A Talented Trio
Gless, Kanter and Towne, respectively, will serve as master of ceremonies, grand master of ceremonies and chair of the event honoring the year’s best film adaptation of a book or novella.
The award, given to both the author and screenwriter, has been handed out annually since 1989 by the Friends of the USC Libraries.
Last year’s winners were author Michael Cunningham and screenwriter David Hare for “The Hours.”
Towne will lead a selection committee comprised of Writers Guild of America members — including Academy Award®-winning and -nominated screenwriters — fiction and nonfiction authors, film industry executives, USC faculty and selected members of the Friends of the USC Libraries.
Each January, the selection committee chooses five finalists, and then a winner, from among all English-language films based on books or novellas released the prior year.
Gless, an Emmy® and Golden Globe® winner for her role on the police drama “Cagney & Lacey,” will follow the late John Ritter, who served as emcee last year and was on board for the 2004 event before his death in September.
“I’m very honored to follow in John’s footsteps in supporting the Scripter Awards,” Gless said. “He was a great supporter and alumnus of USC, as are many in my family, and we’re delighted to be associated with an award that honors great writers.”
Gless, who has starred in numerous TV movies, is currently filming a fourth season of the Showtime drama “Queer as Folk.”
Towne is a four-time Academy Award® nominee whose screenwriting credits include “The Last Detail,” “Shampoo” and the Oscar-winning “Chinatown.”
He currently is preparing to direct his adaptation of John Fante’s “Ask the Dust.” In October 2002, he received the Lifetime Achievement Award for Screenwriting from PEN USA and the outstanding achievement award at this year’s Hollywood Film Festival.
Kanter, a writer, producer and director, has collaborated on the scripts for 32 Academy Awards shows. He has written 25 produced screenplays, including “The Rose Tattoo,” Frank Capra’s “Pocketful of Miracles” and seven Bob Hope comedies.
His novel “Snake in the Glass” was followed by his memoir, “So Far, So Funny,” the subject of a Friends of the USC Libraries literary luncheon in 1999. He is currently editing a sequel that, he said, “I hope to finish before I am.”
The annual black-tie Scripter Award gala is held in the Los Angeles Times Reference Room of the Edward L. Doheny Jr. Memorial Library at USC. Proceeds benefit the Doheny Library Preservation Fund.
Tickets prices are $350 per person with table prices at $5,000, $10,000 and $25,000.
For additional information, call (213) 740-2328, email scripter@usc.edu or go to: http://scripter.usc.edu.
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USC in the News
for 2/8/2012 »-
The Chronicle of Higher Education mentioned USC’s $6 billion fundraising campaign. The story noted that USC had already raised $1 billion in a “quiet phase,” including the $200 million naming gift from USC Trustee and alumnus David Dornsife and wife Dana Dornsife to the USC Dornsife College.
The Guardian (U.K.) highlighted two major gifts to USC in a list of the 10 biggest philanthropic benefactors in America. The list included the $200 million naming gift from USC Trustee and alumnus David Dornsife and wife Dana Dornsife to the USC Dornsife College, and the $110 million gift from USC Trustee and USC Viterbi School alumnus John Mork and wife Julie to create the USC Mork Family Scholars Program.
The New York Times featured the USC U.S.-China Institute documentary “Assignment: China — The Week that Changed the World.” The documentary, part of a series, examines media coverage of the 1972 Nixon trip that reshaped U.S.-China relations after a quarter century of isolation and hostility. “People look back now and take it for granted that the outcome was preordained,” said the institute’s Mike Chinoy, who produced the documentary. Voice of America also featured the story.
Los Angeles Times featured the Oscar Senti-meter, a tool developed by the USC Annenberg School, Los Angeles Times and IBM that analyzes thousands of tweets about the Academy Awards nominees. The story noted that Mexican actor Demian Bechir received an enormous boost on Twitter the day of the nominations, with a total of 6,893 tweets mentioning him, a 47-fold increase from the day before. The story noted the tool uses language-recognition technology developed in collaboration with USC Viterbi School’s Signal Analysis and Interpretation Lab.
The Times of India (India) featured a three-day medical emergency training workshop organized in association with USC. At the workshop, held at GCS Medical College in India, 50 doctors and more than 100 paramedics learned how to improve emergency support systems. William Mallon of the Keck School of USC said that discussion topics included the use of portable ultrasonic devices to scan patients. “The ultrasound applications help physicians make accurate and timely decisions,” he noted. Daily News & Analysis (India) also featured the workshop.
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