Submarine & Concord Originals Board Ilya Chaiken’s Music Film ‘Pretty Ugly: The Story Of The Lunachicks’ – DOC NYC

Melanie Goodfellow
·3 min read
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EXCLUSIVE: Submarine has acquired worldwide distribution rights to Ilya Chaiken’s music documentary feature Pretty Ugly: The Story of the Lunachicks, ahead of its world premiere at DOC NYC.

Concord Originals, the narrative content creation division of L.A.-based music management company Concord, has come on board to finance and produce.

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The film revolves around influential underground New York punk band Les Lunachicks which had its heyday in the 1990s with songs such as Fallopian Rhapsody and Bitterness Barbie, and performed live with the likes of No Doubt, Green Day, The Offspring, The Go-Go’s, NOFX, Rancid, The Ramones, Rev Horton Heat, The Buzzcocks and Joan Jett.

Director and producer Chaiken catches up with the group decades after its messy break-up as its members attempt to reunite for one last show.

“I’ve been a devoted Lunachicks fangirl since I lucked into their very first show in 1988 when we were all teenagers. In making Pretty Ugly, I wanted not only to revive the Lunachicks experience, but to tap into their saga of enduring friendship, survival, and triumph – a universal story that I believe will resonate with audiences of all generations,” said Chaiken.

The filmmaker’s previous credits include Sundance and TIFF title Margarita Happy Hour and Liberty Kid, which was theatrically distributed by Kino Lorber and is now streaming on Max.

Pretty Ugly: The Story of the Lunachicks is executive produced by Betsy West and Julie Cohen, who directed and produced the Academy Award-nominated RBG and Amazon’s Peabody Award-winning film My Name is Pauli Murray; and Concord Originals’ Sophia Dilley, Charles Hopkins and Bob Valentine; with Concord Originals’ Wesley Adams and Quíle Gomez serving as associate producers. Concord Originals is financing the film.

“We fell in love with this fantastic story about the trailblazing Lunachicks, who were not afraid to speak their minds! Ilya has captured the humor, energy and grit of the 80s and 90s punk scene as we follow the queens of punk rock on their journey full of high-octane performances and triumphant moments as the band navigates personal and professional obstacles – it’s an entertaining ride that will make you, if you aren’t already, a punk rock fan,” said Dilley.

Submarine is co-repping worldwide rights with CAA Media Finance.

“Pretty Ugly: The Story of the Lunachicks is quite simply a music doc that rocks hard in every way and we can’t wait for the world to see it,” said Dan Braun, Submarine co-founder alongside Josh Braun.

The Concord Originals deal was brokered by David Markman from DLA Piper LLP.

Submarine was previously been involved in the sale of six Academy Award winning documentaries: American Factory, Citizenfour, 20 Feet From Stardom, Man On Wire, The Cove and Searching For Sugar Man.

It recently produced the 2023 Sundance competition documentary Aum: The Cult At The End Of The World and the Emmy-nominated Netflix documentary series The Andy Warhol Diaries.

DOC NYC runs from November 8 to 26.

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