The following links will take you through the journey of a group of young men and one female coach. It's heartbreaking, tearful, and hopeful. It is a story that is happening as we speak 10 miles down the road from my home, I live ten miles from the heart of Atlanta so these children are within 10 miles of you too.
There is nothing more awesome than the sport of Soccer, except for children who are fighting everyday as refugees and now are fighting on the field to win for there coach while their coach fights against City COuncil for these children to play on grass. Please read the first link; this is their story. The second paragraph is a wonderful story about Universial and Disney. Then the third you can meet theses children and their coach and see what you can do to help. If you can't donate anything, go to the games and be their fans. Even that little act of kindness means SO much.
"Universal buys soccer storyJanuary 24 2007 at 8:19 PMNo score for this post Ken Gamble--------------------------------------------------------------------------------Universal buys soccer storyVariety Exclusive: Studio ponies up $3 millionBy MICHAEL FLEMING, DAVE MCNARYUniversal Pictures has netted rights to make a feature about the Fugees, ayouth soccer club made up of international refugees who settled inClarkston, Ga.The studio has paid $2 million against $3 million for the rights to anarticle by Warren St. John that ran in Sunday's New York Times. He'll turnhis article into a book, which will be part of the rights package. Alsoincluded are life rights to the team's coach, Luma Mufleh.Stuber/Parent's Scott Stuber and Mary Parent will produce withKennedy/Marshall's Kathleen Kennedy and Frank Marshall. Tom Lassally will beexec producer.The article detailed the unlikely success story of the Fugees, a team ofrefugees from global hotspots including Afghanistan, Iraq, Bosnia, Kosovo,Burundi, Congo, Liberia, Somalia and Sudan. Placed by resettlement agencies,the kids were banned from playing on a grassy field in the local town park.Part of the pic deal calls for Universal to pay $500,000 to build a soccerfield for the kids. Part of the money will fund a foun-dation to benefit theteam, and the dealmakers cut their fees so more of the coin would go to theteens.The core of the story is the determined, Jordan-born female coach whorecognized the need in these displaced kids and created a team for them.She also became active in helping their families find work and break throughbureaucratic red tape as they tried to assimilate.The team made it to the semi-finals, but missed the championship after beingeliminated in the final moments of a game against Atlanta's most affluentsoccer academy.Universal beat out several rival seven-figure bids. One came from ColumbiaPictures, which pledged $1.75 million against $2.5 million, with producerMark Gordon attached. Also in the mix was DreamWorks, with a bid of $1million against $2 million. Disney and producer Scott Rudin also were in thebidding.The bidding began hours after the article was published. Auction wasspearheaded by UTA, which reps the writer and the coach. ICM repped thenewspaper in the deal."
2 comments:
Sounds like Disney's next feel-good film. But what's up with the screwed-up line breaks? Hard to read.
Hey matt, I didn't realize the page breaks copied over. Guess I was so excited about this story that I didn't proof read. Oops.
Even if Disney picks it up as a feel good movie, I don't mind. It's a good story that should be told, Disney or bloggers :)
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