Steve Wynn Ramps Up Threats Against Biopic Producers

Posted on: March 20, 2024, 10:50h. 

Last updated on: March 20, 2024, 09:41h.

Corey Levitan Read More
Expertise: Commercial Gaming, Entertainment, Expert Insight, Las Vegas.

Disgraced casino mogul Steve Wynn still has more than enough money left to fund a massive legal battle against his enemies. And that’s exactly what he’s threatening to launch against the producers of a new biopic about him.

Steve Wynn
Steve Wynn has fired a warning shot over the heads of three producers planning to shoot a biopic chronicling his downfall from the gaming industry. (Image: Forbes)

Earlier this month, we reported that The Rise & Fall of Steve Wynn is being adapted for the screen by Christina Binkley from her own 2018 New York Times bestseller, Winner Takes All: How Casino Mogul Steve Wynn Won — and Lost — the High Stakes Gamble to Own Las Vegas. 

On Wednesday, TMZ claimed to have viewed a letter fired off on Wynn’s behalf by powerhouse attorney Patricia Glaser. The letter, paraphrased by the online entertainment news site,  threatens Binkley and her co-producers, Scott Kaplan and Emmet McDermott, with legal action for portraying any unproven accusations against Wynn. It cites Binkley’s “history of false statements and mischaracterizations” regarding the casino mogul.

Glaser, of Glaser Wield Fink Howard Avechen & Shapiro LLP, is the attorney who served as coordinating counsel for the MGM Grand in the litigation following its tragic November 1980 fire. She won the company a $76 million settlement in its subsequent insurance litigation.

She also represented former California State Assemblyman Matt Dababneh, Olympic gold medalist Shaun White, and former Epic Records president Charlie Walk in sexual misconduct cases.

No Wynn Situation?

Though Glaser’s letter didn’t threaten to stop the biopic’s production — basically, because Wynn has no legal right to do so — it did warn producers that every fact presented in their story had better come from fully vetted sources.

Binkley’s book chronicles Wynn’s dramatic rise from scrappy bingo parlor operator to billionaire casino mogul, and his even more dramatic fall after a 2018 Wall Street Journal article accused him of engaging in a “decades-long pattern of sexual misconduct” toward female staff.

That was the second published version of the book. The first, which appeared in 2008, split its focus among Wynn and former MGM Grand president/CEO Kirk Kerkorian and former Caesars Entertainment CEO Gary Loveman.

At the time, Binkley claimed Wynn was furious over several aspects of her story. Those included the depiction of the buyout of Mirage Resorts as an unfriendly merger, Wynn’s reckless use of Mirage Resorts funds, and his nickel-and-diming of MGM Mirage over their purchase of his former home on the Shadow Creek golf course.

According to TMZ,  Wynn didn’t sue Binkley or her publisher over either version of the book.

The Rise & Fall of Steve Wynn will be set primarily in the 1990s. A press release said it and illustrates “how Wynn’s unparalleled drive for power ultimately cost him everything, creating a vacuum of power filled by his ex-wife, Elaine.”

Wynn has denied all sexual assault accusations against him and has never been convicted of a crime. However, the controversy caused him to resign from his position as chairman and CEO of the company that bears his name. He also sold his stake in Wynn Resorts in a bid to protect its gambling licenses in Nevada and Massachusetts.

Sources told TMZ that producers are already casting, though no distribution deal has been announced.