Baseball Legend & Hall of Fame Recipient Tommy Lasorda Partners With Independent Film Group to Produce Feature Film Based on Lasorda's Quest for an Olympic Gold Medal in the 2000 Summer Olympics

Baseball Legend & Hall of Fame Recipient Tommy Lasorda Partners With Independent Film Group to Produce Feature Film Based on Lasorda's Quest for an Olympic Gold Medal in the 2000 Summer Olympics

DEBORAH AMELON RECRUITED TO PEN THE SCREENPLAY

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif., Aug. 18 /PRNewswire/ -- Hall of Fame Baseball recipient, TOMMY LASORDA, has partnered with INDEPENDENT FILM GROUP (IFG) to produce his telling of the greatest period of his life -- "bringing home the Olympic Gold Medal in Baseball to the USA".

Lasorda's storied life, in his short 80 years, has crossed many milestones, but none as important as bringing the Gold Medal back to the USA, and whipping the Cubans in good ole American fashion. "Baseball is America's game," according to Lasorda. "It doesn't belong to the Cubans, Koreans or the Italians. I wanted this job real badly, because I wanted to bring that Gold Medal back where it belongs, The USA!" Steven Jensen, principal of IFG, and his associate, Justin Evans, were inspired by the saga and knew the story had to be told. "Tommy is a legend, even to those of us who aren't baseball nuts. He stands for everything American, and is a true success story. After meeting Tommy, I knew from that moment that this story had to be told, and to be told by Tommy. Some of today's best professional baseball players can thank him for their tremendous success, and for a Gold Medal to boot!" explains Jensen. Production is slated to start July 2009, exactly nine years after team USA took home the Gold in Sydney, Australia, with other locations such as Atlanta, GA and San Diego, CA.

IFG met with dozens of writers before deciding upon Deborah Amelon, who can be called a true baseball fanatic. After several meetings and one final meeting with Tommy, it was clear that Amelon had what it took to bring home the best script. "It's a retelling of history, our history, with a legend telling the story based on the facts. What more could a writer ask for, except maybe getting to meet and interview baseball's greatest like BEN SHEETS, PAT BORDERS, DOUG MIENTKIEWICZ, MIKE NEIL & ERNIE YOUNG to name a few."

The story goes like this ... 2000 is the first Olympiad in which professionals and wooden bats are allowed into Olympic baseball competition. Seven countries (USA among them) are sending baseball teams to Sydney, Australia to dethrone the almighty and undefeated Cuban team. Team USA cultivates their squad from a selection of minor leaguers, pros who won't be called in September, recently retired major leaguers, and college players, yielding one of the most peculiar teams ever, made up of Triple A prospects, 30ish hangers-on, and unproven young pitchers.

Lasorda and this ragtag collection of 28 players with widely ranging ages arrive in Sydney with a mere three weeks to prepare to face Olympic teams who have played together for years, the most forbidding being the undefeated Cubans. The teammates have stars in their eyes about representing their country, but are brought down to earth by taunts from the Cuban players and fans, as well as anti-American attitudes of those who remember the disgraceful behavior of the American hockey players at the '98 Winter Games. But most daunting of all are the jeers from the American sports writers and fans who describe Team USA as "A Bunch of Nobodies" and "The Not Ready for Prime Time Players". Many Americans are embarrassed by the lack of celebrity talent on the team, actually wishing that the country that invented baseball would send no team to the Olympics. But Tommy Lasorda isn't putting up with that. He pulls his team together and surprises them by announcing, "When these Olympics are over, I promise you everybody will know your names." Then he shocks the rest of the world by announcing, "I didn't come 6,000 miles to lose!"

Tommy Lasorda has been called one of the most successful managers in baseball history. In 20 years as a manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers, he led his team to a total of eight division titles. Also on his watch, the Dodgers went to the World Series four times, winning it twice (in 1981, and again in 1988). He retired as Dodger manager in 1996, and became a Dodgers vice president. In May, 2000, four years into his new job as a vice president for the Dodgers and over 50 years with the organization, Lasorda was called on to manage the U.S. Olympic baseball team at the Olympic games in Sydney, Australia. "Being selected to manage the U. S. Olympic team is a great privilege and honor; it's bigger than the World Series," he told USA Today's Mike Dodd on the occasion. "It's bigger than the Dodgers, bigger than Major League Baseball, because it's the United States of America. It's your country." Lasorda led the team and the US it to its first-ever Olympic gold medal at the 2000 Olympic games in Sydney.

Deborah Amelon

Deborah Amelon is an Emmy and ACE award nominated writer with both producing and directing credits. She has written numerous movies for television, series, and theatrical features. Her credits include EXIT TO EDEN, TRICKS, THE LAST SHOT, HUNGER POINT, NASH BRIDGES, PARENT TRAP II and CHICKEN SOUP FOR THE SOUL. EXIT TO EDEN is the adaptation of the ANNE RICE novel of the same title. Ms. Amelon won the prestigious CINE Golden Eagle Award for both writing and directing THE LAST SHOT. CHICKEN SOUP FOR THE SOUL is the series based on the best-selling books. She wrote and produced 122 of the stories. She won the Samuel Goldwyn Award for her screenplay of TRICKS, a theatrical release starring Mimi Rogers. She won a prestigious Writer's Guild Award for her screenplay, KATIE'S CHOICE. She has worked with such Directors as Garry Marshall, Martha Coolidge and Penny Marshall, and Producers such as Academy Award winner Wendy Finerman. She has written the prestigious project about the Mercury 13, ROCKET WOMEN. Her film adaptation of the Jillian Medoff novel, HUNGER POINT, presently airs on Lifetime and stars Barbara Hershey. She wrote TARNISHED GOLD, the story of Jamie Sale and David Pelletier, the Canadian Pair Team awarded the second Gold Medal in the Salt Lake Olympic judging scandal. On October 2, 2007, her book DOROTHY HAMILL, A SKATING LIFE was published and made the NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER LIST after only four days. She graduated Magna Cum Laude with a degree in English Literature from UCLA and attended its Graduate School of Film and Television. Before college she skated with Shipstad's and Johnson's ICE FOLLIES, culminating a career as a competitive figure skater. She is a Visiting Professor at UCLA, teaching screenwriting in the Graduate School of Film and Television, and is a featured speaker at the UCLA Conference Center at Lake Arrowhead.

Contact:
Independent Film Group, LLC
Steven Jensen
8444 Wilshire Blvd, 5th Floor
Beverly Hills, CA 90211
Tel 310-854-2300
email jensen@indygroup.tv
web http://www.indygroup.tv/

First Call Analyst:
FCMN Contact:

Source: Independent Film Group, LLC

CONTACT: Steven Jensen of Independent Film Group, LLC, +1-310-854-2300,
jensen@indygroup.tv

Web site: http://www.indygroup.tv/

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