Zanuck Co. Signs ‘First Look’ Deal With Paramount Pictures

Paramount Pictures has effectively locked up a “first look” deal with the independent Zanuck Co., producer of the current Warner Bros. hit “Driving Miss Daisy,” with a four-year deal that guarantees Zanuck greater participation in front-end profits than it would normally get from a major studio release.

At the same time, by sweetening the terms, Paramount has guaranteed itself the right of first refusal to projects developed by one of the most reliable producers in Hollywood.

“This allows us to have creative freedom in the selection of material during the entire development process,” said Richard D. Zanuck, who formed Zanuck Co. last year with his wife Lili Fini Zanuck and entertainment entrepreneur Jerry Perenchio. “Rather than shopping ourselves around with each project, we have a deal in place where we know where our babies are going.”

The privately financed Zanuck Co. will continue to develop projects with its own money, Richard Zanuck said, but will take the developed scripts to Paramount first. The studio can agree to fund both the production and distribution of the projects, or reject them, in which case Zanuck is free to shop the material elsewhere.

In recent years, films with the Zanuck name on them have been released by almost every studio except Paramount and Disney but most often with 20th Century Fox, a company that his father, Darryl F. Zanuck, helped form in the 1930s and led until the 1950s.

During his long partnership with David Brown, Richard Zanuck was involved in such hit projects as “Jaws,” “The Sting,” “The Verdict” and “Cocoon.” Lili Fini Zanuck joined Zanuck-Brown in 1979 and was instrumental in the development of “Cocoon.” The Zanucks and Perenchio formed Zanuck Co. in January, 1989.