Quick Thought: Franchises: Worth the Price?
The allure of purchasing an already existing property is always a strong one for HTG Hollywood producers. Buying the rights to a book/game/television show/movie in order to adapt it with a story of their own is sometimes a profitable venture for producers, but it can be costly as well.
Taking the top of the box office for a third week is Star Wars X by producer Trax and released by Flip Brothers Studios. Though the release of the film was granted by an award, Flip Brothers has made the franchise purchase for a whopping one billion dollars.
“We won’t make that back” commented co-chief Ritchie Steven about the deal. But that was after SWX was just released. Now with $225 million in domestic receipts, the film could possible make $400 million. Add healthy foreign box office and 2/3 of the purchase of the Star Wars franchise can be back in the Flip Brothers bank account.
Not all franchises cost so much, of course. Many property rights range in price from a few mil to a couple hundred. But just because the rights are bought, there’s no guarantee that a project with the franchise will be made.
“I’ve got a ton of franchises” remarked Miracle Pictures head Marlowe during a recent visit to HTG_Chat. “I get ideas like crazy, but I don’t always follow through with them.”
Miracle Pictures is the owner of such franchises as Die Hard, The Jetsons and Monty Python.
“I bought the Monty Python franchise because a producer had a pretty good idea for a film with them. I figured that any number of projects could be made under the Monty Python flag, so $180 million wouldn’t be that bad of an investment. We’ll just have to wait and see if that investment pays off.”
