Story Merchant E-Book Deal Richard Pena's Last Plane Out of Saigon! FREE March 17 - March 21!

Richard Pena’s compelling first-hand account, written in real-time, chronicles the last desperate year of this tragic war and the hasty departure of American troops from Vietnam.

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LAST PLANE OUT OF SAIGON is a faithful reproduction of the journal of a draftee working in the operating room of Vietnam's largest military hospital during the final year of the war. Supporting historical and political context is provided by award-winning scholar, John Hagan.

Richard Pena’s entries were written in real time and, as they chronicle the last desperate year of this tragic war, present readers with a better understanding of the complicated final year of the Vietnam War from the inside, looking out. A year that tragically remains unfamiliar to most Americans.

This landmark book describes, in part, the hasty departure of American troops from Vietnam but is timely now as America again is challenged with multiple global conflicts. It is a gripping real-time account of the anger, resistance and resilience forged in one man by the horrors of Vietnam witnessed up close, in graphically human terms, touching on mistakes that were made then and which our country continues to make today. All Americans should read this important piece of history, bound to leave them with chills.

Richard Pena served in Vietnam as an Operating Room Specialist for the United States Army and left on the last day of American withdrawal. He is now a nationally renowned practicing attorney in Austin, Texas. He is a former President of the American Bar Foundation and State Bar of Texas and served on the Board of Governors of the American Bar Association.

John Hagan is the John D. MacArthur Professor of Sociology and Law at Northwestern University and Co-Director of the Center of Law & Globalization at the American Bar Foundation in Chicago. He has published nine books and more than 150 articles in nationally renowned magazines and journals.

TV Overmind: What We Know about New Prehistoric Shark Movie “The Meg” Wake

What we know about another shark movie that will make every other shark in any other movie look like a minnow. That’s a lengthy title but it kind of puts into perspective just what this movie will be like. Starring Jason Statham and Ruby Rose this new science fiction horror is going to be based upon the Megalodon, a prehistoric shark that measures out to about 75 feet in length and could quite chomp the submersible it’s being said to have attacked in half.  The story goes that before the submersible that’s been attacked by this monster ever encountered it in the deep blue sea, the main character, Statham, came upon the mammoth creature during one of his dives and was scared so badly that he never ventured into the ocean again.

Now a looming presence has attacked a deep sea submersible and there’s no idea how to tackle this gigantic beast that’s been identified as the largest shark in the ocean. Obviously a team will be assembled to hunt it down and kill it, but with what? You would think that a shark this big would simply shrug off anything less than a hailstorm of torpedoes simply due to its size. But it’s equally obvious that the shark will either be killed or driven away since the general consensus in these types of movies is to eliminate the threat or make it flee in the hopes that it won’t come back.

So far all we really know is the title, the actors, the plot, and the release date, which is at this time set for August of 2018. Barring that there’s not much else to tell about The Meg at this point since it just started production not that long ago. There are lot of things we can guess at this time though, some of which are just conjecture and some that might actually make sense.

It can’t end like a traditional shark movie.
Think about it, in several other shark movies the big bad shark is either blown up, impaled, or, well, blown up. That seems to be the only way to really take care of sharks anymore. Well, actually, one of the sharks in Deep Blue Sea was electrocuted, but honestly it should have taken the half-naked female scientist with it just thanks to their close proximity. But The Meg is simply too big to be blown up by anything less than a full crate of dynamite or a nuclear warhead, and there’s nothing big enough to impale it on in the ocean that it wouldn’t easily swim around, or through.

The humans are going to vastly outmatched.

It’s a shark. It’s longer than most boats. It can maneuver better in the water than any submersible, and it can possibly shred through anything that gets in its way. Unless the humans are packing one extremely impressive and tough arsenal the chances are that the shark is just going to mow through them and keep coming until they’re all done for. There’s no way to really swim out of the way of this thing unless there’s suitable cover within reach and it’s still a good hundred yards out. Even then there’s a good chance that you won’t see it before it’s right on top of you.

It might be worth a look once it’s released.

