Gary Dretzka
Leonard Klady
Emanuel Levy
David Poland
Doug Pratt
Ray Pride

JANUARY 27, 2005

11:27a - The Paramount machine keeps rolling with Paramount Classic's pick-up of Mad Hot Ballroom yesterday. As with Hustle & Flow, the studio has an eye towards synergy, as Nickelodeon will team up with Classics to release the Slamdance doc that suddenly became the second "it" movie of the 10 Days of Sundance.

Coming out of Sundance 2005, there is no question that Paramount has taken the role of being the "Searchlight" of the festival. Meanwhile, Mark Gill is swatting away rumors that Warner Indie is already in serious trouble as an ongoing entity... UA showed, but isn't buying... Miramax made the two least daring buys at the fest... Focus made a cursory buy... and Sony Classics has made one small buy while Sony, in all its brands, continues to consider possibilities, as does everyone else in The Park.

But back to The Ballroom... I'm sure you'll be reading about Tuesday night's screening of the film in Peter Biskind Jr's festival book someday. Execs from virtually every distribution company at the senior festival fought their way into the tiny Slamdance theater to take a look at the hot new title of the week.

Descriptions of the audience reaction range from ecstatic to nearly out-of-control. People who don't like to cry in movies were crying. People don't like Slamdance were dancing. And almost everyone was thinking of buying.

Ironically, a New York Times story on John Sloss, whose Cinetic Media is handling Mad Hot Ballroom, featured a somewhat negative quote about Sloss going for the most money, if not necessarily the best opportunities, for his films. Less than 24 hours later, Sloss was taking less money for what he and Paramount hope is the best for this special film... a documentary that plays like a feature. Numbers like $3.5 million were floating around town as one offer made for this documentary that Sundance rejected. Nonetheless, the opportunity to give the movie the most effective berth superseded the immediate return.

Paramount's Ruth Vitale, David Dinerstein, Jeff Freedman and Team Cinetic pulled another all-nighter getting the deal done on Tuesday night but kept the deal, done by 5am on Wednesday, a secret unitl Thursday, allowing the filmmakers to clean up loose ends that they were contractually responsible for. On the team, but not up all night, was Nickelodeon's Julia Pister… Paramount is synergizing the crap out of itself!

4:45p - The Delta flight from Salt Lake City to New York was loaded with talent... none if it in the Paris Hilton mold. Near Oscar nominees Kevin Bacon and Minnie Driver, Oscar winner Daniel Day-Lewis, plus Sundance filmmaker Rebecca Miller, Krya Sedgwick, producer Ted Hope and journalist Lou Lumenick and Marshall Fine. No pictures, please… though the Bac-wicks had far more of a sense of humor about the gawking than did Mr. Day-Lewis, who was a little enraged and more than a little concerned by one passenger who snapped his picture next to the baggage claim.

5:10p - I'm looking foward to seeing ThinkFilm's DVD 2-pack of Spellbound and The Aristocrats... "It's good for the kids to think... ThinkFilm!"

Day Seven
Day Six
Day Five
Day Four
Day Three
Day Two
Day One
Preview: The Hot Button