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Max Barbakow’s comedy Palm Springs sets a Sundance record

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Wed, 01, 20

At the Sundance Film Festival 2020, which kick started on January 23 and will run till February 2, 2020 at the Park City in Utah, comedy Palm Springs has broken the record for the biggest sale in the history of Sundance by 69 cents.

According to recent reports, the indie distributor Neon and streaming service Hulu bought Palm Springs for exactly $17,500,000.69 in a sale announced earlier this week. This figure exceeds the previous record set by The Birth of a Nation in 2016, which went to the former Fox Searchlight Pictures for $17.5 million.

Palm Springs premiered on Sunday at Park City’s Library Theater. On one hand was director Max Barbakow and his cast, which included leads Andy Samberg and Cristin Milioti. “We spent over 85 million dollars of our own money on this movie, we are taking a bath on this deal. We hope Neon and Hulu are happy but we definitely have a lot of explaining to do to our families,” said producers Samberg, Akiva Schaffer, Jorma Taccone, and Becky Sloviter in a joint statement.

Palm Springs is the latest in a string of Sundance deals to be brokered as the first weekend of the fest came to a close. Other pickups include the Cold War drama Ironbark landing at Lionsgate, Searchlight Pictures grabbing the thriller The Night House and Amazon nabbing the Irish drama Herself and Alan Ball’s Uncle Frank.