The Great Pretender will be First film as StudioCanal Announces Four Picture Deal With Parkes+MacDonald/Image Nation

STUDIOCANAL ANNOUNCES FOUR PICTURE DEVELOPMENT DEAL WITH PARKES+MACDONALD/IMAGE NATION

THE GREAT PRETENDER BY OL PARKER WILL BE THE FIRST PROJECT UNDER THIS NEW COLLABORATION AGREEMENT

STUDIOCANAL and Parkes+MacDonald Productions today announced a deal to develop a slate of four new projects aimed at fulfilling STUDIOCANAL’s goal of making European-based movies for an international audience.

Walter Parkes and Laurie MacDonald will produce each feature, with P+M President of Production Evan Hayes serving as Executive Producer. Three of them are being developed in association with long-term Parkes+MacDonald Productions partner ImageNation Abu Dhabi.

Ron Halpern, EVP of International Productions and Acquisitions for STUDIOCANAL comments “Walter Parkes and Laurie MacDonald are extraordinary producers who bring together great director and writer talent. Their focus on story telling and quality filmmaking for a global audience made them producers with whom STUDIOCANAL very much wanted to work. As we began to discuss different projects we quickly found four films, which represent exactly the films STUDIOCANAL would like to make. We are extremely pleased to begin this partnership with them by developing these projects.”

Walter Parkes adds “For years, STUDIOCANAL has had unmatched creative and commercial success in bringing together extraordinary talent and projects from around the globe and presenting this work to a large international audience. They are true lovers of cinema and a pleasure to work with; we’re thrilled to be building this partnership with them.”

The first film under the new deal will be THE GREAT PRETENDER, based on the autobiography of Roy Tempest – at one time London's most successful concert promoter and booking agent – who dreamt up one the most incredible scams ever in the music business: he organized UK tours for some of America’s biggest soul acts – from the Temptations to the Ronettes – who played in sold-out venues across the country. The only problem was, they were all fakes. With help from mafia connections, Tempest had trawled second-rate clubs in New York’s outer boroughs, carefully selected the talent from the most unlikely places—groups of US postal workers, lingerie saleswomen, NYC bus drivers, and, in one case, ex-bank robbers--and flew them to London to perform. The book charts Roy’s rise as a legitimate concert promoter, his great scam and his unique talent for always landing on his feet.

Laurie MacDonald notes: "Beyond vividly capturing London in the early 60's, Roy's book is ultimately about the power of the music that transformed the world -- whether it was performed by the real Stevie Wonder or Smokey Robinson or the Temptations -- or just by ordinary guys who, thanks to Roy's audacity, were given a glimpse of stardom that would change their lives forever."

Ol Parker (THE BEST EXOTIC MARIGOLD HOTEL) is writing the screen adaptation of the book, which was represented by Intellectual Property Group’s Joel Gotler, who will also serve as an Executive Producer on the project.

In addition to THE GREAT PRETENDER, Parkes+MacDonald and STUDIOCANAL will also work together to develop FALLEN IDOL and HINDENBURG.

FALLEN IDOL is the re-telling of the classic Carol Reed/Graham Greene film. When ex-US Special Forces officer is hired as head of security for a wealthy English family living in Hong Kong, he develops a paternal relationship with the son, which becomes deadly when the son discovers his true past. Adapted from the short story by Graham Greene, the script is being written by acclaimed New Yorker journalist Patrick Radden Keefe (author of The Hunt For El Chapo and The Snakehead, and screenwriter of THE SON, with Jake Gyllenhaal and Denis Villenueve attached) after a draft by David Farr.

HINDENBURG is the retelling of the most famous air disaster of all time, and focuses on the chief engineer of the Zeppelin Company. The engineer attempts to save his Jewish lover from the dangers of pre-war Berlin, by booking passage for both of them to America on the great Airship – only to discover that they and the rest of the passengers are in mortal danger because of a saboteur on board. Gary Spinelli (Universal’s upcoming AMERICAN MADE, starring Tom Cruise) is onboard to write the project, which is based on an original screenplay by Jacob Held. Adam Kolbrenner of Madhouse Entertainment will serve as Executive Producer.

In addition to these three projects, Parkes+MacDonald is also working with STUDIOCANAL to develop its fourth project under the new deal, COLDHEART.

In this contemporary thriller, a disgraced intelligence officer is brought back into active duty to help spring a young American political activist captured in Russia, only to uncover a trail of deception that leads to the upper reaches of the CIA, and threatens to cost him his life. David Farr (BBC’s Acclaimed Mini-series “The Night Manager,” Joe Wright’s HANNA) is writing COLDHEART based on an original story by Farr and Parkes.

