Paramount Home Media has acquired the worldwide rights to the Nick Jonas fraternity-hazing drama “Goat” at the Sundance Film Festival for $2.25 million, TheWrap has learned.
Based on true events chronicled in Brad Land’s memoir, “Goat” stars Ben Schnetzer (“Pride”) as young man pledging his older brother’s fraternity following a violent assault that left him questioning his own manhood after he didn’t fight back.
Determined to prove himself as a man among men, Brad puts up with all kinds of crap — literally and figuratively — while his older brother (Nick Jonas) feels increasingly guilty about subjecting Brad to another painful ordeal, regardless of the light at the end of a semester-long tunnel.
The drama is directed by Andrew Neel and the cast also includes Virginia Gardner, Austin Lyon and Danny Flaherty.
Like “The Intervention,” which Paramount Home Media acquired on Thursday, there will be a day-and-date VOD release, with MTV getting the first TV window. A third party will handle the theatrical distribution.
“Goat” entered Sundance with no shortage of early buzz, boasting James Franco as a producer (he also appears in a surprise cameo) and David Gordon Green as a co-writer.
Franco and his Rabbit Bandini producing partner Vince Jolivette have been developing the project for the past 10 years, and they were joined by the Killer Films duo of David Hinojosa and Christine Vachon, whose “Boys Don’t Cry” featured similar scenes of unthinkable violence.
At the post-screening Q&A, Neel said he hoped that “Goat” would start a conversation about modern masculinity. “It hasn’t been discussed very much,” said the director, who added that “most of women’s problems are because of men’s problems,” and men tend to suffer in silence rather than discuss their true feelings.
CAA repped the filmmakers.