Parting the Offers

Paramount has won in the competition for film rights to Taylor Branch’s Martin Luther King Jr. bio, “Parting the Waters.” The book won a 1988 National Book Critics Circle Award. Gary David Goldberg is the producer associated with the project, which is intended for feature filming. A well-placed source told us the price was $350,000, but neither Branch nor his agent, George Diskant, would discuss business details.

“I don’t want to get into all that,” Diskant said. “I think it’s in bad taste.”

The acclaimed book covers the life of the late civil rights leader from 1954 through JFK’s assassination in 1963.

Speaking from his Baltimore home, Branch said he started getting Tinseltown overtures “as soon at it hit the New York Times best-seller list.” The interested parties who contacted him, he added, “had actually read the book, instead of just a memo or something, which hasn’t been my experience with Hollywood in the past.”