Read the Latest Entertainment News from Richard Zampella who is an American Public Television Producer/Editor for PBS. He is also the owner of Idylease in the Newfoundland Section of West Milford, NJ.
Wednesday, October 12, 2022
Official Trailer for Inside High Noon for Public Television: Narrated by Matthew Rhys
Monday, July 25, 2022
Elmore Leonard Documentary Airing Nationally on Public Television
A documentary about renowned author Elmore Leonard, But Don’t Try to Write, will be airing first on July 7th at 2 p.m. on public television in the cities across the United States. The documentary was written and directed by John Mulholland and Produced and Edited by Richard Zampella.
But Don’t Try to Write explores the author’s legacy and his influence on generations of writers and will be narrated by Campbell Scott. It will first premiere on July 7th, 2022 at 2 p.m. in cities like Memphis, Jackson, Columbus-Tupelo, Biloxi-Gulfport, Meridian, and Greenwood-Greenville. At 9 p.m. the documentary will premiere in San Francisco and Monterey-Salinas. In the days following the initial premiers, the film will be broadcasted across the country in cities like Cleveland, Portland, Bend, Tucson, Eugene, Meridian, and Youngstown. But Don’t Try to Write is a produced by Richard Zampella and Shannon Mulholland, executive produced by Craig Gilbert, a production of Dutch Films, LLC and distributed by American Public Television (APT).
The film features interviews with Jim Born, Mike Lupica, Wendy Calhoun, Neely Tucker, Graham Yost, and many others. Through these conversations, the film paints a portrait of an artist who has profoundly impacted our culture and our language. It also includes 30 minutes of original, unreleased interview footage with Elmore Leonard.
Tuesday, July 14, 2020
HD Versions of Inside High Noon & Sergeant York: Of God & Country
Film Trailer: Inside High Noon
Written & Directed by John Mulholland
Produced & Edited by Richard Zampella at Transmultimedia Entertainment for Lionsgate Entertainment.
INSIDE HIGH NOON, a documentary explores both the remarkable 1952 film and the gripping story behind its troubled production. The real-life events behind the making of HIGH NOON make for rich drama, indeed.When released, HIGH NOON was seen as an attack on HUAC. However, this means little to an audience today. INSIDE HIGH NOON examines with fresh insight what makes HIGH NOON timeless, and why it works so powerfully still, over 65 years after its release. Introduction by President Bill Clinton. #princealbertmonaco #billclinton #highnoon #garycooper #gracekelly
Movie Trailer
Sergeant York: Of God and Country
Narrated by Liam Neeson
Written & Directed by John Mulholland
Produced & Edited by Richard Zampella
A Transmultimedia Production for
Warner Home Entertainment
Sergeant York: Of God and Country chronicles how Medal of Honor winner Alvin York’s story was brought to the screen in the 1941 film starring Gary Cooper. The documentary explores casting decisions, script development, performances, characters, shooting topics, and production problems. It also examines the complex political environment in America, in which isolationism, anti-Semitism, and the war in Europe almost derailed the film. Gary Cooper won his first Best Actor Oscar for his performance #garycooper #alvinyork #liamneeson #medalofhonor #joanleslie #walterbrennan #junelockhart
Saturday, February 23, 2019
Elmore Leonard: But Don't Try to Write
There's Literature... There's Genre... and then there's Elmore Leonard - A Documentary Coming Spring 2019.
Elmore Leonard, one of the most popular and admired authors of his time, wrote more than forty novels and dozens of short stories. Among his many NY Times bestsellers: Tishomingo Blues, Glitz, Get Shorty, Maximum Bob, and Rum Punch. Unlike most (so-called) genre writers, however, Leonard is taken seriously, indeed, by those in the literary arena. This documentary film from Transmultimedia Entertainment is Produced/Edited by Richard Zampella and Written/Directed by John Mulholland. Craig Gilbert is Executive Producer and Campbell Scott Narrates.
