UCLA students, alums take all finalist spots for Samuel Goldwyn awards
By Asher Landau
Sept. 18, 2014 12:35 a.m.
The original version of this article contained multiple errors and has been changed. See the bottom of the article for more information.
The five finalists for the 2014 Samuel Goldwyn Writing Awards, which accepts screenplays, teleplays and stage plays and is open to all UC students, were announced Tuesday.
All of the finalists are enrolled in or are graduates of the screenwriting program at UCLA’s School of Theater, Film and Television. The announcement marks the sixth time in the past 15 years that all five finalists are students or alumni from the School of Theater, Film and Television.
The finalists include alumnus Kevin Human, for his TV pilot “Hell Is Other Cowboys,” a Western fantasy in which two cowboys race to save the soul of the woman they love from Death.
Alumnus Dan Patrick was nominated for “Village of Sweet Dreams,” in which U.S. soldiers investigate a tunnel system beneath a village during the Vietnam War and discover an unnatural presence.
The jointly created TV pilot “Doubleblind,” by alumni Teresa Sullivan and A.J. Marchisello, is a sci-fi thriller about six graduate students who attempt to expose illegal genetic experiments conducted on them in vitro.
In the family drama “Spaghetti Bridges,” by graduate student Han-Yee Ling, an immigrant Chinese father works with his American-born son on a high school physics project in hopes of repairing their relationship.
Graduate student Gaia Violo was nominated for her thriller “Absentia,” which follows an FBI agent who escapes after nine years of imprisonment by a serial killer only to be blamed for multiple murders.
Winners will be announced Nov. 3 and will be selected by director, writer, producer and UCLA alumna Allison Anders, Ben Feingold, producer and former president of worldwide home entertainment, digital distribution and product acquisitions at Sony Pictures, and Jeremy Kay, U.S. editor of Screen International.
Winners will receive $15,000 for first prize, $7,500 for second prize, $4,000 for third prize and $2,000 and $1,000 for honorable mentions.
Compiled by Asher Landau, A&E senior staff.
Correction: Patrick’s name was misspelled. Violo was nominated for her thriller. “Hell Is Other Cowboys” is a TV pilot.
