EPM press releases and other news can be found here. Our latest news includes:

NEWPORT DOCUMENTARY FILMING BEGINS

June 26, 2009 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE NEWPORT, R.I. –– After weeks of advance work, production begins today on BEHIND THE HEDGEROW, a feature-length documentary about Newport society that will be broadcast on PBS in 2010. A companion book will also be published.

The movie, from filmmakers G. Wayne Miller and David Bettencourt, is an exclusive inside look at the people of fortune and their descendants who have made Newport a coveted address and summer destination since the mid-1800s.

Filming at the Newport Flower Show, courtesy of The Preservation Society of Newport County, host of the show, is the first of several on-location shoots that will bring the filmmakers literally behind the hedgerow –– into the residences and private worlds of Newport’s leading families.

Part history and part contemporary look, BEHIND THE HEDGEROW will utilize rare footage, photographs, archives and on-camera interviews. A significant part of the film will be the story of the late Eileen Gillespie Slocum, whose family has welcomed the filmmakers into the world of their late mother, who died in 2008.

“To our knowledge, no one has ever documented these fascinating people and their city-by-the-sea in a movie,” said Miller. “We are excited to begin.”

BEHIND THE HEDGEROW will premiere at the 2010 Rhode Island International Film Festival. The movie trailer will be shown publicly for the first time in Newport on Aug. 13, 2009, at the Redwood Library, one of the many local and state institutions that is assisting Miller, Bettencourt and their crew with the film.

BEHIND THE HEDGEROW is the second title from Miller and Bettencourt’s non-profit Eagle Peak Media production company. ON THE LAKE, Eagle Peak’s first title, premiered in February to critical acclaim. PBS broadcasts in major national markets began in March and continue today. The DVD has recently been released.

Funding for the film is provided, in part, by a grant from the Rhode Island Council for the Humanities.

Miller, a staff writer at The Providence Journal, authored the 2000 Journal series about Newport society, A Nearly Perfect Summer. Bettencourt’s first feature film was the wildly successful YOU MUST BE THIS TALL: The Story of Rocky Point Park.

More information, including how to follow us on Facebook and Twitter, is available at the BEHIND THE HEDGEROW movie site.

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>>>> June 9, 2009 <<<<

ON THE LAKE WEB SITE REDESIGNED

Today, we went live with an exciting new design of our ON THE LAKE movie web site, designed by our friend James Nicholas at www.easywebcreations.com Be sure to check it out.

>>>> May 11, 2009 <<<<

National conference to sponsor screening

On June 18, ON THE LAKE will be shown at the 2009 National TB Conference in Atlanta:

-- Details about the conference and screening can be found here. Sponsored by the National Tuberculosis Controllers Association and the National Tuberculosis Nurse Coalition, the conference draws TB specialist from state, federal, university and private organizations, including the CDC's Division of Tuberculosis Control (DTBE).

>>>> April 10, 2009 <<<<

Two showings of ON THE LAKE

Dave and I will be showing and discussing the movie twice in April:

-- Friday, April 18, to the Rhode Island Council for the Humanities, which has supported us through grants.

-- Tuesday, April 28, 6 p.m., Roger Williams University, The Roving Eye Film Festival. This is open to the public.

>>>> March 6, 2009 <<<<

Leading Universities Sponsor TB Awareness Days

Screenings of ON THE LAKE are serving as the centerpiece of university-sponsored events to help raise understanding of this deadly disease. Here's a partial list of screenings:

-- Tuesday, March 3, 3:30 p.m., Kresge Building, Harvard School of Public Health in Boston.

-- Wednesday, March 11, 7 p.m., MUB Theatre II, The University of New Hampshire in Durham, N.H.

-- Thursday, March 12, 1 p.m., Faculty Conference Room, University of Massachusetts Medical School, in Worcester, Mass.

-- Friday, March 27, 2 p.m., Saul Farber Auditorium, New York University School of Medicine/Bellevue Hospital in Manhattan.

If you belong to a university, medical school or school of public health and would like to arrange a TB Awareness Day, or you wish to purchase rights to use the film for educational purposes or as a public performance, please email us.

>>>> Jan. 29, 2009 <<<<

OTL PRESS NIGHT SLATED

Critics, reviewers and others are invited to the first press screening of ON THE LAKE: Life and Love in a Distant Place, a documentary movie about the tuberculosis epidemic in America in the 1900s and globally today. The feature-length movie by filmmakers David Bettencourt and G. Wayne Miller will have its world premiere on Feb. 13 at the Stadium Theatre in Woonsocket, R.I., and be broadcast on PBS in March.

The press night will be held at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Feb. 10, at the Cable Car Cinema, 204 South Main Street, Providence, R.I. Bettencourt, Miller and members of the cast and crew will be on hand to answer questions.

ON THE LAKE had three successful test screenings last fall: in Pittsburgh, at Harvard College, and at state-run Zambarano Hospital in Pascoag, R.I., where much of the film is set. Zambarano opened in 1905 as a tuberculosis sanatorium.

Production of ON THE LAKE began in late 2007 at Zambarano, and later took filmmakers to Colorado, North Carolina, Massachusetts, Maryland and New York. The final version has images and reports from overseas. Globally, tuberculosis is the number-two infectious disease killer, after HIV/AIDS.

Even before its release, ON THE LAKE has garnered honors. The film is a member of the Geneva, Switzerland-based worldwide Stop TB Partnership (www.stoptb.org), whose board is run by an executive committee that includes members of the World Health Organization, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the U.S. Agency for International Development.