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In good company ... on the front page of the UK Express Books section

MEG'S Long, Long Journey to the Screen

Giant Shark Movie ‘Meg’ Had A Ridiculously Complex Journey To Screens

Macmillan

It seems strange that Hollywood hasn’t already made a movie where Jason Statham fights a giant shark, which is more or less the plot summary of Meg, a movie that just cast Rainn Wilson as the well-meaning billionaire who unleashes said giant shark by mistake. But Meg is a movie with a decades-long history of not getting made that lays bare just how hard it is to make a movie that seems like a slam dunk.

Meg first pinged Hollywood’s radar in 1997, when the thriller of the same name from prolific thriller author Steve Alten first hit bookstores. Alten’s book was practically designed for Hollywood: It followed Navy SEAL and diving expert Jonas Taylor, who stumbles over a giant shark in the Marianas Trench and is immediately dismissed as a crackpot. He goes back to help retrieve a submersible and a series of accidents unleashes the giant shark on the ocean. Alten’s mix of old-school monster movie and Tom Clancy-esque technothriller was unique, and he’s kept returning to the concept with five other novels.

Alten’s book was, quite literally, optioned before it was printed. Alten’s agent used the plot to tempt Disney into optioning the novel and then turned that around to get Alten a publishing deal. But before Disney could start building sharks, Deep Blue Sea, a movie about sharks with human intelligence eating Samuel L. Jackson, went into production, so Disney held off. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Renny Harlin’s gleeful B-movie did okay at the box office, but wasn’t the globe-spanning hit Disney was hoping to see. Disney threw Meg back, but it didn’t stay in for long, as in 2004, the producers behind Hellboy, along with the editor of CHUD.com at the time, Nick Nunziata, optioned it for Guillermo Del Toro to direct.

Unfortunately, as fans of his many, many abandoned projects can tell you, Del Toro’s eyes are often bigger than his stomach. So, in 2007, it went to another filmmaker, Speed director Jan de Bont. De Bont, by the way, hasn’t directed a movie since 2003’s Tomb Raider: Cradle of Life, and in 2010, Meg was released into the wild yet again.

Aside from a brief mention in 2011 from Alten that the movie was back on track, Meg was dormant until 2015, when it was announced Eli Roth was taking over directorial duties. What changed?

The short answer was that China was interested. Just as The Rock and Matt Damon have turned up in Chinese-funded projects, Meg will largely be paid for by obscure production company Gravity Pictures, which will distribute it in China. But even with the funding on lock, there was still the matter of finding a director, as Roth left and was replaced by National Treasure director Jon Turteltaub.

It seems Meg has finally escaped production hell. In addition to Wilson, Orange is the New Black star Ruby Rose and Chinese megastar/pop singer Fan Bingbing have signed on, and Meg is on track to arrive in March 2018. But, of course, if the giant shark has learned anything from Hollywood, it’s that even a sure thing may be harder to make than it looks.

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Ken Atchity Featured in the UK Express: The hollywood producer and writer who loves making waves

KEN ATCHITY has quite literally been making waves on the Hollywood film scene.

By Nick Rippington

 

The writer, editor, literary manager and producer now operates the only wave generating tank in North America with his partners.

The Louisiana Wave Studio is a huge tank built originally by the Disney Company for their film the Guardian.

“We’ve filmed numerous movies there and it’s always an astonishing thing to watch in action,” says Ken, who is from Louisiana himself. “Waves from 2ft to 7ft can be made at the touch of a button.”

The 72-year-old now operates the only wave generating tank in North America

 

A brief look at Ken’s CV should leave no one surprised that he seized on the chance to try something unique and different.

He has spent a lifetime leaping into the unknown, from the moment he left Yale having won the university’s prestigious Porter Prize for his 853-page dissertation on Homer’s Iliad.

“When I told a great editor, Norman Cousins of the Saturday Review, that I was feeling claustrophobic in the Academic World he suggested I enter the world of entertainment where ‘anything goes’ and ‘nobody knows anything’ – to quote from William Goldman’s Adventures in the Screen Trade.

“A year later, I was the executive producer on 16 romance films in Montreal, Canada. I’ve never looked back.”

Ken had got the film-making bug and was soon rubbing shoulders with stars like Angelina Jolie, James Belushi, Tim Allen and Rupert Everett.

