11-10-06
A&E to Air Local Filmmaker’s Street Thief
Malik Bader of Bader Brothers Pictures has signed with A&E for a broadcast and DVD release next March of his debut feature, the verite-style “filmed portrait” of a commercial burglar, Street Thief. Bader retains theatrical rights and is still seeking a theatrical release.
Street Thief premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival and also screened at the Chicago, Locarno and Flanders film festivals. Bader produced with his brother Sam Bader, editor Nadav Kurtz, and Derrick Grahn. Ken Seng shot. I was line producer.
Malik Bader is on screens nationwide this fall in the Newmarket Films release Death of a President, winner of the international critics award at the Toronto Film Festival. Bader plays a Muslim activist suspected in the presidential assassination. See www.streetthief.com.
Paul Kampf, artistic/executive director of Breadline Theatre Group, is launching the film development and acquisition company Midcoast Development, with two partners: David Lewis, one of the last owners of the now-defunct Actors Center of Chicago, and independent casting director Deborah Aquila.
Midcoast has announced plans to acquire 20 screenplays over the next two years and broker production deals for as many of the writers as they can.
Last year Kampf directed his feature film debut American Gothic, which he adapted from his own Jeff-winning play about estranged brothers reunited by their father’s death.
American Gothic stars John Heard, Patrick Wilson, Neal McDonough, Scott Michael Campbell and Melora Walters. Kampf said he expects the film to be released early next year.
Kampf has two pictures in development with Aquila, who was casting director on American Gothic: the family drama Guarding Angels, about a troubled marriage, and The Unspoken, a romantic social drama set in the Jim Crow South. Stephen McEveety is producing. Both films are pending cast attachments. See www.midcoastdevelopment.com.
David Scott Hay’s debut feature, the jet-black comedy Hard Scrambled, made its theatrical debut at the Fine Arts Theatre in Beverly Hills, Oct. 13-22. Hay said he expects a DVD release early next year. Kurtwood Smith stars with Richard Edson, Alanna Ubach and Eyal Podell as denizens of a greasy spoon vying for power when the owner (Beth Grant) meets with a deep-fryer accident. Hay, a founding member of Visions and Voices theatre company, adapted Hard Scrambled from his own play. The script was the first winner of Creative Screenwriting Magazine’s New Visions Fellowship, a screenplay competition that guaranteed the top writer a production deal. Creative Screenwriting’s Erik Bauer and James Mercurio produced the film, which shot in L.A. over 18 days in 2003 and 2004. It premiered at the Cinequest Film Festival and played the Garden State and Phoenix film festivals. Hay is actively developing several other features, likely as part of a slate of films for Bauer, including AWOL Blues, the story of “an Arab American Marine who goes AWOL in the states,” Hay said. Hay is also in development talks for his arthouse script Sense of Color, which Joe Lorenzo of Society Entertainment is shopping for financing. It’s about a painter with Synesthesia, a condition in which the senses are crossed. See www.hardscrambled.com.
Hombre Films’ horror short “The Look” has been chosen by votes cast at www.ifc.com to screen on the Independent Film Channel’s “Media Lab Uploaded,” Nov. 11 at 7:20 a.m. and Nov. 21 at 6:25 a.m. Hombre partners Ed Boe, Joe Avella and Mike Petrik collaborated on “The Look,” which stars Sarah Coe, Avella, Jason Dummeldinger, and Luke Wolfgram. See www.hombrefilms.com.
Bruce Wood of Dreamfast Cinema has signed with CED Entertainment Distribution to release 12 CDs or DVDs, beginning with the DVD of Wood’s surreal debut feature The Door, that film’s soundtrack CD by Brian Citro and Charles Corczynski, and Steve Hillman’s forthcoming jazz record “The World Over.” CED had an output deal with Bayside, a division of the recently bankrupted Tower Records. CED has signed a new output deal with Super D/Phantom Distribution, which takes over the Dreamfast releases. CED also maintains an ongoing digital distribution deal with Sony Red. Wood is developing his second feature, the gay ghost story The Deer Thief, for production next spring. “The new affiliation will ensure a direct-to-DVD release for Dreamfast’s next nine projects, including The Deer Thief,” Wood said. See www.afapress.com/Dreamfast/index.html.
Chris Griffin of AAA Studios is in post-production on his debut feature, the HD romantic thriller Partyline, about a young woman’s budding romance that turns to dangerous obsession. The film stars Janet Williams and Simeon Henderson, who is co-producing through his Simbolic Entertainment. With Jami Travis, Shanara Fornett, Cordell Rainey, and Jay Deep. See www.partylinemovie.com.
Kelly Luchtman’s in-progress documentary Art House, about the tribulations of the Near NorthWest Arts Council’s Acme Artists’ Community, has been awarded a grant from the Illinois Arts Council that enables Luchtman to go into post-production on the film with editor Susanne Suffredin. Luchtman is producing with Thomas Gaunt. Daniel Alpert of fiscal sponsor the Kindling Group is executive producer. E-mail kelly@lightfellow.com
Jonas Hart Ginsburg of Feeling Films screens his experimental documentary Aijo Nov. 10 at the Somewhat North of Boston Film Festival. See www.snobfilmfestival.org.
I’m Back from a four-month hiatus from PerformInk, during which we shot and started editing the still-untitled feature film Okinawa Project.
Erika (Kore-eda’s “After Life”) stars as an Okinawan woman who kidnaps the teenage son (Katori Eason) of a U.S. Marine (Sean Nix) from her dark and mysterious past. With Ric Arthur.
I wrote and directed with Junko Kajino and we’re producing with Yuko Kajino. We shot in July and August in Okinawa and Chicago, with DP Stephen Combs and production designer David Christopher Krause. Chris Boscardin is editing.
See www.homesickblues.com/okinawa.html.
E-mail edk@homesickblues.com.