Margot Robbie’s LuckyChap Entertainment and Christina Hodson’s Hodson Exports are partnering up for the Lucky Exports Pitch Program (LEPP) to help female writers develop original feature films.
Writers during the four-week program will break, outline and develop their ideas into studio-ready pitches, which must demonstrate their ability to write an action film while gaining some exposure in the process.
The six female-identifying writers were selected through a process where the samples were read blindly and from those, a pool of writers were selected to apply to the program, which will be run by Robbie, Josey McNamara and Tom Ackerley of LuckyChap and Hodson and Morgan Howell of Hodson Exports. More than a dozen speakers, including actors, directors, producers and writers, will be participating in a Q&A and workshops. These speakers include Sue Kroll, Chris Morgan, Zak Penn, Chad Strahelski, Max Borenstein and Lindsey Beer.
The six writers selected for the LEPP are Sue Chung (Lindsay Perraud & Kaplan / Kaplan/ Perrone Entertainment), Charmaine DeGrate (Josh Goldenberg / Kaplan Perrone Entertainment), Eileen Jones (Nicky Mohebbi / Verve), Faith Liu (Nicky Mohebbi / Verve), Dagny Looper (Amar Hansen / Anonymous), and Maria Sten (Zak Frognowski / Grandview). Both LuckyChap and Hodson Exports will produce each project that will have a maximum budget of $30 million.
“It is no secret that there are more men than women getting hired to write big-budget studio movies, and yet there are a huge number of talented female voices looking to break into this space,” Hodson said in a statement. “I have been extremely fortunate to have had the opportunity to work on a number of franchise movies, alongside great male and female writers. Feature writing has traditionally been a solitary exercise but it doesn’t need to be. I wanted to create a program that was as much about peer to peer collaboration and community as it is about changing the statistics. Margot and I share a passion for championing female voices and feel that one way to do that is to connect these writers with a wide-array of experts in big-budget filmmaking – men and women alike.”
LuckyChap Entertainment added: “We feel it is both a responsibility and a great honor to help create opportunities for the voices in our industry who are not yet being heard in the big budget action space. We couldn’t be more excited to join these six incredible writers on this journey!”
LuckyChap Entertainment, founded in 2014 by Robbie, Ackerley, McNamara and Sophia Kerr, was the production company behind the award-winning film “I, Tonya.” It recently wrapped production on “Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn),” as well as “Promising Young Woman.” Hodson Exports was founded in 2018 by Hodson, and Morgan joined the company shortly after. Her first three specs were featured on the Black List before she joined the writers room for “Transformers.” She then wrote the screenplay for “Bumblebee.” She also wrote “Birds of Prey.”
LuckyChap Entertainment is represented by Management 360, CAA, Attorney Jeff Bernstein and Narrative PR. Hodson Exports are represented by Kaplan Perrone Entertainment, Ziffren Brittenham, and CAA.