This new deal reunites Parkes+MacDonald Productions, Image Nation Abu Dhabi and STUDIOCANAL who most recently worked together on the French theatrical release of the feature documentary HE NAMED ME MALALA, directed by Academy-Award-winning director David Guggenheim, produced by Walter Parkes and Laurie MacDonald under their long-term producing partnership with Image Nation Abu Dhabi and co-financed by Participant Media.

Image Nation Abu Dhabi also worked with STUDIOCANAL on Ali Mostafa’s road comedy FROM A TO B, which STUDIOCANAL released in the UK, and Majid Al-Ansari’s psychological thriller ZINZANA, which STUDIOCANAL released in the UK and Germany.

About Parkes+MacDonald Productions
The husband and wife team of Walter F. Parkes and Laurie MacDonald are producers and former studio heads whose films include the MEN IN BLACK series, GLADIATOR, FLIGHT, MINORITY REPORT, CATCH ME IF YOU CAN, THE RING, AWAKENINGS, THE MASK OF ZORRO, TWISTER, AMISTAD and HE NAMED ME MALALA, as well as the screen adaptations of THE KITE RUNNER and Steven Sondheim’s SWEENY TODD, and many others. Their upcoming slate includes the comedy KEEPING UP WITH THE JONESES and the horror sequel RINGS. In total, films produced or executive produced by Parkes & MacDonald have grossed over $6B globally.

Parkes & MacDonald ran the motion picture division of DreamWorks Studios from its inception in 1997 until 2006. During their tenure, the fledgling studio won, for only the second time in Academy history, three consecutive Best Picture Oscars: American Beauty, Gladiator, and A Beautiful Mind, the latter two in partnership with Universal Studios.

In 2009, Parkes & MacDonald formed Parkes+MacDonald ImageNation, a partnership with the Abu Dhabi media company, for the development and production of films for the international market. Last year, the partnership released a feature-length documentary about Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani school girl and activist who survived an assassination attempt by the Taliban. The film was directed by Davis Guggenheim, whose Inconvenient Truth won the Best Documentary Oscar in 2006. The next film to be released through this partnership is an adaptation of Dave Eggers’ novel THE CIRCLE, which stars Tom Hanks and Emma Watson and was directed by James Ponsoldt (THE SPECTACULAR NOW).

About STUDIOCANAL
STUDIOCANAL is Europe’s leader in production, right acquisition, distribution and international sales of feature films and TV series. STUDIOCANAL operates directly in all three major European markets, France, the United Kingdom and Germany, as well as in Australia and New Zealand. STUDIOCANAL is also present in the USA and in China.

STUDIOCANAL has fully-financed recent box office hits like Paddington, Shaun the Sheep and Non-Stop. Upcoming films backed by STUDIOCANAL include The Commuter featuring Liam Neeson, Paddington 2 currently in production and Nick Park's stop-motion movie Early Man, with Aardman Studios with voice cast Eddie Redmayne and Tom Hiddleston, recently announced.

STUDIOCANAL is actively developing and distributing high-end TV series through its network of award-winning production companies including Tandem Productions in Germany (Crossing Lines, Spotless), the UK’s RED Production Company (Happy Valley) and BAMBÚ PRODUCCIONES (Grand Hotel, Velvet).

Additionally, STUDIOCANAL owns one of the most important film libraries in the world, with thousands of international titles.

STUDIOCANAL’s parent company, CANAL+ Group, is fully-owned by Vivendi, a global media and content production and distribution group.

About Image Nation Abu Dhabi
Image Nation Abu Dhabi is one of the leading media and entertainment companies in the Arabic-speaking world. The company produces local and international films, documentaries and television content. In 2105 Image Nation launched the Arabic TV channel Quest Arabiya in association with Discovery Communications. Quest Arabiya reaches an Arab audience of 340 million people in 45 million homes in 22 countries across the Middle East and North Africa.

The company aims to build a sustainable film and television industry in Abu Dhabi and the United Arab Emirates.

Image Nation’s slate includes Emirati-produced feature films (Zinzana, From A to B), cause-driven documentaries (He Named Me Malala, Every Last Child), insightful television shows (Beyond Borders, Hayati Walaskariya) television dramas (Justice) and award-winning international films (The Help, Flight, 99 Homes). Through its content, Image Nation is creating opportunities for local talent to tell their stories and gain the experience essential to sustain a local industry.