What do you get if you start bartering for items using a small red paperclip? If you’re Kyle MacDonald, you apparently get a house and a movie deal.
DreamWorks has paid out to by the rights to MacDonald’s real-life story, which saw him cannily run through 14 trades –including a fish-shaped pen, a camping stove and a snowmobile – all the way to a house in Canada.
"It's a story that speaks to the idea of relative values: What's worthless to one person is priceless to someone else," producer Walter Parkes told The Hollywood Reporter. Parkes and partner/wife Laurie MacDonald (no relation) saw the story of the barter star’s trades online and made an offer. The company is still deciding if the project will become a film, a reality TV series or a sitcom.
"I wish we could have traded something other than cash for the story," Parkes laughed. "But bartering was not an option." Oh, he’s a wag, that Walter.