Academy Award® winner Steven Soderbergh (“Traffic,” “Erin Brockovich,” “Ocean’s Eleven”) will produce, with an eye to direct, a movie based on the infamous Panama Papers, the largest data leak in corporate and government history.
Lawrence Grey’s Grey Matter Productions acquired the feature film rights to the forthcoming book, Secrecy World, being written by Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Jake Bernstein and published by Henry Holt and Company, and is teaming with Anonymous Content (“The Revenant,” “Spotlight,” “Babel”) to develop, finance and produce the film. Producers are Lawrence Grey, Anonymous Content’s Michael Sugar, Scott Burns and Steven Soderbergh. Executive Producers are Jake Bernstein and Grey Matter COO, Ben Everard.
Jake Bernstein was part of the international team of journalists who are members of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists that broke the story of the Panama Papers in April. More than 11 million records were leaked as a part of the papers sourced from Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca.
Bernstein’s book contains all-new details about the Panama Papers, including revelations about the financial machinations of rulers and royalty, the illegal activities connected to dozens of banks, and the extent to which U.S. companies and citizens are involved. Jake Bernstein won a Pulitzer in 2011 for his and ProPublica cohort Jessie Eisinger’s reporting about Wall Street ahead of the financial crisis. He also co-authored the 2006 book Vice: Dick Cheney and the Hijacking of the American Presidency with journalist Lou Dubose.
The deal was negotiated by Jamie Feldman of Lichter Grossman Nichols Adler & Feldman. David Patterson of Stuart Krichevsky Literary Agency along with Howie Sanders of United Talent Agency (UTA) represent and negotiated on behalf of Jake Bernstein.
