Here’s the deal. This guy, who at the time I considered a friend told me this story of how his family entered this country. He asked me would I help him do a doc on. I said okay, my company will produce it and you can direct it. Well of course I did my research on the subject first. It turns out it was beyond the story of his family but involves millions. So I work the treatment based on the vast amount of people it effected. My company put up all the funds and secure venture capital as well. During filming my friend at the time was interested more in having a fun while on the trip than the subject at hand. Between trips he was no where to be found. I barely heard from him. As a producer I keep the ball rolling to complete the film. During the editing stage my editor, who was my friend at the time decided he wanted a writting credit but did no writting. I said okay we are all family maybe this could be our big break. Later he decided to give the footage to the guy that told me about his family and convinced him to take it as his own and run. Then I get legal paperwork giving him all the credit (director, producer, writer, etc.) and my editor a co-producer credit and me a a co-producer credit. Take in mind I payed my editor 24k and raised over 65k for the doc. This guy never dropped a dime. Now he has the finished product with a few re-edits by my editor. They have entered into film fest with the footage I shot, the music I secured by a grammy award winning artist and the interviews I secured. He does not have releases on anything.

Now he wants me to sigh this contract and walk away, sharing a small percentage and having no say so.

I ask you… Has anyone been through this? What would you do?