“Sure, there are plenty of stories,” says Ken. “I could tell you about the ‘trailer war’ between Tim Allen and Julie Bowen at the Target Center in Minneapolis during the shooting of Joe Somebody, but maybe I’d better stick to my walk-on role in that film as Jesse Ventura’s bodyguard!

Atchity has written more than 20 books – including the novel The Messiah Matrix

 

“I’ll never forget the time, either, that we were filming in London and Maggie Gyllenhaal shot one of her scenes in Hysteria while her daughter was secreted underneath her ample Victorian bustle.

“Of all of them I loved working with Angelina because she’s so business-like about her acting—refusing even to take a toilet break so as not to hold up a shot.

“In contrast, I won’t name the actress who demanded that we buy her an $8,000 watch as a “gift”—then, when we politely refused, showed up hours late for the next day’s shoot.”

It’s words, though, that get Ken’s juices flowing. He has written more than 20 books – including the novels Seven Ways To Die, The Messiah Matrix and Brae Mackenzie – and when he isn’t doing it himself he is helping others navigate the publishing minefield. 

 

The Lost Valentine is among Ken Atchity's film productions

Ken has made literally hundreds of film and television deals for storytellers wanting their books to be films - including movies, series and reality shows - since he began producing in 1987 after retiring from his tenured professorship at Occidental College. 

As a literary manager his authors have logged nearly 20 New York Times bestsellers. Added to that he is the creator of the free on-demand webinar presentation "Sell Your Story to Hollywood" for aspiring storytellers available at Real Fast Hollywood Deal. I bumped into him at the Dublin Writers’ Conference, run by the book promotion service Books Go Social.

“I have good time management skills and can keep my ego under control – things I learned from my high school and college Jesuit teachers,” says Ken. “They were the world’s toughest coaches.

“I’ve sold seven or eight scripts for the prodigious John Scott Shepherd, two of which have been made to date: Joe Somebody (with Tim Allen and Julie Bowen) and Life or Something Like It (Angelina Jolie, Ed Burns, Jim Belushi).

“Steve Alten’s Meg is the biggest sale I’ve made ($2.2 million to Doubleday-Bantam), and is finally going into production this summer starring Jason Statham and Bingbing Fan after about 15 years in development at three studios. 

 

Ken had got the film-making bug and was soon rubbing shoulders with stars like James Belushi

Then there’s Jerry Blaine and Lisa McCubbins’ The Kennedy Detail which was a New York Times bestseller and was made into an Emmy-nominated film for Discovery. They plan to make it into a feature film next.

Ken is married to Kayoko Mitsumatsu, accomplished producer for NHK (Japanese National Television), and president of the non-profit YogaGivesBack.org (“For the cost of one yoga class you can change a life”). They have two children, Vincent and Rosemary, and four grandchildren.

With all that going on you would think he might be ready to wind down, but he doesn’t see it that way. 

 

Joe Somebody was one of the several scripts Ken Atchity sold for John Scott Shepherd

 

“Outside of family and friends, I now intend to give all my remaining energy to storytelling and storytellers,” says Ken. “I’ll continue teaching along the way through writers’ conferences and webinars, like my new one with Daniel Hall, which is called Sell Your Story to Hollywood.

 

Nothing else matters, though. Stories are how we change the world – for better or for worse.”

In Ken Atchity’s case, it seems there are still plenty more waves left in the tank.

Nick Rippington is a sports journalist with Express newspapers. He is also author of the UK gangland thriller Crossing The Whitewash.

 

Reposted from the Express UK

 

 

Warner, CMC announce 12-movie package that includes MEG

Jon Turteltaub in talks to direct. 

After forming joint venture Flagship Entertainment in Hong Kong in September last year, Warner Bros. and China Media Capital (CMC) have announced plans for the production and global release of a dozen movies under the Flagship Entertainment banner over the coming two years. Chinese news website china.org.cn reported Warner Bros. chairman Kevin Tsujihara as saying the high-quality co-productions would appeal to a wide demographic of audiences both in China and around the world.

