President Trump's treasury secretary and former film producer Steven Mnuchin reportedly brought Charles G. Koch and David H. Koch on as investors in RatPac-Dune Entertainment, the financing company behind joints like Wonder Woman, Dunkirk, and the forthcoming Steven Spielberg film Ready Player One, The Hollywood Reporter has learned. "The idea of the Koch brothers as Hollywood stakeholders might be difficult to swallow for some of the industry's more liberal-minded power players like Spielberg and Ben Affleck, whose 2016 drama Live by Night was one of the films co-financed by RatPac-Dune," THR writes.
The Koch brothers' stake in the production company, bought for around $450 million in 2013, was not previously reported because RatPac-Dune is privately owned. Mnuchin reportedly brought on Bill Gates, too, for a deal in the same ballpark as the Koch brothers' investment.
A spokesperson for Koch Industries told THR that "Charles Koch, David Koch, and Koch Industries do not have any involvement with this investment." A person familiar with the RatPac-Dune deal claimed the Kochs and Gates kept their investment under wraps because "they're in it to make money. They're not in it for the recognition." Read the full scoop at The Hollywood Reporter.
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