Thursday, December 13, 2018
Happy 102nd Birthday to Kirk Douglas
When Kirk Douglas, several years ago, happened to hear that we were putting together a documentary on the friendship between Ernest Hemingway and Gary Cooper, he got in touch and told us about a letter he had written to Gary Cooper.
Gracious and modest gentleman that he is, Mr. Douglas enquired if we had any interest in the letter. When we responded immediately in the affirmative, he then offered to read the letter on camera for the documentary.
What appears in The True Gen is an edited version. Here, in our tribute to Mr. Kirk Douglas on his 102nd birthday, is Mr. Douglas reading the letter in full, unedited.
From all of us at Transmultimedia, Happy Birthday, Kirk Douglas.
We shan't soon see your like again.
Cooper & Hemingway: The True Gen is Available on DVD and in a Collector's Edition Blu-Ray DVD Box Set! http://www.chiptaylor.com/cooper_hemi...
Cooper & Hemingway: The True Gen is written/directed by John Mulholland. Narrated by Sam Waterston with Len Cariou as the voice of Ernest Hemingway. Produced by Richard Zampella
Learn more at http://cooperhemingway.com
Thursday, February 22, 2018
Inside High Noon: DVD Trailer HD
NARRATED BY FRANK LANGELLA
WRITTEN & DIRECTED BY JOHN MULHOLLAND
PRODUCED BY RICHARD ZAMPELLA
Original DVD Trailer for Inside High Noon, produced by Transmultimedia Entertainment for the Paramount DVD release of the 2-Disc Special Collectors Edition of the 1952 Motion Picture, High Noon.
Gary Cooper won the Oscar for Best Actor in this classic tale of a lawman who stands alone to defend a town of cowardly citizens against a gang of revenge-seeking criminals. In the greatest showdown in the history of cinema, Cooper stands to lose not only the town but his new wife. The film also stars one of Hollywood’s most beloved and prolific actors, Lloyd Bridges, and marks the first starring role for screen legend, Grace Kelly.
The real-life story behind the making of HIGH NOON is dramatic, suspenseful, gripping. Like the film itself, it is a story of fear, of heroism, and the very real danger of political abuse. What happens up on the screen is in many ways a metaphor for the extraordinary events behind the camera.
But Inside High Noon also explores the film itself:
Why it has aroused controversy among critics. Why its treatment of women was far ahead of its time. Why its treatment of masculinity was far ahead of its time. Why it has remained popular decades and decades after its release. Indeed, why High Noon is the masterpiece it is.
Thursday, July 27, 2017
Blu-Ray Release of Cooper & Hemingway: The True Gen


Richard Zampella at Transmultimedia announces the Blue-Ray release of Cooper & Hemingway: The True Gen to coincide with the birthday of writer Ernest Hemingway. The two disc collectors set includes a unique 16 page fold-out Arts-in-Review booklet comprising articles, photographs and original newspaper reviews and advertisements of Ernest Hemingway’s novels and stories and Gary Cooper’s films. In addition, the box set includes a brand new audio commentary by director/writer John Mulholland and hours of never-before-seen interviews and footage.
The documentary is narrated by Sam Waterston with Len Cariou as the voice of Ernest Hemingway. It includes interviews with Kirk Douglas, Charlton Heston, Patricia Neal, George Plimpton, Robert Stack, and dozens more.
About Cooper & Hemingway: The True Gen
In many ways it was the perfect match: Ernest Hemingway, whose heroes on the page personified courage - "grace under pressure" - and Gary Cooper, the man who often portrayed those characters on screen. Yet, in other ways - politically, emotionally and personally - Hemingway and Cooper were a study in contradictions. The story of this extraordinary 20-year friendship is the focus of The True Gen. Written/Directed by John Mulholland and Produced by Richard Zampella.
