The daughter got her money
The New York Times
June 16, 2005
'Deep Throat' Sells Story
By EDWARD WYATT
Universal Pictures and PublicAffairs have agreed to pay close to $1 million to buy the film and book rights to the life story of W. Mark Felt, people involved in the deal said yesterday.
Mr. Felt is the former F.B.I. official who recently said he was Deep Throat, the secret source for Bob Woodward, the Washington Post reporter, during the Watergate investigation.
The potential sale has been the subject of intense speculation in the publishing industry and in Hollywood since Mr. Felt's identity was revealed last month in an article in Vanity Fair magazine.
The contracts, which are expected to be announced today, include an option to produce a feature film and the rights to a biography based on previously unpublished material written by Mr. Felt after his retirement from the F.B.I.
Peter Osnos, the publisher and chief executive of PublicAffairs, an independent publishing company, said yesterday that the book would be published next spring and would combine Mr. Felt's recollections about his life and his relationship with Mr. Woodward with material written by John O'Connor, the lawyer who wrote the Vanity Fair article. Mr. Osnos declined to comment on the amount to be paid for the book rights.
An option to produce a film based on the material and Mr. Felt's memoir of his life in the F.B.I. was bought by Universal for development by Playtone, the production company owned by the actor Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman, according to two people involved in the deal, who asked not to be named. A representative of Universal Pictures did not return phone calls last night.
The full amount to be realized by Mr. Felt's family will not be known for some time and depends on whether a film is actually made, people involved in the deal said. But the largest portion of the $1 million amount is likely to come from the movie rights.
David Kuhn, a literary agent at Kuhn Projects who represented the Felt family in the negotiations, said the family chose PublicAffairs as its publisher not because of a large advance but because of its reputation for producing literary nonfiction. |
