Nick Shumaker Latest Celebrity News & Gossip

On an abnormally hot summer day in Oslo, a strange electric field surrounds the city as a collective migraine spreads across town. TVs, lightbulbs, and electronics go haywire, the chaos reaching a debilitating crescendo when suddenly, it’s over.

The Match Factory has locked multi-territory deals on Berlinale titles Architecton by Victor Kossakovsky and Dying by Matthias Glasner, which picked up the festival’s Silver Bear for Best Screenplay.

MGM+ has announced the acquisition of the two-part docuseries “In Restless Dreams: The Music of Paul Simon, debuting on the streamer on March 17 and March 24 at 9 p.m. EDT/PDT.

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor Universal Pictures Content Group has acquired international rights to Elon Musk documentary “Musk,” directed by Academy Award-winning filmmaker Alex Gibney. It was announced during Cannes earlier this year that HBO Documentary Films had come on board to join the production and will release the film in North America.

The future of working with streamers was on the table at the Zurich Summit on Saturday amid talk that the content bubble has burst as key markets such as the U.S. reach saturation point.

Elysian Film Group, Anonymous Content, and Bleecker Street have jointly acquired UK rights to The Boy and the Heron, the latest feature from celebrated Japanese filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki.

EXCLUSIVE: The Veterans is launching international sales on upcoming UK period comedy Fackham Hall at Toronto and has unveiled first members of the ensemble cast.

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent Anonymous Content has come on board California surf-themed animated feature adapted from illustrator AJ Dungo’s celebrated graphic memoir, “In Waves.” Produced by Paris-based Silex Films, “In Waves” marks the feature debut of Phuong Mai Nguyen (“Brazen”), and is being penned by Fanny Burdino and Samuel Doux, whose screenwriting credits include “After Love” and “The Origin of Evil.” The feature is produced by Priscilla Bertin and Judith Nora, co-Founders of Silex Films, alongside Charades and Nick Shumaker, Garrett Kemble, and David Levine who will executive produce on behalf of Anonymous Content.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EaMahhnZMogThe film had its world premiere at the 2022 Toronto Film festival and will open in select theaters on Friday, May 19, expanding wide on Friday, June 2.Zachary Wigon directs from a script written by Micah Bloomberg.In “Sanctuary,” a dominatrix (Qualley) and her wealthy client (Abbott) engage in a battle of wills inside a luxury hotel suite after he tries to end their relationship. Over the course of one emotionally fraught night, the balance of power swings back and forth as each seeks to gain the upper hand.

Sophia Scorziello editor The official trailer has been released for Zachary Wigon’s dark thriller “Sanctuary,” starring Margaret Qualley and Christopher Abbott. The film follows a dominatrix named Rebecca (Qualley) and her rich client Hal (Abbott) as disaster unfolds over the course of a single night in a hotel room. The film first premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in September 2022 and will open in theaters in the U.S. on May 25. In “Sancutary,” Abbott plays the son of luxe hotel chain owner who is the successor of the hotel and the rest of his father’s billion-dollar enterprise. Rebecca sees the opportunity to cash in on Hal’s soon-to-be fortune.

NEON has acquired the North American rights to Academy Award-nominated and BAFTA-winning director, Raoul Peck’s (I Am Not Your Negro) documentary Orwell, the definitive feature-length documentary on visionary author George Orwell, with the exclusive cooperation of the Orwell Estate.

Alex Gibney, the Emmy- and Academy Award-nominated documentary filmmaker behind “Taxi to the Dark Side,” “Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room” and “The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley,” will next set his sights on Elon Musk with “Musk,” described in the official announcement as “a definitive and unvarnished examination of multi-billionaire tech entrepreneur Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, SpaceX and Twitter.”“I have been working on this film, off and on, for some time and am hugely excited about it,” said Gibney in an official statement. “I am delighted by this extraordinary group who are working with me.

Matt Donnelly Senior Film Writer Elon Musk will be the center of a new documentary from the unflinching Alex Gibney, the Oscar-winning director of “Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief.” Already months into production, Gibney announced the project on Monday saying he was “hugely excited” about tackling Musk on film. It is described as a “definitive and unvarnished examination of multi-billionaire tech entrepreneur and CEO of Tesla, SpaceX and Twitter.” Tech mogul Musk reached peak saturation in late 2022 when he completed a $44 billion acquisition of Twitter, promising to upend the platform’s user experience as well as restore “balance” to its user body (including the elimination of bot accounts, which Musk has previously said ran rampant on the site).