To order your limited edition 2 disc set visit: http://cooperhemingway.com/blu-ray/
Sunday, February 12, 2017
Transmultimedia 2016 Video Retrospective
Richard Zampella is a documentary film producer who along with Writer/Director John Mulholland has created content for Warner Home Video and Paramount Pictures. Among their production credits are Sergeant York: Of God and Country, narrated by Liam Neeson. Inside High Noon narrated by Frank Langella and Cooper & Hemingway: The True Gen narrated by Sam Waterston. The later was chosen by the New York Times as a Critics’ Pic in October of 2013.
In early 2017 both Mulholland and Zampella have begin post production on a brand new documentary which explores the life and works of Author Elmore Leonard and his place in the American literary pantheon. The documentary discusses how he started, why he wrote what he did, how he arrived at his lean, terse minimalist style of writing.
Get social with Richard Zampella at: facebook.com/RichardZampella.nyc
Tuesday, February 7, 2017
New Elmore Leonard Documentary Begins Post Production
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Image(s) courtesy of: "The Elmore Leonard Archive, Irvin Department , University of South Carolina Libraries" |
Documentary Writer/Director, John Mulholland has wrapped production on his new feature documentary on "Hollywood's Favorite Writer" Elmore Leonard, and has begun post-production on the film.
The documentary is produced by Richard Zampella , who shot the interviews and will be editing the film with Mulholland. Central to the film, adding depth and resonance, is more than half-an-hour of never-before-seen interview footage with Leonard in which he analyzes and discusses how he started, why he wrote what he did, how he arrived at his lean, terse minimalist trademark.
Elmore Leonard is an American novelist, short story writer, and screenwriter. Among his best-known works are Get Shorty, Out of Sight, Swag, Hombre, Mr. Majestyk, and Rum Punch (adapted for the movie Jackie Brown). Leonard's writings include short stories and original screenplays that became the films 3:10 to Yuma and The Tall T, as well as the FX television series Justified.
On camera interviews include:
Author, James O. Born, Producer & Writer, Wendy Calhoun, Retired LAPD Sergeant, Cheryl Dorsey Writer, Kate Dries, Author, Rachel Howzell Hall, Author, James W. Hall, Elmore Leonard Children, Peter, Chris, Kate and Jane Leonard, Elmore Leonard Wife, Beverly Leonard, Author and Sports Writer, Mike Lupica, Author, Alphie McCourt, Family Friend and Leonard Advisor, Bill Mertz Family Friend, Eliza Mertz, Author, Friend & Bookstore Owner, Otto Pendler, Virginia Tech Film Studies Professor, Stephen Prince, Bailbondsman, Mike Sandy, Author & Leonard Researcher, Gregg Sutter, Washington Post Columnist and Author, Neely Tucker and Producer & Writer, Graham Youst
Director John Mulholland & Producer Richard Zampella's last film, "Cooper & Hemingway: The True Gen" received a New York Times Critic's Pick which opened in theaters in New York & Los Angeles in 2013 and is currently in distribution nationwide.
Monday, April 25, 2016
Neely Tucker on Elmore Leonard

Elmore Leonard was personally and professionally a huge influence on author Neely Tucker who is a staff writer for the Washington Post Sunday Magazine. Tucker has reported from more than 50 countries around the world and from two dozen of these United States. He is the author of “Love in the Driest Season.” A native of Mississippi, he now lives with his family just outside of D.C. He is an embarrassingly huge fan of Mississippi State and the New Orleans Saints.
We spent a Saturday afternoon with Neely outside Washington, D.C. – discussing all things Elmore Leonard. His interview for the documentary Elmore Leonard: The Dickens of Detroit was wonderfully focused, animated and filled with engaging insight.
The Dickens of Detroit is Written & Directed by John Mulholland and produced by Richard Zampella. Visit http://www.dickensofdetroit.com
Monday, February 29, 2016
Elmore Leonard Miami Interviews
Wednesday, February 24, 2016
Life is like a box of chocolates in Savannah..