The film had also been endorsed by the globe’s most prominent fight-TB advocate, Harvard’s Dr. Paul Farmer, subject of Pulitzer prize-winning author Tracy Kidder’s Mountains Beyond Mountains. Farmer said:

“Tuberculosis -- one of humankind's oldest documented illnesses -- has been placed, by some, in the category of 'emerging infectious diseases.' The truth is, TB has never gone away. It has been and remains one of the world's leading infectious killers… I applaud the efforts of Eagle Peak Media and their film 'On The Lake' to tell the human story of the tuberculosis epidemic.”

ON THE LAKE is the first production from Eagle Peak Media, a multi-media company founded in May by Bettencourt, the award-winning director of YOU MUST BE THIS TALL: The Story of Rocky Point Park, and Miller, Providence Journal staff writer and author of seven books. More Eagle Peak documentaries are in pre-production.

>>>> Nov. 16, 2008 <<<<

GOOD SCREENING, GREAT COVERAGE

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. –– A nearly full house people braved cold, rainy weather last Thursday to attend the second of three scheduled test screenings of ON THE LAKE: Life and Love in a Distant Place, a documentary movie about the tuberculosis epidemic in America in the 1900s and globally today.

Filmmakers David Bettencourt and G. Wayne Miller spoke at the showing of ON THE LAKE, which is scheduled for PBS broadcast on March 23, 2009. The movie will premiere at the Stadium Theatre in Woonsocket, R.I., at 8 p.m. on Feb. 13.

Among those in Thursday’s audience were Barbara Parkos and C. Gale Perkins, two TB survivors who tell their stories of long stays at sanatoriums in the movie. In a post-screening interview, Parkos told The Harvard Crimson that watching the film for the first time was a powerful emotional experience:

“Parkos said the film brought back memories of living in a sanitarium, where she was forced to sleep outside in an attempt to combat the disease," the paper reported. “Watching scenes of beds lined up on outdoor porches ‘brought it back so vividly I felt cold.’ ”

Read the full Crimson Article.

The first test screening of ON THE LAKE was held last month in Pittsburgh, before an audience of nearly 100 people. The final test screening will be before a private audience on Dec. 3.

For more information about the movie, visit the movie site.

>>>> Nov. 5, 2008 <<<<

ON THE LAKE SCREENING SET FOR HARVARD

November 5, 2008

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. –– The second of three scheduled test screenings of ON THE LAKE: Life and Love in a Distant Place, a documentary movie about the tuberculosis epidemic in America in the 1900s and globally today, will be held will be at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, Nov. 13, at Harvard Hall, Harvard College.

Filmmakers David Bettencourt and G. Wayne Miller will speak at the showing of ON THE LAKE, which is scheduled for PBS broadcast in March 2009. This showing is free and open to the public. The movie will premiere at the Stadium Theatre in Woonsocket, R.I., on Feb. 13.

ON THE LAKE is the first production from Eagle Peak Media, a multi-media company founded in May by Bettencourt, the award-winning director of YOU MUST BE THIS TALL: The Story of Rocky Point Park, and Miller, journalist and author of seven books. Two more Eagle Peak documentaries are in pre-production.

The first test screening of ON THE LAKE was held last month in Pittsburgh, before an audience of nearly 100 people. The final test screening will be before a private audience on Dec. 3.

While less of a public health issue in America today than in the early 1900s, when much of the film is set, it remains epidemic on the planet. Tuberculosis is the number-two infectious disease killer globally today, according to the World Health Organization, with nearly two million deaths and nine million new cases in 2006, the last year for which data is available. The only disease with a higher worldwide mortality is HIV/AIDS.

Audience reaction from the Pittsburgh screening suggests that the filmmakers have succeeded in bringing powerful emotion and personal stories to the screen.

“Our aim was not to produce a ‘disease-of-the-week’ movie, but rather a compelling narrative of real people,” Miller said. “Against this tragic backdrop, against the many deaths, we found love stories and stories of triumph.”

Harvard Hall is located at the main entrance to Harvard Yard, which is in the center of Harvard Square in Cambridge, Mass.

For more information about the movie, visit the movie site.

>>>> OCTOBER 1, 2008 <<<<

We are almost done ON THE LAKE. Lots of final editing and sound work, but we are almost there -- just in time for our first wide-screen showing, on October 16th at the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health. Dave and I will present the film. The next showing will be on November 13th at Harvard College, in Cambridge, Mass., as part of Global Health Week. These showings are for students and faculty of the two schools. The official world premiere will be February 13th at the Stadium Theatre in Woonsocket, Rhode Island.

>>>> AUGUST 7, 2008 <<<<

Give the green light to our third documentary, which is in the very early stages. Very early. But we have permission now to proceed with a film about one of the central characters in the Providence Journal series about Newport society, A Nearly Perfect Summer. We suggest you join our mailing list to follow details of this most unusual inside look at a world most of us never see...

>>>> JULY 24, 2008 <<<<

As Eagle Peak Media moves forward with plans to help raise awareness of tuberculosis today, we are pleased to announce that leading TB expert Dr. E. Jane Carter, senior consultant for the RISE tuberculosis Clinic at Providence's Miriam Hospital and assistant professor at the Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University, has agreed to join our efforts. Details on the OTL blog.

>>>> JULY 11, 2008 <<<<

Watch an interview of Miller on writing, conducted by his son, G. Calvin Miller, click here.

>>>> JULY 7, 2008 <<<<

Lonnie Montaquila, half of our movie music/recording team (with Ben Mesiti) will be performing with his three-member rock/pop band The Show at 6 p.m. on Sunday, August 23, in Harrisville, R.I., at the season-closing event of the summertime outdoor entertainment series, Riverwalk Times.

>>>> JULY 3, 2008 <<<<

EAGLE PEAK MEDIA
Studio 7B
200 Allens Avenue
Providence, R.I., 02903
EaglePeakMedia.com
eaglepeakmedia@yahoo.com