Is it possible to own someone’s life story? While you’d think the obvious answer is no, the recent cancellation of Madonna’s biopic – which had been in the works with Universal Pictures for years – sheds new light on this question.
In 2021, Universal won a competitive, multi-studio bidding war for the rights to the script for this highly anticipated biopic. Madonna herself co-wrote the script alongside screenwriters Diablo Cody and Erin Cressida Wilson, and was creatively attached to direct the film. Emmy winner Julia Garner was even cast to play the pop icon, after what was described as an intense “boot camp” audition process in 2022.
Yet, after years of work, Madonna recently revealed that the project was axed due to a “falling out” with Universal over budget.
“I’ve had an extraordinary life. I’ve had a huge life, so I needed a big budget,” she told Interview Magazine when explaining what drove her pivot toward producing her upcoming album Confessions on a Dance Floor: Part II.
I mean, we all knew Madonna’s biopic wasn’t going to make an indie film, but how big was this budget exactly?
The extortionate cost of creative control
To her credit, Madonna suggested filming in Serbia to cut costs, but according to the singer, Universal “didn’t believe [she’d] stay in Serbia more than four days.”
The situation grew more complicated when streaming competitors tried to rescue the project.
“Netflix reached out to make a series,” Madonna explained. “That was a whole other long process, because I couldn’t use the script I had with Universal unless I bought it from them for an extortionist’s price, even though I wrote it. Don’t ask.”
Unable to buy back the script she co-wrote about her own life, Madonna attempted to redevelop the biopic into a series format from scratch. However, meeting with countless new writers and finding a showrunner proved too difficult, and the project was shelved entirely.
The legality of ‘Turnaround’ clauses
Speaking to WHO, Jahan Kalantar, the Managing Partner of Executive Law Group, unpacked whether a studio can really own the rights to your life story, and exposed how common these kinds of disputes are…especially in Hollywood.
When it comes to your actual life, Kalantar notes that the law is straightforward: “No one can own the rights to your life story”, he says. “That’s a very simple proposition. You own your story.”
However, Universal doesn’t claim to own Madonna‘s life; they own a specific piece of Intellectual Property (IP).
“It’s the specific document, the specific scenes, the specific work that has gone into creating this script,” Kalantar explains.
“Madonna is absolutely one of the most famous pop stars of all time, and she has had a longevity unlike many others, and so to tell her story would naturally be a very big, complex process,” he continues. “And so Madonna has worked to develop this script, and I think just by virtue of someone who’s had so many hits and been in the space so long, it’s going to be a really long and interesting story.
“So a lot of time has been invested in this, and what generally happens in the United States is that when a studio makes a deal with you, they basically own the work from the moment you put pen to paper, which is a little bit different to Australia. In Australia, at the end of the work, you can then assign the rights, but you basically own it until it’s written.”
“They basically own the work from the moment you put pen to paper”.
Jahan Kalantar
This clause is known as a turnaround, and is commonly built into a lot of similar arrangements in the United States and other parts of the world.
“So what’s happened with this particular story is Madonna has worked with a team, prepared a manuscript,” says Kalantar. “That manuscript, because of the challenges in being made, has sat in abatement [suspended or paused], and she wants it back.
“But the studio is saying, well, we’ve actually invested a fortune in getting it to this stage. We’re not just going to give it back to you without you compensating us for all of the effort that we went to.”
So, while Universal isn’t asking Madonna to buy back the rights to her life story, they are asking her to compensate them for the time and money they put into producing the film’s specific script alongside her – especially if she’s planning to go to Netflix with this same script.
Hollywood’s messiest “safest bet”
While a broken development deal of this scale is a shock to fans, Kalantar emphasises that these fallouts happen constantly behind closed doors.
“The unusual one is when IP is purchased, and it goes absolutely painlessly,” he says. “It’s much more likely for something to get purchased and nothing to come of it than for something to come of it.”
However, fans shouldn’t mourn the Madonna biopic just yet.
Right now, biopics are Hollywood’s safest bet. From Bohemian Rhapsody earning over US$900 million at the global box office after premiering in 2018, to Michael already blowing this number out of the water this year, with over US$940 million globally, studios are well aware of the genre’s massive earning potential.
“No one wants a profitable, interesting Madonna biopic more than potentially Universal and Madonna,” Kalantar says. “So the fact that it’s not being made means something, somewhere has gone in a direction that someone’s unhappy with.”
Someone will find a way to make this film – if it’s not Madonna herself – and I wouldn’t be surprised if her recent Interview Magazine tell-all was just the public negotiation tactic she needed to get the ball rolling again.
While we may only see an ironic, fictionalised version of the scrapped biopic through season two of The Studio for now – where Madonna and Julia Garner play themselves attempting to shoot a Madonna biopic – the time, money, and star power of the Queen of Pop alone is enough for us to assume this idea isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
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