Portobello Productions are suing Benedict Cumberbatch’s production company SunnyMarch and his producing partner Adam Ackland. The lawsuit concerns the rights over a Roald Dahl script, “Danny the Champion of the World,” that the two parties agreed to co-produce in Novemeber 2019. Portobello commissioned a writer and never heard back from SunnyMatch again. Portobello claims that the co-production agreement grants them ownership over the script if it is “not approved within 12 months of delivery or if the parties could not get it funded within three years.” SunnyMarch disagrees that SunnyMarch is “entitled to terminate the agreement.”
The lawsuit alleges: “Since the date of the Agreement, no material progress has been made in the development of the Film. The parties have not engaged a director, and no revised first draft of the Screenplay has been produced.” “Portobello went to court to get confirmation that the “agreement has been terminated and SunnyMarch “has no continuing rights over the Film.”
– Excerpt from an article for Variety by K.J. Yossman. Read the full article here.
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