Oscar-winning filmmaker Alex Gibney has his next doc as he is currently months into the making of Musk, a definitive and unvarnished examination of multi-billionaire tech entrepreneur Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, SpaceX, and Twitter. 

European Film Market which at one and the same time has underscored the challenges still facing the international independent film business.  Following by way of an industry wrap, a dozen takeaways on the 2023 Berlin market, including its Berlinale Series Market, an ever more building proposition at the Festival.  The Verdict If the European Film Market is anything to go by, broadly, the international movie market is in some ways making a international comeback, despite still vastly challenging circumstances. On Thursday, the EFM reported “record results” of a total of over 11,500 market participants from 132 countries. “It was a rather busy market, with no single must-have, but much mid-sized product,” recognizesConstantin’s Martin Moszkowicz of this year’s Berlin European Film Market, noting that Constantin received about 90 project submissions prior to market, “which is a lot.” “There’s been more deals happening at the EFM than at Sundance and we sense a new vibrancy in the international markets,” says Nick Shumaker, at Anonymous Content’s AC Independent.

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent AC Independent, Anonymous Content’s new sales and finance division, is set to introduce Pippa Ehrlich’s anticipated follow-up to her Oscar-winning “My Octopus Teacher,” as well as Walter Salles’ “Sócrates,” to buyers at the Berlin Film Festival. Ehrlich’s untitled new project and Salles’ “Sócrates” are part of AC Independent’s robust slate of documentary features from celebrated filmmakers. In her upcoming project, Ehrlich will shed light on the secretive and endangered world of pangolins, a species viewed as mythological creatures. When Stevie, a baby pangolin, is rescued from death at the hands of poachers in Johannesburg, an investment manager pivots his life to become the animal’s caretaker, teaching him to trust the world again and, in doing so, rediscovers his own purpose. Hand-reared until his release back into the wild, Stevie takes Gareth into his dragon world and together they find freedom and healing in the wild.

EXCLUSIVE: Anonymous Content, Alexander Rodnyansky’s AR Content and The Atlantic have secured rights to journalist Peter Pomerantsev’s article for The Atlantic ‘We Can Only Be Enemies’ and will adapt it for film.

EXCLUSIVE: Anonymous Content and Impact Partners have teamed to produce a new doc on a China-based “mistress dispeller,” to be directed and produced by award-winning filmmaker Elizabeth Lo (Stray). Plans for a scripted adaptation of the documentary are also in the works.

Penny Lane is to direct Mrs. America, exploring the changing role of American womanhood through the Mrs. America Beauty Pageant’s half-century history.

Naman Ramachandran Penny Lane (“Listening to Kenny G”) will direct “Mrs. America,” a documentary which will explore the changing role of American womanhood through the Mrs.

Christopher Vourlias Two-time Berlinale prize winner Małgorzata Szumowska (“Body,” “Mug”) will write and direct “The Gambler Wife,” a revelatory portrait of novelist Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s wife Anna Snitkina, to be produced by Russia’s Hype Film, Variety can reveal.Adapted from Andrew D. Kaufman’s book “The Gambler Wife: A True Story of Love, Risk, and the Woman Who Saved Dostoyevsky,” the film tells the story of the courageous woman who saved the life of the Russian literary icon and, as the first Russian woman to found her own publishing house, became a pioneer in the country’s literary history.Ilya Stewart of Hype Film (“Petrov’s Flu,” “Persian Lessons”) will produce in collaboration with Polish production company Nowhere.

Elsa Keslassy International CorrespondentAnonymous Content has enlisted Nicholas Shumaker, a longtime producer and former talent agent at UTA, and Kimberly Carver, a veteran manager and TV producer, to join the company’s literary department. Both will work as managers and producers.

Kaleem Aftab Actor and filmmaker Matt Dillon has released two clips from “The Great Fellove” [“El Gran Fellove”], a long-gestating documentary chronicling the musical career of Cuban scat singer and showman Francisco ‘el Gran’ Fellove and the recording of his last album. The film is world premiering at the San Sebastian Film Festival and is being sold by Nick Shumaker of United Talent Agency.It is Academy-Award nominee Dillon’s second feature film in the director’s chair.