Would you cash in a $6 Million winning lottery ticket that isn’t yours? “Finder’s Fee,” the feature film that marks the directorial debut of Jeff Probst, the host of the CBS hit show Survivor, has been selected as the Final Closing Night Film of the 3rd annual The Method Fest independent film festival slated for June 15-22 at Laemmle Playhouse Cinemas in Pasadena. Finder’s Fee will screen Thursday, June 21, at 8:30 pm and it will be preceded by the Spanish film Sobrevivire (I Will Survive), the Early Closing Film, at 6:30 pm.
James Earl Jones, co-star of Finder’s Fee, will be honored with The Method Fest’s Lifetime Achievement Award in a special ceremony during the festival’s Awards Gala, Friday, June 22, at Pacific Asia Museum. Jones is only the second actor to receive The Method Fest Lifetime Achievement Award. Maximillian Schell, the Austrian-born Oscar winning actor (Judgment at Nuremberg) received the award in 1999.
“They don’t get better than James Earl Jones,” said Don Franken, Method Fest Executive Director. “His body of work, from “Cry, The Beloved Country,” to “A Family Thing,” from “Clear and Present Danger” to “Patriot Games” and so many other projects is truly amazing. His is truly a unique voice in cinema,” Franken said.
“Finder’s Fee” is written and directed by Jeff Probst who, in his spare time moonlights as the host of Survivor, the most watched series on television. The film is produced by Katy Wallin of MysticArt Pictures, Brad Van Arragon and Shawn Williamson of Shavick Entertainment. Wallin and Probst partnered up over two years ago in an effort to produce the film. They got the “green-light” for their film while Probst was in the middle of the South China Seas shooting the first “Survivor.”
Finder’s Fee (executive producer James Shavick), is a psychological thriller about a struggling street artist, Adam Tepper (Erik Palladino) who finds a wallet and discovers it contains a winning lottery ticket worth $6 Million. The ante is raised when Tepper and his poker buddies (Matthew Lillard, Dash Mihok and Ryan Reynolds) become trapped inside a sweltering NYC apartment with Avery Phillips (James Earl Jones), the rightful owner of the wallet. The film stars James Earl Jones, Oscar-nominated actor Robert Forster (“Me, Myself and Irene,” “Jackie Brown,”) Erik Palladino (“E.R.”, “U571”), Matthew Lillard (Warner Bros.’ “Summer Catch,” “Scream ,” “She’s All That, and currently shooting Scooby Doo”), Dash Mihok (“The Perfect Storm,” “The Thin Red Line,”) Ryan Reynolds (ABC’s “Two Guys and a Girl,” features “Dick,” “Buying the Cow”) and Carly Pope (WB’s “Popular.”)
“We are delighted to close our festival on a high note with a quality film like Finder’s Fee,” said Method Fest programming director Elaine R. Wood. “The Method Fest celebrates the actor, and it’s both an honor and a thrill to have the participation of actors like James Earl Jones in our festival.”
For festival information call 310-535-9230 or check the official Method Fest web site.
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