in Georgia. In September
2012, AMC listed production costs at $100 million, but with the 30% tax
credit, the profit pool was “improperly deflated by more than $30
million,” according to the suit.
The litigation also claims that
Darabont was dismissed from the
series in the summer of 2011 without cause, even though he brought it in
on time and within budget. The suit contends that AMC did so to avoid
paying him increased compensation, as well as to avoid his right of
first negotiation to serve as showrunner in the series’ third season.
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