Matt Damon and Ben Affleck at "The Rip" New York premiere. ZUMAPRESS.com Proof that there are no hard feelings in Hollywood.
Artists Equity, the production company led by Ben Affleck and Matt Damon, signed a first-look deal with Netflix to cover streaming releases. On its face, it’s a pretty straightforward arrangement for the Affleck-Damon firm and Netflix — and another feather in the cap of the duo’s fledgling company, having signed a similar deal with Sony to cover theatrical releases last year.
But given the recent news cycle that featured Netflix as a main player, this particular deal contains some gallows humor.
The cast of “The Rip” with Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos. Getty Images for Netflix That’s because Artists Equity, founded in 2022, is backed by RedBird Capital, the investment firm led by Gerry Cardinale (he’s counted as one of Artists Equity’s three co-founders). That’s the same Gerry Cardinale that spent the last three months trashing the streaming giant’s (now-scuttled) deal for Warner Bros. in favor of Paramount, where RedBird is a major backer via David Ellison and Skydance.
(In one memorable moment, Cardinale traded verbal blows with Netflix co-CEO Greg Peters, calling their bid “smoke and mirrors.”)
Taking the irony out of it, the deal makes a lot of sense for Netflix. Damon and Affleck’s crime thriller “The Rip” has been one of the service’s top movies since it debuted in January — it spent three weeks at No. 1 globally. Netflix is also on tap to release an upcoming Artist Equity film (and Affleck’s next directorial feature) “Animals,” which Affleck stars in alongside Kerry Washington and Gillian Anderson.
Even Artists Equity’s deal with Sony has Netflix ties. All of those movies will eventually find their way to Netflix given its recent pay 1 deal with Sony (meaning they’ll head to the streamer following their theatrical runs).
Artists Equity’s deal with Netflix for “The Rip” included a bonus payment for everyone involved with the film if it hit certain performance targets (in the old days, this was known as back-end payments). It was viewed as groundbreaking for Netflix, which pioneered the model of paying heftier upfront fees in lieu of back-end, much to the chagrin of creatives.
It’s not clear if films under this new, multi-year deal would contain those same terms, and Netflix declined to comment further. A source told P6H that “The Rip” was a “bespoke” deal, and that the streamer doesn’t plan to change its compensation model, echoing comments that Bela Bajaria, Netflix’s content chief, told the New York Times earlier this year.
