9/11 Victims Fund Worth Netflix Obamas Higher Ground; Michael Keaton

Michael Keaton as Kenneth Feinberg and Stanley Tucci as Charles Wolf Monika Lek/Netflix

Teamed with Barack and Michelle Obama’s Higher Ground, Netflix has acquired North American and other territorial rights to Worth, the Sara Colangelo-directed adaptation of the Kenneth Feinberg memoir What Is Life Worth. Feinberg, who is played by Michael Keaton in the film, was appointed Special Master of the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund. Pic premiered at 2020 Sundance. Tasked by Congress to allocate financial compensation to victims of the tragedy, the film chronicles his battles against bureaucracy and the daunting notion of trying to assess the value of those killed, in the face of cynicism, bureaucracy and the politics of division. Feinberg’s committee awarded $7.1 billion in taxpayer funds paid out to 5300 people whose lives were irrevocably changed that fateful day when terrorists flew planes into the Twin Towers in the World Trade Center, and hijacked and crashed commercial planes in DC and other U.S. cities.

Netflix will release the film in September to mark the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.

Netflix

Stanley Tucci, Amy Ryan, Tate Donovan and Laura Benanti also star. Aside from U.S. and Canada, Netflix acquired Latin America, Australia, the UK, France, Turkey and select other countries.

Max Borenstein (Godzilla V Kong) wrote a script which made the Black List in 2008.

Pic is produced by MadRiver Pictures Marc Butan (The Trial of the Chicago 7), Anthony Katagas for Keep Your Head (12 Years a Slave), Sugar23’s Michael Sugar (Spotlight), Michael Keaton, Bard Dorros of Anonymous Content (Spotlight, True Detective), Sean Sorensen for Royal Viking Entertainment (Black and Blue) and Max Borenstein.

Worth was co-financed by Ingenious Media, Paradise City Films, West Madison Entertainment and Riverstone Pictures.

The biopic follows Kenneth Feinberg (Keaton), an accomplished lawyer appointed Special Master of the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund, tasked by Congress to allocate financial compensation to the victims of the tragedy — to calculate incalculable loss in the face of cynicism, bureaucracy, and the politics of division.