Brad Pitt’s Plan B, Mediawan Closing Deal for Majority Stake Sale

Brad Pitt’s Plan B Entertainment is on track to sell a majority stake to Mediawan, the pan-European media conglomerate. The deal is expected to close this weekend, Variety has confirmed.

Plan B Entertainment, which is run by Brad Pitt and Dede Gardner, hired Moelis & Co. to shop for a buyer or potential investors last month. The company was founded in 2001 by Pitt and Jennifer Aniston shortly after the pair married. Pitt eventually took over the banner after the two divorced in 2005. Its credits include “The Departed,” “Moonlight” and “12 Years a Slave,” all of which won the Oscar for best picture. The company recently produced “She Said,” a look at the journalists who broke the Harvey Weinstein story, as well as “Blonde,” an off-beat drama about Marilyn Monroe.

Mediawan was founded in 2015 by Pierre-Antoine Capton, telecom billionaire Xavier Niel and Matthieu Pigasse. The company, which is financially backed by New York-based private equity firm KKR,  has been ramping up its presence within the competitive English-language market through the acquisition (with Leonine Studios) of Drama Republic in the U.K. and recently announced a joint venture with “The Son” filmmaker Florian Zeller and former CAA executive Federica Sainte-Rose to launch an L.A.-based production vehicle called Blue Monday Pictures.

Mediawan already boasts a strong footprint in Europe with stakes in some of France’s most successful production banners, including Dimitri Rassam’s Chapter 2 (“The Three Musketeers”), Hugo Selignac’s Chi-Fou-Mi (“November”), ON Kids & Family (“Miraculous), Mon Voisin Production (“Call My Agent!”), and Italy’s Palomar (“The Name of the Rose”).

CNBC was first to report that a deal was imminent.

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