‘CURTAIN CALL’ GOES ON LOCATION TO THE SET OF HBO’S BOARDWALK EMPIRE
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ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (Sept. 15) - The Prohibition-era Boardwalk comes alive when Curtain Call with David Spatz goes on location to the set of HBO’s Boardwalk Empire to chat with the creator of the series and two stars of the award-winning show.
This special edition of Curtain Call airs September 24 at 6 p.m. on WMGM-TV NBC40, one night before the second season of Boardwalk Empire premiers on HBO.
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (Sept. 15) - The Prohibition-era Boardwalk comes alive when Curtain Call with David Spatz goes on location to the set of HBO’s Boardwalk Empire to chat with the creator of the series and two stars of the award-winning show.
This special edition of Curtain Call airs September 24 at 6 p.m. on WMGM-TV NBC40, one night before the second season of Boardwalk Empire premiers on HBO.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: David Pashuck
(609) 383-6711
dpashuck@mac.com
Actors Anthony Laciura, who plays Nucky Thompson’s beleaguered assistant, Eddie Kessler, and Michael Kenneth Williams, who portrays Thompson’s bootlegger Chalky White, along with series creator and executive producer Terence Winter, join Spatz on the set, which recreates the Atlantic City Boardwalk of the 1920s in meticulous detail.
“It’s one thing to see the Boardwalk on the TV screen as it’s depicted on the HBO series,” says Curtain Call producer Jake Glassey, Jr. “But to actually walk on that set is to literally step 90 years into Atlantic City’s famously notorious past.”
Laciura, a retired opera tenor, talks about how he landed the role of Nucky’s assistant by recalling his operatic training and developing such a realistic German accent that it fooled the show’s casting director. He also explains how he was able to dial in his character by getting friendly with the family of Louie Kessel, the former professional wrestler and cab driver who spent 20 years as the personal assistant of Nucky Johnson, the Atlantic City politician and racketeer who inspired the Nucky Thompson character.
Williams, whose character also serves as the de facto mayor of Atlantic City’s Prohibition-era black community, explains how Chalky White is treated as an equal of Nucky Thompson and his cronies because of the service he provides, but who also knows his limits in a segregated town and is never seen on the Boardwalk.
And Winter, whose pre-Boardwalk Empire credits include writing or co-writing 25 episodes of The Sopranos, tells Spatz how he was given author Nelson Johnson’s “Boardwalk Empire” book and told to “find a series” somewhere in the book’s 12 chapters. When Winter learned that acclaimed director Martin Scorsese would direct the premier and be an executive producer, he assured HBO he would definitely find a series somewhere in the book.
For Spatz, the visit to the Boardwalk Empire set, located on the East River in the Greenpoint section of Brooklyn, was very personal.
“My grandparents and great-grandparents were business partners who owned a pair of Boardwalk hotels in the 1920s,” Spatz says. “I spent my life looking at scrapbook pictures of those hotels and the Boardwalk and memorized every small detail. Suddenly, all of those black-and-white pictures were life-size and in vivid color. The attention to detail is incredible. Tiny things in the windows and storefronts that the cameras and the audience will never see have been included to help inspire the actors into believing they’re on the real Atlantic City Boardwalk in 1921.”
Produced by Atlantic Coast Productions in Northfield, Curtain Call with David Spatz is an Emmy Award-winning series that features casual and insightful conversations with world-class entertainers and personalities.
In addition to Spatz and Glassey, who co-produce the show, the Curtain Call production team includes associate producer Tom Morgenweck, Jr. and production supervisor Dave Pashuck.
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FOR IMMEDATE RELEASE
Contact:
Barbara Berman ● 609-487-1483 ● 215-370-6717 (cell) ● barbberman@comcast.net
William H. Sokolic ● (609) 823-9159
Atlantic City, NJ - September 6, 2011 - Downbeach Film Festival presents the 2011 Atlantic City Cinefest, October 14 to 16 in The Screening Room at Resorts Casino Hotel. As in the prior three years, the festival will screen a selection of more than 30 features, shorts and documentaries, as well as honor cinematic success stories, such as Scott Rosenfelt, who will receive the Lifesaver Award Saturday night.
Rosenfelt has produced such Hollywood hits as Home Alone, Mystic Pizza, Teen Wolf and Smoke Signals. He will be honored with a retrospective following the screening of a documentary he produced and directed, Standing Silent. The powerful film, a Sundance Documentary Filmmaker Grant recipient, exposes the issue of child abuse among orthodox rabbis in Baltimore.
One of the festival’s opening night films, Deconstructing Dad, is another documentary on the life of iconic musician, Raymond Scott, who produced the music for Warner Brother’s classic cartoons, directed the orchestra for TV’s “Your Hit Parade,” and developed the use of technology in music. The festival will close with the 25th Anniversary screening of Wise Guys with co-star Joe Piscopo doing a Q & A.
Once again, the festival will screen a selection of shorties, the longest under four minutes. Local filmmaker, Tony Piccotti, will unveil his latest, The Fifth Door. Independent shorts include the hilarious religious piece, The Tailor, previous Lifesaver Award winner, Chris Mulkey’s Never Has Beenz, the clever, Side Effect, Rowan grad, David Simonetti’s, Silk City, and experimental films, Bike’s Eyes, from returning director, Michael Gaughan, and 60 in Sixty Seconds, from returning director, Ronnie Cramer.
Log onto downbeachfilmfestival.org for festival updates.
OFFICERS
Nichole Kilpatrick, Vice President Barbara Berman, Treasurer
Joelle Sokolic, Secretary Sam Held, Business Development
President and Board Chair: William Sokolic
Trustees: Pinky Kravitz, Stefanie Ryan, Danielle Gomes Chapman, Heather Colache,
Ned Eckhardt, John Sachar, Jeff Quinlan, Andy Myers
Los Angeles Members: Louis Mandylor, Marc Clebanoff
DOWNBEACH FILM FESTIVAL ● 401 Berkshire Drive ● Ventnor, NJ 08406 ● 609.823.9159 ● www.downbeachfilmfestival.org