According to CMC chairman Li Ruigang, the film package would include an adaptation of best-selling science-fiction novel MEG: A Novel of Deep Terror by Steve Alten and cost over $100 million to produce. MEG tells the story of a deep-sea diver who while diving in the Mariana Trench is attacked by what he believes to be a megalodon, a gigantic predecessor of modern sharks thought to have been extinct since the Pleistocene era. Nobody believes him, but as the events unfold he encounters more of the creatures, some of which manage to make their way to the surface and wreak havoc.

Read more at Film Journal

Melanie Neilan Featured in Classic Chicago Magazine

Women to Watch

With a key role in “Domesticated” (now playing at Steppenwolf Theatre), two films currently screening on the festival circuit, and an audition for a Tracy Letts play, Melanie Neilan has 2016 at her feet.

“In "Domesticated," a drama with a ton of comedy, I play an über-smart, extremely acidic, sarcastic teenager. One of my favorite scenes is when I impulsively throw a bowl of oranges off the table to express my anger at my dad,” she said. “I have learned so much from writer/director Bruce Norris.

Melanie Neilan in "Domesticated," by Joel Moorman.

Melanie Neilan in "Domesticated," by Joel Moorman.

“I am currently attached to three film projects, one, a short film that deals with a hard-hitting and relevant social issue that the filmmakers want to develop into a full-length feature. My manager, Nancy Scanlon, is developing, under the banner of her company Au Courant, a biopic set in the Victorian era, and I will play a starlet. My current films include My First Love, in which my character transfers her love notes on Hostess Cup Cakes.”

A purple belt in karate, Melanie has studied since childhood at the Irina Makkai Classical Ballet & Dance School in Highland Park. Dividing her time between Chicago and Los Angeles, she trains in ballet in Santa Monica. Melanie was a founding ensemble member of A Red Orchid Youth Ensemble. “I look up to Michael Shannon, who is a founding father of A Red Orchid Theatre, as he has always been one of my longtime acting heroes, and I admire so much his current work in ‘Boardwalk Empire,’” she shared.

Her greatest hero of all and lifelong mentor, however, is her grandmother Merle Reskin, beloved Chicago arts patron, actress, and singer. Merle, an actress and singer who, along with her husband Harold, saved the historic Blackstone Theatre, which is now a part of DePaul University and bears her name.

She was in attendance at the opening night of “Domesticated,” with her daughter, Melanie’s mother Leslie Neilan.

Leslie, Melanie, and Merle by Joshua Aaron Weinstein.

Leslie, Melanie, and Merle by Joshua Aaron Weinstein.

“Merle played the role of Ensign Janet MacGregor in the original Broadway cast of ‘South Pacific.’” This wasn’t a road show either; it was the real deal,” Leslie said. “I remember when Melanie was five, my mom was being presented with an award for philanthropy and she brought Melanie up onstage, too. Melanie looked at the audience and gave a royal wave. I knew then that she loved being in front of audiences.”

Melanie says there’s something particularly terrific about this strong bond between the women in her family. She cites her grandmother as “the potent force driving my love of the craft; without her stories and passion for the arts, I would not have discovered the world of theatre in quite the same way. And her humor always keeps me laughing.”

She is similarly influenced by mom, Leslie: “My mother’s turn headlong into the field of producing is one of the most inspirational things I have ever seen. She has a real gift for storytelling and [is] unbelievably insightful. I hope to be a part of a horror film she and my agent Nancy Scanlon hope to produce.”

Leslie Neilan will be producing her first feature film this year based on a story she has written called The Book of Leah. She and Alan Roth, recipient of an Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences fellowship, are the screenwriters. She has two other children, Sean and Spencer, who are both engineers.

Looking forward to 2016, Melanie hopes to spend more time in Los Angeles, particularly during pilot season. “I want to continue to work in theatre and film, and break into television. I’d love to find more ways to express my love for languages, singing, dancing, unicycling and yodeling.” Yodeling? “Most of my friends know I yodel, so if I see them across the street, I yodel, and they know it could be no one else but me,” Melanie said. “Yodeling is a random and surprising thing. When I do it, it gives me great joy.”

Read more at Classic Chicago Magazine