IconEntertainment and Warner have teamed up to jointly buy The Life And Death Of PeterSellers, the big-budget drama about the quirky British entertainer. Theybought rights in the UK, Australia and New Zealand.

The two companies haveworked in tandem before with Warner handling the video rights to Iconacquisitions. But the deal with sales agent HBO Films London is believed to bethe first where the two operate as a joint venture and share risks.

The $26m drama, adapted from Roger Lewis' book and directed by Stephen Hopkins, stars Geoffrey Rush,Charlize Theron and Emily Watson. It is currently in post production and isexpected to be delivered in March 2004.

"Wehave enjoyed quite a flurry of deals and came back from Mifed having donebetter than we had hoped at this stage. This is great news for the HBO kind offilm; interesting, left-field work," said Penny Wolf, HBO London managingdirector.

The Life And Death OfPeter Sellers was targeted by IndieCircle, a five territory European acquisition alliance. But a joint buy wasdefeated when French distributor Ocean Films came up with a bid said to havebeen substantially higher than the value of French rights indicated by IndieCircle partner Haut Et Court. The remaining Indie Circle members A Film(Netherlands, Cineart (Belgium), Frenetic Films (Switzerland) and Lucky Red(Italy) instead struck individual territory deals.

OtherMifed deals on the film included Japan (Toshiba), Scandinavia (Scanbox), MiddleEast (Prime) Portugal (LNK) Greece (Spentzos) Israel (Noah).