Latest Hollywood script deals
LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - Actor-turned-scribe Danny Strong will write "The Butler," Columbia's story of Eugene Allen, a black man who served as a White House butler for 34 years.
Allen started at the White House as a "pantry man" in 1952 when blacks weren't allowed to use public restrooms in his native Virginia. He ended up serving eight presidents and had a unique front row seat as political and racial history was being made, from the Vietnam War and the civil rights movement to the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. , President John F. Kennedy and Robert Kennedy Jr.
The picture is based on Wil Haygood's Washington Post article "A Butler Well Served by This Election," which was published November 7, just days before the historic election of Barack Obama. Allen and his wife of 65 years talked and marveled at the idea that a black man could be president. But on Election Day, Allen cast his vote alone; his wife died the day before.
Strong was best known for a recurring starring role on "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" before writing "Recount," HBO's look at the 2000 presidential election. He scored an Emmy nomination for his work.
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LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - Writer-director Craig Zobel and producer Beau Flynn want to tell you the story behind "Gizmondo."
Flynn has optioned an October 2006 Wired article by Randall Sullivan titled "Gizmondo's Spectacular Crack-up" that Zobel brought to him.
The article focuses on Swedish con artist Bo Stefan Eriksson, who, among other stunts, wrecked a million-dollar Ferrari Enzo going 160 mph on Pacific Coast Highway above Malibu in February 2006.
Eriksson had launched a hand-held video game company, Gizmondo, that ultimately filed for bankruptcy. Allegedly once a figure in organized crime, he has been in and out of Swedish and U.S. jails for fraud, extortion, auto theft, embezzlement, kidnapping and other charges.
Eriksson had been deported after leaving jail in January 2008 and was arrested again in March.
"He just keeps giving," Flynn joked.
(Editing by Dean Gooodman at Reuters)
