Universal Closes Spec Deal for Script By Gary Spinelli

Yesterday, Universal Pictures closed a $1 million spec deal for Mena, a script by Gary Spinelli. Doug Davison and Brian Grazer are producing, and Kim Roth is executive producing.

Deadline reported that the battle for Mena was a “hot script auction, with Sony also bidding. Universal took it off the table with a $1 million offer, plus a blind script commitment in a deal brokered by Gersh.”

The spec is a fact-based story about a slightly overweight pilot named Barry Seal. In the 1980s, he was a 300-pound gun runner and drug trafficker who transported contraband for the CIA and the Medellin cartel. He ended up being shot to death in Baton Rouge by the cartel.

Deadline reported that, “the title refers to Mena, Arkansas, where a lot of the illegal activity took place, under the noses of Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and then-Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton.”

Spinelli wrote the 2002 thriller film Stash House. The storyline involved a young couple who move into their first house together, only to be terrorized by a criminal gang who want something that’s inside the house.

In other recent Hollywood news, Disney has picked up a pitch from Robert Rugan, an award-winning commercials director, to revive the classic cartoon duo of Chip ‘n’ Dale as a big-screen feature. Check out the ScreenCraft post, Disney to Revive Chip ‘n’ Dale as Live Action Feature.

And don’t miss our other recent post, Spotlight: 5 Questions With Screenwriter Phillip E. Hardy.