Go backBack to selection

EVEN HEDGE FUND MANAGERS STARTED SMALL

by
in Filmmaking
on May 19, 2008

Brooks Barnes has a funny article in The New York Times about Sanjay Sanghoee, a novelist, hedge-fund employee, and would-be writer/director/producer, who is out there in the wilds of film finance trying to make an adaptation of his book Merger. Let’s just say that a rolodex full of multi-millionaire contacts can’t buy happiness — or an independent feature.

An excerpt recounting Sanhoee’s arrival in L.A. to pitch his movie:

Mr. Sanghoee landed in a boomtown. More than $12 billion was in the midst of flowing into 150 movies, according to trade estimates. Hedge funds, awash in cash, were eager to write checks. At the restaurant Spago, “I’m raising some capital” became the new, “Don’t you know who I am?”

Ramius ultimately decided to take its toe out of the water — too risky — but Mr. Sanghoee saw an opening. With a novel and, now, a Rolodex full of hedge fund and Hollywood contacts, he would make a movie himself.

“I had no idea what I was getting myself into,” he said recently.

© 2024 Filmmaker Magazine. All Rights Reserved. A Publication of The Gotham