NEWSMAKERS

NEWSMAKERS

Hollywood to explore Manning, WikiLeaks

LOS ANGELES

The story of WikiLeaks is the kind of real-life drama Hollywood loves, so expect to see multiple interpretations of it on the big screen.

Several projects chronicle the organization’s enigmatic leader Julian Assange and recently convicted leaker Bradley Manning.

Alex Gibney’s documentary, “We Steal Secrets: The Story of WikiLeaks,” was released earlier this year. Bill Condon’s narrative take on the tale, “The Fifth Estate,” will premiere in September at the Toronto Film Festival.

Two other WikiLeaks projects are in development.

“Zero Dark Thirty” screenwriter Mark Boal optioned a New York Times article about Assange earlier this year, and Gibney acquired the rights last year to Denver Nicks’ 2012 book, “Private: Bradley Manning, WikiLeaks, and the Biggest Exposure of Official Secrets in American History.”

“The Bradley Manning story is easily one of the most important stories of the last decade,” Nicks told Democracy Now! last year. “In many ways, Bradley Manning’s story is the story of the United States in the post-9/11 era.”

Buddy Guy pushes for blues on radio

ATLANTA

Buddy Guy knows that blues music isn’t the taste of today’s youth, but the Chicago guitar legend wants to show directors at radio stations and aspiring musicians that the classic sound is still alive with his new album, “Rhythm & Blues.”

“I’m not saying play the blues every day like everything else,” said Guy, who released the album Tuesday, the same day he turned 77. “Just play the blues two or three times a week and I’ll be happy with that.

Guy is looking to make a hit by infusing his down-home country blues sound with top acts from the rock and country music realm.

The double album has guest appearances from Kid Rock, Keith Urban, Steven Tyler, Joe Perry, Beth Hart and Gary Clark Jr.

Guy, who toured with the Rolling Stones during the 1960s, said there are a few fresh acts keeping the blues sound alive with Clark Jr. and 14-year-old guitarist Quinn Sullivan.

He said they may be the key to “wake up” the genre.

Restored ‘Trek’ ship arrives in Houston

HOUSTON

Trekkies of all stripes arrived in Houston Wednesday for the momentous unveiling of the shuttlecraft Galilio that crash-landed on a hostile planet in the 1967 “Star Trek” episode called “The Galileo Seven.”

Some wore Scotty’s Repair Shop T-shirts, others full-blown spandex outfits worn by Mr. Spock and his peers in the famous TV show and movies that have garnered a following so large and so devoted it is almost cult-like.

Adam Schneider paid $61,000 for the battered shuttlecraft in an auction and spent about a year restoring the fiberglass ship and making it look nearly as it did on that episode.

He flew in from New York to mark the unveiling at the Space Center Houston, where it will be permanently displayed not far from NASA’s Mission Control.

Vindicator wire reports