Diving in before others have a chance to load up their iPads for weekends reads, we’re hearing UCP has already fired off a preemptive offer to take the film rights package CLEANSING OF A NATION off the board. Written by Ryan Riley, who previously saw his short story “Encyclopedia Dad” sell to WBTV and his feature spec “Take Back The Night” land with New Regency following a bidding war, the project is being pitched as a socio-political thriller that focuses on the world of tomorrow – a world drowning in it’s own agenda-driven censorship, and spiraling toward the beginning of an uprising.
Based on a short story by Riley, the rights package was slipped to a very small group of film and TV producers earlier this week by Charlie Ferraro & Katrina Escudero of UTA and Brooklyn Weaver of Energy Entertainment, and there is said to be multiple studios expressing interest. Working to dislodge that interest, UCP made an aggressive first move tying together a rights and scripting offer for Riley, in a deal that would lock him in as a series creator as well.
Riley has quickly forged a path into Hollywood, and in many ways has solidified the new model of creator the entertainment industry has turned its eye toward. With a seamless ability to slip between short and long form prose, as well as writing for film and television, he’s not only become one of the most in-demand newcomers to the market, but one who’s seen his first three offerings selling in their first weeks on the market, and often doing so with multiple offers to choose from.
More to come, as we continue to track this into the weekend…
