COMEDIAN TOM DREESEN will MC the Oct. 27 invitation-only NBC premiere of the TV special shot by Resolution Digital Studios at the recent Sweet Home Illinois party, hosted by Brenda Sexton’s Chicago Link Productions and presented by AT&T.
Sexton, the former IFO director, is hosting the premiere at the new, super swank Elysian Hotel on Walton St. Sun-Times columnists Bill Zwecker and Richard Roeper are the red carpet hosts and Beth Malone and David Pisor the Elysian hosts who will be greeting the VIP guests.
NEW CREATIVE DIRECTOR for boutique agency Tom, Dick & Harry is Thomas Richie, a founding partner and CD at Hadrian’s Wall, the creative agency that was sold and rebranded as Zig/Chicago. He will share overall creative duties at TD&H with CD Amy Markley.
BTW, Zig moved from the Clybourn Corridor to 444 N. Michigan where it occupies 3,500-sq. ft. office space. Since last winter, the agencyhas been under the creative leadersip of Toronto’s Stephen Leps.
WRITER/DIRECTOR GARY SHERMAN talks to the Chicago Screenwriters Network Nov. 2 at the Lincoln Restaurant about his 30 year career writing and producing dark, scary movies (“Poltergeist III”). A Chicago native who spent 20 years in Hollywood, he and was writer/executive producer of the “Missing Persons” TV series that filmed in Chicago during the ?90s.
REEL MICHIGAN: Fletcher supplied the cameras for “Highland Park,” the indie feature now shooting in Detroit, starring Danny Glover, Billy Burke and Parker Posey. Cinematographer is Danny Moder (a.k.a. Julie Roberts’ husband).
A YEAR’S ANNIVERSARY for the Next Generation Media (NGM), the $22 million Minneapolis-based duplicating company’s purchase Allied Vaughn’s duplication and replication assets last year. Allied Vaughn’s sole business now is the Manufacture of Movies-on-Demand.
Kevin Kolba, who spent 12 years with Allied Vaughn, heads NGM’s Chicago sales/customer service office of eight, located at Allied Vaughn’s Elk Grove Village plant. His phone is 847/595-5051.
GIGI PRITZKER of the Chicago Hyatt dynasty merged her L.A.-based Odd Lot Entertainment company with that of Bold Films, owned by another billionaire, Belgian industrialist Michel Litvak. The new combo is expected to bolster their positions in the global movie marketplace.
NATIONAL SAG made permanent the interim status of executive director David White, who also was named the union’s chief negotiator.
