Every penny counts when you’re in debt and a middleman is now suing Annie Leibovitz, according to Bloomberg, for their fee for introducing the photographer’s financial advisers to Colony Capital, the hedge fund that assumed her loans:
Photographer Annie Leibovitz was sued by Brunswick Capital Partners LP, a Manhattan-based investment firm, for failing to pay at least $315,000 in fees it claims are due as part of her financing deal with the private- equity firm Colony Capital LLC.Brunswick entered into an agreement with the two parties in February 2009, to seek “strategic financing” for the photographer, it said April 2 in a lawsuit in New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan,
In exchange for a $50,000 initial retainer and weekly $10,000 payments, Brunswick worked “exhaustively” to obtain a list of lenders for Leibovitz that included Colony, Brunswick claimed. Leibovitz was sued along with her studio and other business entities.
Felix Salmon concludes from the numbers in the new court case that Leibovitz’s first lender made $16 million off a the short-term loan it gave the photographer:
The refinancing happened in March of this year; the original loan from Art Capital, for $24 million, took place in September 2008. Which means that Leibovitz racked up at least $16 million in fees and interest payments over the course of 18 months — and that’s not including any payments that she did manage to make to Art Capital along the way. That’s a rate of something over $10 million per year on the initial loan, or 44%.
Annie Leibovitz Sued by Brunswick Capital for Finance Fees (Bloomberg)
Art Capital Made at Least $16 million Off Annie Leibovitz (Felix Salmon/Reuters)
