Legendary Pictures, Inc. (also referred to as Legendary Entertainment) is an American film production company based in Burbank, California. The company was founded by Thomas Tull in 2000 and in 2005 the company concluded an agreement to co-produce and co-finance 40 films with Warner Bros.

 

History

Thomas Tull founded Legendary Entertainment after raising $500 million from private equity firms. It was one of the first companies of its kind to pair major motion picture production with major Wall Street private equity and hedge fund investors, including ABRY Partners, AIG Direct Investments, Bank of America Capital Investors, Columbia Capital, Falcon Investment Advisors, and M/C Venture Partners. The company was incorporated in California in 2000 and in 2005 it signed a seven-year agreement with Warner Bros. to co-produce and co-finance 40 films over seven years. In 2010 Tull and two other investors, Fidelity Investments and Fortress Investment Group, bought all the shares of the original investors. Following the transaction, Tull became the largest shareholder, thus enabling him to more easily direct the company's operations. By 2011 the company was reported to have been valued at more than $1 billion.In September 2011, Chief Creative Officer Jon Jashni was appointed to the new position of President.

 

Divisions and ventures

In addition to producing American feature films, Legendary Entertainment has announced various other business endeavors, which are currently in the early stages of development. In addition to those listed below, Legendary Entertainment (via Legendary Pictures, Inc.) owns several shell corporations and holding companies registered as limited liability companies (LLCs) including Legendary Entertainment, Legend Pictures, Legendary Pictures Films, Legendary Pictures Funding, Legendary Pictures Productions, Legen Pictures, Lpsco, and Lpod.

 

Digital division

In 2009, the company announced the establishment of a digital division, to be headed by Kathy Vrabeck, that would primarily focus on game development, a move which surprised many industry analysts because of the film industry's previous disengagement with the video game industry.The goal of the division was reoriented in 2012 with the acquisition of Nerdist Industries, LLC, a pop culture blog with a synonymous podcast.Nerdist founder Chris Hardwick announced that he and his partner Peter Levin (founder of GeekChicDaily) would still have complete control editorial autonomy and that they would become the new presidents of the digital division, with Levin heading digital strategy and he digital content.

 

Legendary Comics

In 2010, the company announced the launch of a comic book division called Legendary Comics, LLC under the direction of editor-in-chief Bob Schreck.The first graphic novel published by the company was Holy Terror by Frank Miller, which was released in 2011.

 

Legendary Television

In 2011, the company announced the creation of Legendary Television, LLC to focus on developing television productions. The division was headed by Jeremy Elice and a co-financing contract with Warner Bros. Television was signed.However, in 2012, Legendary decided to postpone its expansion into television and shut down the division; the contract with Warner Bros. was terminated and Elice left the company.

 

Legendary East

In 2011, the company announced the formation of Legendary East Ltd., a joint venture film production company based in Hong Kong. Half of the company will be owned by the shell corporation Paul Y. Engineering Group (which will be partially owned by Kelvin Wu, who will be Legendary East's CEO), 40% will be owned by Legendary Entertainment (through holding companies such as Legendary Asian Pacific, LLC or Legendary East Holdings, LLC), and 10% will be owned by the Chinese film distributor Huayi Brothers International.Legendary East initially hoped to produce one to two globally marketed English-language films per year and finance a quarter of the production of an additional two films per year. Because the company will be based in China, it will be able to circumvent the quota on theatrically released foreign films. The company hoped to raise US$220.5 million through the sale of stock of Paul Y.Engineering Group on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange by the end of 2011. However, because financing did not meet the targeted goal, Legendary East is planning to continue its efforts to secure financing in 2012.The first film announced by the company is The Great Wall.

 

Filmography

Legendary Entertainment has co-produced 24 feature films. In addition, the company is also in the process of producing an additional seven films and is developing various other projects. Of the 24 feature films produced, 23 have had theatrical releases and one has had a direct-to-video release. All films that were theatrically released were distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures (except for Watchmen which was distributed by both Warner Bros. Pictures and Paramount Pictures) and the direct-to-video film was distributed by Warner Premiere. Note that in all cases the distributor or distributors are also co-producers. Also, in all cases the film listed is a work of Legendary Pictures, unless the film's name is followed by a subscript "E", indicating that Legendary East is the production company. The box office column reflects the worldwide gross for the theatrical release of the film in United States dollars.

