News

July 16, 2008 - [ The Huffington Post ]

Over the last few years, I've been working on a documentary about the scandal surrounding former lobbyist Jack Abramoff.
 

July 9, 2008 - [ Variety ]

Participant Media has set up eco-horror tale The Colony, based on a pitch by Stacy Title and Jonathan Penner. Steven Schneider of Room 101 and Vertigo Entertainment's Doug Davison and Roy Lee are producing. Gabriel Mason will exec produce the project.
 

July 8, 2008 - [ Variety ]

William Friedkin will direct the premiere of the opera An Inconvenient Truth, which will debut at La Scala in Milan on May 11, 2011.
 

July 7, 2008 - [ Los Angeles Times ]

... Why has The Visitor managed to survive amid so much horrific indie failure? And does it point the way to indie film rejuvenation and revival?
 

July 3, 2008 - [ The Times Online ]

Sometimes something as insignificant as a minor box office success story can reaffirm your faith in the film industry, even in life in general. One such story is The Visitor. A gentle, hopeful movie with no big name stars and no muscular marketing budget, it has charmed, city by city, the audiences of America, growing from an initial release on a handful of screens to a place in the top ten weekly box office earners, alongside behemoth releases like Indiana Jones and Iron Man.
 

June 30, 2008 - [ Hollywood Elsewhere ]

Hollywood Elsewhere Names The Visitor in 2008 'Best-of' List.
 

June 30, 2008 - [ The New York Times ]

This summer, it seems only The Visitor will hit the classic indie trifecta of good reviews, strong word of mouth and staying power in theaters.
 

June 30, 2008 - [ indieWIRE ]

... it's hard to beat the humanity of Jennifer Grausman and Mark Becker's Pressure Cooker ... with its engaging and ultimately emotional look at the turning point in the lives of these children through the use vice of cooking.
 

June 30, 2008 - [ The Hollywood Reporter ]

... The documentary jury also bestowed a special commendation on Pressure Cooker, directed by Jennifer Grausman and Mark Becker.
 

June 29, 2008 - [ The Hollywood Reporter ]

Richard Jenkins wins Best Actor at the Moscow International Film Festival.
 

June 24, 2008 - [ indieWIRE ]

Screening in the Documentary Competition at the Los Angeles Film Festival, Jennifer Grausman and Mark Becker's Pressure Cooker follows three inner-city seniors at Philadelphia's Frankford High School as they take on Wilma Stephenson's Culinary Arts class. With her assistance, the students prepare for a citywide cooking competition for scholarships to some of the country's top culinary arts institutions. Both directors talked to indieWIRE about their experience and the film's screening at LAFF.

 

June 23, 2008 - [ Associated Press ]

Sacha Baron Cohen, Marion Cotillard, Ruby Dee and Jet Li ... were among 105 actors, filmmakers, executives and others in the movie business who were asked to become members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Also on the list of invitees ... [Participant Media chairman] Jeff Skoll.

June 18, 2008 - [ Gourmet Magazine ]

At the beginning of Pressure Cooker, a feature-length documentary making its world premiere on June 21 at the Los Angeles Film Festival, it’s unclear why any right-minded student at Northeast Philadelphia’s Frankford High School would submit to the tutelage of Wilma Stephenson. A barking drill sergeant of a Culinary Arts teacher, Stephenson has a manner so gruff and volatile that it makes for unintentional laughs.

 

April 10, 2008 - [ Cleveland Plain Dealer ]

About 100 crew and cast members -- including Jamie Foxx -- are scheduled to be [in Cleveland] April 17-19 for filming. It's the biggest feature film to come here since Spider-Man 3 swung through Euclid Avenue in 2006, and is hiring more local crewmembers than that blockbuster, said Greater Cleveland Film Commission Executive Director Ivan Schwarz.
 

March 20, 2008 - [ Los Angeles Confidential ]

Participant CEO Jim Berk honored at the "I Have a Dream" Foundation's Dream Keeper Awards ceremony, held at the 10th annual Gospel Brunch at the House of Blues in West Hollywood.

March 20, 2008 - [ The Hollywood Reporter ]

Participant Media and Wedding Crashers producer Tapestry Films are making Minimum Wage, a comedy about a thieving corporate exec sentenced to live on minimum wage in the town his company bankrupted.

March 19, 2008 - [ Variety ]

In a move toward the mainstream, the politically activist company Participant Media will join forces with Tapestry Films to develop Minimum Wage, a comedy about corporate greed written by TV actors-turned-screenwriters Tegan West and Scott Atkinson. Tapestry produced Wedding Crashers.
 

March 12, 2008 - [ OK! Magazine ]

OK! Magazine features Participant's celebrity 'I am Voting For' public service announcements.
 

March 6, 2008 - [ Time ]

...Chicago 10 was financed by Participant Productions, founded in 2004 on a "double bottom line" premise. "We want to make a social return and a commercial return on our investment," says Participant president Ricky Strauss.

February 29, 2008 - [ The Hollywood Reporter ]

... Activist production company Participant, one of the film's producers, even has created a Web address, www.takepart.com/Chicago10, to channel any of the political energy the movie inspires.