Hanks sits on the park bench located in Chippewa Square for 80% of the film, telling his life story to anyone who will listen. Film Director John Mulholland and Producer Richard Zampella visited Savannah in February 2016 while traveling to Miami, Florida to conduct interviews for the Elmore Leonard Documentary: The Dickens of Detroit.
Monday, October 12, 2015
Zampella & Mulholland Press Release for Elmore Leonard Documentary
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Richard Zampella & John Mulholland Press Release on Broadway World |
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Mulholland & Zampella Press Release on Los Angeles CBS Affiliate |
http://www.broadwayworld.com/bwwtv/article/John-Mulholland-Richard-Zampella-Filming-Interviews-for-Elmore-Leonard-Documentary-20151012
http://www.cbs8.com/story/30237090/writerdirector-john-mulholland-and-producer-richard-zampella-in-los-angeles-filming-interviews-for-elmore-leonard-documentary
John Mulholland wrote/directed the NY Times Critics Pick, Cooper and Hemingway: The True Gen, which explores The 20 year friendship of Ernest Hemingway and Gary Cooper. The feature documentary was produced by Richard Zampella at Transmultimedia Entertainment.
Thursday, October 8, 2015
Writer/Director John Mulholland and Producer Richard Zampella in Los Angeles Filming Interviews for Elmore Leonard Documentary
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Zampella & Mulholland Wrap West Coast Interviews for Elmore Leonard Documentary |
Among those interviewed: Producer/Writer Gregg Sutter, who served as Leonard’s researcher for more than three decades, is editor and contributor to the Library of America’s three-volume Elmore Leonard Anthology.
Graham Yost created and co-wrote Justified, which concluded its six-season run earlier this year. The series was based on Elmore Leonard's short story, Fire in the Hole. Yost wrote the films, Speed, Broken Arrow and Hard Rain, and worked on such HBO series as Band Of Brothers and The Pacific.
Rachel Howzell Hall is author of the critically-acclaimed Detective Elouise Norton novels, Land of Shadows and Skies of Ash (Forge) -- cited by the LA Times as “Books to Read This Summer” in both 2014 and 2015. Hall’s first novel, A Quiet Storm (Scribner), was a Borders’ Original Voices selection.
Wendy Calhoun, currently co-exec producer on Empire, Fox’s hip-hop smash, was a co-producer, story editor and writer for two seasons on Justified. Calhoun was also a writer and producer on the ABC-TV series, Revenge.
Cheryl Dorsey, retired LAPD Sergeant, is author of Black & Blue: The Creation of a Manifesto, which offers an unsparing look at the inner workings of the LAPD regarding its black officers, its female officers, and, most especially, its black female officers. Dorsey has appeared on MSNBC and contributes to The Huffington Post.
Mulholland wrote/directed the NY Times Critics Pick, Cooper and Hemingway: The True Gen, which explored the 20 year friendship of Ernest Hemingway and Gary Cooper. The feature documentary was produced by Richard Zampella at Transmultimedia Entertainment.
For more info visit:
www.dickensofdetroit.com
www.richardzampella.com
www.transmultimedia.com
www.cooperhemingway.com
Friday, October 2, 2015
Graham Yost Interview in Carmel
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Screenwriter Graham Yost: Show runner of FX's Justified is interviewed for Elmore Leonard Documentary |
CARMEL, CA – 10.1.15: Writer/Director John Mulholland and Producer Richard Zampella travel to Carmel, California to Interview Screenwriter Graham Yost for Elmore Leonard Documentary. Yost wrote the films Speed, Broken Arrow, and Hard Rain and helmed the FX television series Justified for 6 seasons. The series was based on Elmore Leonard's short story "Fire in the Hole".