 

Released

Year	Title	Director	Co-production company(s)	Distributor(s)	Box office	Ref.
001 !2005	Batman Begins	Nolan, ChristopherChristopher Nolan	Syncopy Films	Warner Bros.	$372,710,015	[16]
002 !2006	Superman Returns	Singer, BryanBryan Singer	Bad Hat Harry Productions / Peters Entertainment	Warner Bros.	$391,081,192	[17]
003 !2006	Lady in the Water	Shyamalan, M. NightM. Night Shyamalan	Blinding Edge Pictures	Warner Bros.	$72,785,169	[18]
004 !2006	Ant Bully !The Ant Bully	Davis, John A.John A. Davis	Playtone / DNA Productions	Warner Bros.	$55,181,129	[19]
005 !2006	Beerfest	Chandrasekhar, JayJay Chandrasekhar	Gerber Pictures / Cataland Films / Broken Lizard	Warner Bros.	$20,387,597	[20]
006 !2006	We Are Marshall	McG	Thunder Road Films / Wonderland Sound and Vision	Warner Bros.	$43,545,364	[21]
007 !2007	A !300	Snyder, ZackZack Snyder	Virtual Studios	Warner Bros.	$456,068,181	[22]
008 !2008	AA !10,000 BC	Emmerich, RolandRoland Emmerich	Centropolis	Warner Bros.	$269,784,201	[23]
009 !2008	Dark Knight !The Dark Knight	Nolan, ChristopherChristopher Nolan	Syncopy Films	Warner Bros.	$1,001,921,825	[24]
010 !2009	Watchmen	Snyder, ZackZack Snyder	Lawrence Gordon Productions	Warner Bros. / Paramount	$185,258,983	[25]
011 !2009	Observe and Report	Hill, JodyJody Hill	DeLine Pictures	Warner Bros.	$26,973,554	[26]
012 !2009	Hangover !The Hangover	Phillips, ToddTodd Phillips	Green Hat Films	Warner Bros.	$467,483,912	[27]
013 !2009	Trick 'r Treat	Dougherty, MichaelMichael Dougherty	Bad Hat Harry Productions	Warner Premiere	$0 !—	[28]
014 !2009	Where the Wild Things Are	Jonze, SpikeSpike Jonze	Playtone / Village Roadshow Pictures	Warner Bros.	$100,086,793	[29]
015 !2009	Ninja Assassin	McTeigue, JamesJames McTeigue	Dark Castle Entertainment / Anarchos Productions	Warner Bros.	$61,601,280	[30]
016 !2010	Clash of the Titans	Leterrier, LouisLouis Leterrier	Thunder Road Films / The Zanuck Company	Warner Bros.	$493,214,993	[31]
017 !2010	Jonah Hex	Hayward, JimmyJimmy Hayward	Mad Chance / Weed Road Pictures	Warner Bros.	$10,903,112	[32]
018 !2010	Inception	Nolan, ChristopherChristopher Nolan	Syncopy Films	Warner Bros.	$825,532,764	[33]
019 !2010	Town !The Town	Affleck, BenBen Affleck	GK Films / Thunder Road Films	Warner Bros.	$154,026,136	[34]
020 !2010	Due Date	Phillips, ToddTodd Phillips	Green Hat Films	Warner Bros.	$211,780,824	[35]
021 !2011	Sucker Punch	Snyder, ZackZack Snyder	Cruel and Unusual Films	Warner Bros.	$89,792,502	[36]
022 !2011	Hangover Part II !The Hangover Part II	Phillips, ToddTodd Phillips	Green Hat Films	Warner Bros.	$581,464,305	[37]
023 !2012	Wrath of the Titans	Liebesman, JonathanJonathan Liebesman	Thunder Road Films	Warner Bros.	$301,970,083	[38]
024 !2012	Dark Knight Rises !The Dark Knight Rises	Nolan, ChristopherChristopher Nolan	Syncopy Films	Warner Bros.	$1,077,694,498	[39]
Box office total:					$7,271,248,412	—