Legendary Entertainment Explores Deal for Lionsgate Studio

Legendary Entertainment, the studio behind Dune, Godzilla and the Minecraft Movie, is weighing a potential deal for Lionsgate, the studio behind John Wick and The Hunger Games franchises, The Hollywood Reporter has confirmed.

For now, the companies are looking into potentially partnering on some films, though if those go well it could evolve into a more complete offer.

Lionsgate officially split itself in two back in May, with the studio business and its Starz business separating, in part to make it easier for both sides of the business to pursue dealmaking.

Legendary, meanwhile, is backed by the private equity giant Apollo, having bought out Dalian Wanda Group’s stake last year.

Legendary CEO Josh Grode told THR at the time that the buyout could enable the company to pursue M&A deals.

“We had management control and we had creative control before the deal, so nothing really changes on that front,” he said. “I think probably the only thing that maybe is no longer there, is when we would have conversations around large scale M&A, we would have to deal with the foreign ownership issue, and that’s now no longer an issue.”

Spokespeople for both Lionsgate and Legendary declined to comment. Bloomberg first reported the talks.