Read more about: Elmore Leonard: The Dickens of Detroit
Wednesday, September 30, 2015
Mulholland & Zampella Elmore Leonard Documentary Interviews
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Wendy Calhoun, Co-Executive Producer of Fox's Empire Interviewed by John Mulholland |
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Cheryl Dorsey, Author of Black & Blue: The Creation of a Manifesto is Interviewed on Elmore Leonard |
[Top] Wendy Calhoun is interviewed for Elmore Leonard Documentary. Wendy was a co-producer and writer for Elmore Leonard adapted FX television series Justified. She was the Executive Story Editor for the first season and wrote the episode "Blind Spot". For the second season she wrote the episode "For Blood Or Money". Prior to Justified she had worked as a writer and producer on Revenge. Currently, Wendy serves as co-executive producer of creator Lee Daniels television series “Empire” –Fox’s new hip-hop family drama.
[Bottom] Cheryl Dorsey is author of Black & Blue: The Creation of a Manifesto which takes a hard look at the inner workings of the LAPD—especially regarding its black officers, its women officers, and most especially its black women officers. She is interviewed by Writer/Director John Mulholland for the documentary Elmore Leonard: The Dickens of Detroit in Los Angeles on 9.28.15
Monday, September 28, 2015
Zampella & Mulholland Filming Interviews in Los Angeles
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Author Gregg Sutter |
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Author Rachel Howzell Hall |
[Pictured Top] Production still of Gregg Sutter who for more than 30 years, served as the late Elmore Leonard's researcher. Sutter is the editor of the Library of America's Elmore Leonard anthology, which will be released in three volumes, the first of which was published last year (volume two comes this year, volume three in 2016). The first volume features Leonard's early Detroit crime novels—Fifty-Two Pick Up, Swag, Unknown Man No. 89 , and The Switch.
[Pictured Below] Transmultimedia Entertainment Interview with RACHEL HOWZELL HALL who is the author of the critically acclaimed Detective Elouise Norton series. Land of Shadows and Skies of Ash (Forge) were included on the Los Angeles Times’ “Books to Read This Summer” for 2014 and 2015, and the New York Times called Lou Norton “a formidable fighter—someone you want on your side.” Rachel’s first novel, A Quiet Storm (Scribner), was a Borders’ Original Voices selection. A featured writer on NPR’s acclaimed ‘Crime in the City’ series, Rachel also serves as a mentor in AWP’s Writer to Writer Program. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and daughter.
Thursday, August 13, 2015
John Mulholland & Richard Zampella Wrap Interviews in Detroit
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Bill Leonard -- Son of Author Elmore Leonard Interviewed for the (2015) Documentary -- The Dickens of Detroit |
Writer/Director John Mulholland and Producer Richard Zampella are in Detroit, Michigan this week, filming Interviews for the upcoming documentary, Elmore Leonard: The Dickens of Detroit. The documentary explores Elmore Leonard’s life, his works and his place in the American literary pantheon. When Elmore Leonard died on August 20, 2013 at age 87, he left behind more than 40 novels and dozens of short stories. By almost universal consent, he is the finest American crime writer in the 20th Century . Many critics argue that, if anything, the reference to genre slights his contributions. Martin Amis described him as “a literary genius,” and “the nearest America has to a national writer.”
Throughout the fifties, Elmore Leonard was an obscurity, toiling in a dying genre – the western – putting down first drafts on yellow notepads from five to seven in the morning, before laboring all day on the Chevrolet truck account at Campbell Ewald, a Detroit ad agency. By the 1970s, Leonard had turned to crime fiction -- set usually in Detroit or South Florida -- and the men and women who commit the crimes. And then, in 1985, featured on the cover of Newsweek, Elmore Leonard became the proverbial overnight sensation and an NY Times best-selling author. Leonard became a household name, profiled in GQ, Rolling Stone and The New York Times Sunday Magazine. Praised by authors and critics, Time Magazine dubbed him “The Dickens of Detroit.”
When he died in 2013, at age 87, he was still writing, still a NY Times best-selling author. Chances are you knew him, even if you didn’t know his name, by such film titles as: Get Shorty, Jackie Brown, Out Of Sight, or the TV series, Justified. As Elmore Leonard once said, “I’ve always seen my books as movies.”
