Who Are You People?

Variety and The Hollywood Reporter are both running an announcement that Lionsgate has acquired foreign rights to my thriller screenplay, DEVIL TO PAY, to star Lucy Liu.

(The above linked articles may require very expensive subscriptions).

I anticipate these sorts of trade notices with excitement and trepidation, ever since Variety botched the spelling of my name. Big deal, you say. And you're right. Except that, in this Internet age -- this post-Ain't It Cool News world -- these trade announcements are picked up and run on websites all over the world.

Google "Gillvary Sanctum" if you care to see how far and wide.

Posted by Michael Gilvary at 10:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

There's a certain satisfaction to the act of filling in the occupation field of a form with the word "screenwriter." It's even more satisfying when it's the truth -- when, after long years of struggle, you're finally making a living at something your mother rightly considered a deranged fantasy.

But the novelty wears thin when you've been doing it for a while, yet you still can't provide a positive response to the inevitable question that comes from the people reading that form:

"Oh, you're a screenwriter? Have you written anything I've seen?"

Civilians don't understand the vagaries of this business. They can't make sense of the Hollywood development machine. They're puzzled by any industry that would spend huge piles of money developing a product that's never going to get made.

Stupid civilians.

No. I haven't been produced yet. But, I'm looking for 2006 to change all that, because I've got three decent chances of seeing it happen.

First is a thriller called SLEEPWALKER, which I wrote for Intermedia. It's being produced by Mark Johnson and Scott Kroopf (men who have been involved with some excellent films, but none so sublime as Galaxy Quest and Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure). SLEEPWALKER is a remake of a Swedish film of the same name, so it was not an original idea of mine. In fact, I was not even the first writer brought on for the remake. Still, it's something I'm proud of.

As I've said before, nothing's a sure thing in this business. And this project doesn't even have a director yet. But I have a good feeling about it anyway. And I'm not a superstitious person, so I'm not afraid of jinxing it.

Next up is a script called GRETA. That's the one that was almost lost to the ages. A producer/director named Rick Rosenthal is planning to produce GRETA on a low budget next summer, with the very cool music video maker Nancy Bardawil directing.

Again, nothing's a sure thing, but this one has a real good chance of going, due to the scale of the production and the people involved. These aren't guys who develop movies. They make them.

The third of my great hopes for '06 is another of my original screenplays, a thriller called DEVIL TO PAY. It's setup at Echo Lake Entertainment, and Lucy Liu is attached to star as a divorced mother who is forced to rob the bank where she works in order to save her kidnapped children. (UPDATE - 5/31/06: Antonia Bird is going to direct DEVIL TO PAY!)

These are not all of my projects, but they're the ones that stand the best chance of seeing the light of a film projector in the foreseeable future. Accordingly, I hope to be writing more about them on this site, to chronicle their progress.

Unless I really did jinx them just now.

Posted by Michael Gilvary at 10:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I won't be making too many movie , TV show or book recommendations on this site, but I reserve the right to do so every once in a while. The first one is Joss Whedon's Serenity. I'm sad to say, I missed this one in the theaters. Not because I wasn't a fan of the cancelled series, Firefly, which is true, but because my life has been a little hectic lately. But the DVD is out and I've finally taken a peek.

I'm not going to write a review of the film here. There are plenty of good reviews to be found. Suffice to say, I really dug it. I give it four out of five stars, which is actually a lot for me. I'm fairly hard to please.

But the reason I'm recommending it is because a) it's that rare, smartly crafted, highly entertaining science fiction movie, and b) it pretty much bombed, and I don't think that's fair. Not only do I not think that's fair, but I fear what it means to the film industry.

It's a sprawling, effects-heavy space adventure that could've easily cost $150 million, but Whedon bent over backwards to bring it in at well under a third of that amount (and he shot it in LA instead of Canada). I care a lot less when a behemoth like King Kong underperforms. But when somebody makes an effecient and entertaining movie, and it tanks, well... that just breaks my heart.

Of course, there are no big stars in the film (just a bunch of really talented people). And the title sucks -- makes it sound like a chick flick. But the studio gave it a respectable push and it didn't take. And now, I fear, we'll go for another long stretch without any seriously interesting science ficition movies.

So, if you haven't already, check it out. Vote with your DVD buying or renting dollars. See if we can't retroactively convince Universal that this one was worth making.

Posted by Michael Gilvary at 10:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)