PATRICK SWAYZE stars as an unorthodox but effective FBI agent who trains a new na?ve young partner (Travis Fimmel) while being pursued by an Internal Affairs team in in “The Beast,” which has begun three weeks of shooting in Chicago.
Directed by Michael Dinner, “The Beast” is one of four pilots being produced by Sony Pictures Television, for A&E, its first original scripted drama series since 2002.
Although it looked like “The Beast” would shoot in Toronto, Chicago got the green light the end of November that the city would serve as the story’s locale.
Swayze hasn’t worked in Chicago since 1989, when he played a Chicago cop looking to find his brother’s killer in “Next of Kin.”
RESHOOTS OF “THE HORSEMEN, the action/thriller starring Dennis Quaid originally scheduled for December is now slated for January 7-11 filming in Chicago. Principal photography originally took place in Winnipeg, Canada.
Quaid was in Chicago last spring filming “The Express.”
NAME DROPPING. Slack Barshinger’s president/ECD Don Barshinger will leave the agency Dec. 31 after 19 ytears to pursue a full-time career as an independent writer. Ron Klingensmith, Kelley Fead and Karen Miller will assume Barshinger’s creative duties ?
Jack Morton Worldwide’s new managing director and U.S. consumer practice leader is Larry Deutsch, former managing director of OgilvyAction/Chicago ? Priscilla Field Kozel joined Topin & Associates as an ACD, from Goble & Associates/Chicago ? DDB group CD Mark Gross was tapped president of the Cannes Lions 2008 Radio Lions jury.
SECOND CITY ALUMS Mark Nutter, Joe Liss, John Rubano and Dave Lewman are the writers of “The Bicycle Men, a comedic musical whose Dec. 16 screening at the Lakeshore theatre Dec. 16 will benefit Northwestern Hospital’s Ovarian Cancer Early Detection program.
Chicago native Dan Castellaneta, best known the voice of Homer Simpson, plays the lead. The weeklong run starts Dec. 12.
FRAGMENT G is veteran executive producer Dick Gillespie’s new company that helps busy companies with necessities like production, management/creative development, marketing and consulting.
Gillespie is also business development director for AboutFace Media, where he’s reunited with directors Barry Polterman and Steve Farr from their old Spoke Productions/Superior Street days together.
“AboutFace works with directors, editors and web/graphic designers who have many years of commercial and documentary experience,” says Gillespie.
See www.FragmentG.com and www.AboutFaceMedia.com. Gillespie’s cell phone is 505/310-8433.
ROOM AT THE TOP for Big Shoulders digital video, having moved over the weekend to the former WLUP-FM (The Loop) studios on the 37th floor of the John Hancock building, from 303 E. Wacker Dr.
“We have three Avid HD suites to complement our Avid DS suite, Final Cut HD, an insert studio, a five-staff crew and 15 camera packages and connections to VYVX and Ascent Media,” says partner Brad Fox.
Phone number is the same, 312/540-5400. See bigshoulders.com.
GOOD NEWS FOR PIXEL BROS. They can count on another season (or more) of editing the daily “Steve Wilkos Show.” The fall 2008 series has been renewed on Tribune stations by NBC Universal Television Distribution.
Steve Wilkos, a “Jerry Springer Show” spinoff not unlike “Dr. Phil,” showed three straight weeks of growth, averaging 1.23 million viewers, and that bodes well for the show’s future.
AND IN NEW YORK … The Brooklyn Navy Yard and its largest tenant – the wildly successful Steiner Studios – are teaming up to redevelop a 20-acre site within the Navy Yard as a media campus.
Seeking to attract a diversified pool of media, film, television, and entertainment companies, as well as non-profit organizations, Steiner Studios and Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation (BNYDC) issued a joint Request for Expressions of Interest (RFEI) for the site, which formerly was used by the Navy as a medical compound.
