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Archive for January 8th, 2009

Thursday, January 8th, 2009

THURSDAY JANUARY 8, 2009

PROJECTS ANNOUNCED

Darko Entertainment has acquired the novel “Fade” by the late young-adult fiction writer Robert Cormier. The indie company, which will finance and produce the project, has tapped scribe Adam Prince to adapt. Set in summer 1938, story centers on a 13-year-old who discovers he has a secret gift: He can “fade.” When he learns that each generation of his family has one “fader,” he realizes the dangers of his gift and how easy it is to abuse his power of invisibility.

Jenji Kohan, creator and exec producer of “Weeds,” is exec producing and co-writing a comedy project for Showtime and Lionsgate TV with hyphenates Jessica Chaffin and Jamie Denbo. “Ronna and Beverly” is based on a comedy sketch that Chaffin and Denbo have honed for the past few years at clubs and other venues. “Ronna and Beverly” revolves around two middle-aged women in Boston who decide to self-publish and aggressively promote a dating guide for Jewish singles, “You’ll Do a Little Better Next Time.” Paul Feig (“The Office”) is attached to direct the project, skedded to shoot in early February. Chaffin and Denbo, who will play the title characters, co-wrote the pilot script with Kohan. Showtime has ordered a presentation reel.

New Regency is acquiring screen rights to “Beat the Reaper,” eyed as a star vehicle for Leonardo DiCaprio. The protagonist in the novel penned by Josh Bazell is a Manhattan emergency room doctor, whose life becomes complicated when a mobster recognizes the doc from his former life as a hitman who went into the witness protection program.

PROJECT UPDATES

In what would mark his first studio film since resurrecting his career with “The Wrestler,” Mickey Rourke is in talks to play the heavy in “Iron Man 2,” the Marvel Entertainment sequel that director Jon Favreau begins shooting this spring. Rourke is in discussions to play a villain described as Tony Stark’s Russian alter ego, a heavily tattooed bruiser who is in the arms trade and battles Iron Man in his own nuclear-powered armored suit. Actor Sam Rockwell is in negotiations to play another villian in the pic. The script — which is still being written — is a guarded secret, but speculation is that villain is likely comicbook nemesis Crimson Dynamo.

Teresa Palmer has nabbed the female lead in Disney’s “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice,” starring Nicolas Cage and Jay Baruchel. Taking its cues from the classic Goethe and Paul Dukas-inspired Mickey Mouse portion of “Fantasia,” the live-action feature centers on an apprentice (Baruchel) who is left to tend to a magic workshop when his sorcerer master (Cage) leaves it in his hands. The apprentice gets a broomstick to do his chores for him, but things get out of control when the broom develops a mind of its own. Palmer is playing Baruchel’s love interest. Jon Turteltaub is directing; Jerry Bruckheimer is producing.

BUSINESS NEWS

Tuesday, Jan. 20 could be D-day in the “Watchmen” dispute. Or rather I-day, when Fox and Warner Bros. have agreed to let Judge Gary A. Feess decide whether to issue an injunction against the film’s release. But Warners is asking that the hearing be moved up to as early as Monday because “time is critical,” the studio argues in papers filed this week. “Watchmen” is scheduled for a March 6 bow, and Warners must soon commit to tens of millions of dollars in marketing for a film it isn’t sure it can release. The injunction fight stems from Feess’ Christmas Eve preliminary ruling that Fox has a right to distribute the Zack Snyder adaptation of the popular graphic novel. Feess found that producer Lawrence Gordon failed to acquire Fox’s entire interest in “Watchmen,” thereby leaving Fox with rights under a 1994 turnaround agreement. The studios are now battling over the key issue of whether that decision allows Fox to stop the film’s release or whether the parties should proceed to a trial over money damages.

TNT has picked up two pilots to series, the Jada Pinkett Smith-starring medical drama “Time Heals” and Jerry Bruckheimer’s cop drama pilot “The Line.” Both projects have been given 10-episode orders and are targeted for premieres later this year. “Time Heals,” from writer John Masius, Sony TV, 100% Womon Prods., John Masius Prods. and FanFare Prods., centers on Christina Hawthorne (Pinkett Smith), a strong but caring director of nursing at a Charlotte, N.C., hospital. “Line,” from Warner Horizon and Jerry Bruckheimer TV, stars Dylan McDermott as the head of a squad of undercover LAPD officers who walk the line between doing their job and being seduced by easy money. Co-starring in the project are Logan Marshall-Green, Omari Hardwick and Nicki Aycox.

INDUSTRY MOVES

Brad Grey has reupped as chairman and CEO of Paramount through 2014. Grey took the reins of the studio in March 2005 with a mandate to reinvent Paramount from the bottom up. In the ensuing years, the Melrose studio has strengthened its overseas distribution presence and became a domestic marketing force, launching such tentpoles as “Iron Man,” “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull” and “Transformers.” Move comes amid a tumultuous year at Paramount where DreamWorks extracted itself from the studio fold and launched as a standalone company. The studio also endured a slew of layoffs and nearly shuttered its once-thriving Paramount Vantage label.

WEBSITE TO WATCH

http://www.veoh.com/

This video sharing site has prevailed in another important legal battle with Universal Music Group just before the New Year that should help insure the survival of video entertainment services in the future. UMG sued Veoh in 2007 to try and prevent it from utilizing the “safe harbor” provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act as a defense against charges of copyright infringement. The ruling found that activities related to making content accessible on the web, including the transcoding of uploaded video files and the creation of copies of those files, do in fact fall under the DMCA safe harbor rules. “If providing access could trigger liability without the possibility of DMCA immunity,” the judge ruled, “service providers would be greatly deterred from performing their basic, vital and salutary functionnamely, providing access to information and material for the public.” In his blog posting on the EFF website Senior Staff Attorney Fred von Lohmann finds it ironic that smaller legal battles are beginning to define the online video space as the high profile Viacom vs. YouTube battle drags on endlessly.