The Weinstein Company has entered talks for a sale of the bulk of its assets with private equity firm Colony Capital, the two companies said in a statement on Monday.
The Weinstein Company’s co-chairman, Bob Weinstein, over the weekend denied the company was seeking to sell or shut down after his brother and partner Harvey Weinstein was fired following reports of sexual harassment allegations.
Read: “‘Me Too’: How Alyssa Milano’s Two-Word Protest Against Sexual Harassment Went Viral.”
Colony Capital was founded by Tom Barrack, a financier who was one of the first major backers of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign. The firm has other connections to the Weinstein family’s media empire: It was part of a group of investors who bought Miramax, a film company founded by the Weinstein brothers, from the Walt Disney Co. in 2010. As Bloomberg reports today, Colony made a substantial profit when Qatar-based broadcaster BeIN Media Group bought Miramax in 2016.
In a statement, Barrack said of Weinstein Co., “We will help return the company to its rightful iconic position in the independent film and television industry.”