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A late entry to the Sundance program, “Hamlet 2,″ produced by Leonid Rozhetskin,
was described by several distributors as the first indie this year to
have commercial crossover possibilities like “Little Miss Sunshine.”Read the whole story.What a piece of workFrom The Hollywood Reporter, Risky Biz Blog By Gregg Goldstein and Steven Zeitchik

Throughout Sundance, distributors have been asking “Indie hit, wherefore art thou?”

The
answer may have come Monday evening with “Hamlet 2,” Andrew Fleming’s
frequently hilarious story of an overly dramatic high school drama
teacher (played by Steve Coogan) who attempts to salvage his department
by putting on a controversial musical sequel to Shakespeare’s play.
Produced by Leonid Rozhetskin

The
late addition to the fest had intermitent lulls, but it also had every
top film exec unreservedly gushing outside the Library screening room.
The Weinstein Co., Fox Searchlight, Lionsgate, Focus, ThinkFilm,
Paramount Vantage and other execs all openly agreeing about how funny
it was.

“I heard before I came that it needed a lot of work, but
it doesn’t need that much work,” said one buyer. Others said some
judicious cutting could bring it big success. At a “Hamlet” dinner
afterwards, veteran studio director Fleming (”Threesome,” “Nancy Drew”)
said he’d be open to working with a distributor on a refined edit,
despite saying he avoided the development process initially. “It”s
nothing I haven’t been through before,” he deadpanned.

The
film’s satirical take on theater types, modern musicals, high school
and high school movies like “Dangerous Minds” resonated with the
audience, as did top notch performances by Coogan and Catherine Keener
(pictured above), Amy Poehler and the amazing newcomer Skyler Astin,
who plays a budding drama student many will recognize.

(Full
disclosure: after seeking out Astin to speak with him at the dinner, I
realized he currently stars in the Tony-winning best musical “Spring
Awakening,” co-produced by an old friend, Amanda Dubois. — Gregg
Goldstein)

“Hamlet 2″ came together thanks to producers Eric Eisner and Leonid Rozhetskin
as well as “Little Miss Sunshine” producers Ron Yerxa and Albert
Berger.” Editors were still cutting the movie as late as December with
the possibility that it wouldn”t have made into the festival.

But
the filmmakers finished it and got it into the festival just under the
wire, not unlike the way the fall’s big indie hit, “Juno,” snuck into
Telluride at the last minute.

CAA is selling the title, and top distributors began gathering at their Park City house immediately after the film  ‘Hamlet 2′ Sells After All-Night Bidding War  From The Wall Street Journal  By Lauren Schuker, January 22, 2008

This just in: After receiving an uproarious reaction from crowds last night, “Hamlet 2”
provoked the first major bidding war of the festival. After an
all-night battle, the film sold early this morning, according to
producer Eric Eisner and Leonid Rozhetskin who only arrived home at 7:30 a.m.

The comedy, which stars Steve Coogan
as a failed actor turned high school drama teacher, tells the
unpredictable, charmingly offensive tale of a high school drama class
that stages a sequel to Hamlet. The film is complete with time machines
and a modern-day version of Jesus Christ — with sex appeal and a cell
phone. Equal Opportunity Insults, In Five Acts      From The New York Times, The Carpetbagger By David M. Halbfinger

Sundance
looks to have its first unqualified hit, and a Cinderella story at
that, in “Hamlet 2.” A late addition to the film festival, this bawdy
romp, starring Steve Coogan as a failed actor-turned-pathetic
high-school drama teacher — who stages a musical sequel to “Hamlet,”
with a “sexy Jesus” Christ in a starring role — enjoyed a riotous
reaction at its premiere in Park City’s library Monday night.

One
of the festival’s running themes has been hope and optimism, as most
evident in films about people facing down death, among them Amy
Redford’s drama “The Guitar” (which didn’t wow audiences on Friday) and
Mark Pellington’s lighter-hearted “Henry Poole Is Here” (which played
quite well Monday afternoon and immediately drew interest from several
buyers).

But “Hamlet 2,” even as it made sure to insult
Christians, gays, Latinos, Jews, the A.C.L.U., Hollywood movies about
inspiring teachers and one of its lead actresses (Elisabeth Shue), also
managed to puncture the death-defying optimism that has hovered over
Park City.

As the acquisition teams from Focus Features, Fox
Searchlight, Lionsgate, Miramax and the Weinstein Company, among
others, filed out into the night – some of them, presumably, to huddle
and come up with offers – the non-buying audience hung around for a
quick Q-&-A with Andrew Fleming, the director of “Hamlet 2,” and
several members of his cast.

Mr. Fleming said he and his writing
partner, Pam Brady, had been working on the script for five years, but
the idea of a “Hamlet” sequel was much more recent, and the actual
play-within-the-movie was written on deadline. “It was this kind of
panicked, last-minute thing – ‘let’s write some songs and put on a
show,’” Mr. Fleming said. The film was produced by Leonid Rozhetskin.

In
the movie Ms. Shue plays herself, oddly enough – or a version of
herself that could be so smitten by Mr. Coogan that she’d lick his face
(as she did again onstage, for good measure). Why’d she take the role?
“I just got the script and it said ‘a famous actress who’s a has-been,
lives in Tucson and is a nurse,’” she said. “It was hilarious and I had
to do it.”

Industry watching for strike-inspired bidding wars, hot films at Sundance

Hamlet 2 is cited as a movie title “that could sneak up under the radar.” Produced by Leonid Rozhetskin Read the whole article.

     Filmmakers Look to Sundance Buying Spree