John Mulholland (Cooper & Hemingway: The True Gen) has been immersed in everything Elmore Leonard for a year, his writing – novels, short stories, screenplays, and films based on his work -- and much of what has been written about him over the decades. He is in the process of interviewing Leonard’s family and closest friends, along with a rich assortment of women and men who worked with Leonard or who have written about and studied Leonard.
Richard Zampella is a documentary film producer who has created content for Warner Home Video and Paramount Pictures. Among his production credits are producer of Sergeant York of God and Country, narrated by Liam Neeson. Inside High Noon narrated by Frank Langella and Cooper & Hemingway: The True Gen narrated by Sam Waterston. The later was chosen by the New York Times as a Critics’ Pic in October of 2013.
Visit the Dickens of Detroit Website
John Mulholland & Richard Zampella Filming Documentary in Detroit
PR Log - Aug. 13, 2015 - DETROIT -- Writer/Director John Mulholland and Producer Richard Zampella are in Detroit, Michigan this week, filming Interviews for the upcoming Transmultimedia Entertainment documentary, Elmore Leonard: The Dickens of Detroit. The documentary explores Elmore Leonard’s life, his works and his place in the American literary pantheon. When Elmore Leonard died on August 20, 2013 at age 87, he left behind more than 40 novels and dozens of short stories. By almost universal consent, he is the finest American crime writer in the 20th Century . Many critics argue that, if anything, the reference to genre slights his contributions. Martin Amis described him as “a literary genius,” and “the nearest America has to a national writer.”
Throughout the fifties, Elmore Leonard was an obscurity, toiling in a dying genre – the western – putting down first drafts on yellow notepads from five to seven in the morning, before laboring all day on the Chevrolet truck account at Campbell Ewald, a Detroit ad agency. By the 1970s, Leonard had turned to crime fiction -- set usually in Detroit or South Florida -- and the men and women who commit the crimes. And then, in 1985, featured on the cover of Newsweek, Elmore Leonard became the proverbial overnight sensation and an NY Times best-selling author. Leonard became a household name, profiled in GQ, Rolling Stone and The New York Times Sunday Magazine. Praised by authors and critics, Time Magazine dubbed him “The Dickens of Detroit.”
When he died in 2013, at age 87, he was still writing, still a NY Times best-selling author. Chances are you knew him, even if you didn’t know his name, by such film titles as: Get Shorty, Jackie Brown, Out Of Sight, or the TV series, Justified. As Elmore Leonard once said, “I’ve always seen my books as movies.”
John Mulholland (Cooper & Hemingway: The True Gen) has been immersed in everything Elmore Leonard for a year, his writing – novels, short stories, screenplays, and films based on his work -- and much of what has been written about him over the decades. He is in the process of interviewing Leonard’s family and closest friends, along with a rich assortment of women and men who worked with Leonard or who have written about and studied Leonard.
Richard Zampella is a documentary film producer who has created content for Warner Home Video and Paramount Pictures. Among his production credits are producer of Sergeant York of God and Country, narrated by Liam Neeson. Inside High Noon narrated by Frank Langella and Cooper & Hemingway: The True Gen narrated by Sam Waterston. The later was chosen by the New York Times as a Critics’ Pic in October of 2013.
Visit The Dickens of Detroit Website
Tuesday, August 11, 2015
Mulholland/Zampella Filming Interviews in Detroit for New Documentary
DETROIT -- August 11, 2015 -- Writer/Director John Mulholland and Producer Richard Zampella arrive in Detroit, Michigan this week to conduct interviews for Elmore Leonard: The Dickens of Detroit. Production still of Interview with Bill Martz: Best friend of Elmore Leonard in Michigan since childhood.
Elmore Leonard’s life, his works, his place in the American literary pantheon, is the subject of this new documentary. Central to the film, adding depth and resonance, is more than half-an-hour of never-before-seen interview footage with Leonard in which he analyzes and discusses how he started, why he wrote what he did, how he arrived at his lean, terse minimalist trademark.
See more at: www.dickensofdetroit.com