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Author of The Graduate is Writing a Sequel
From: www.writerswrite.com

" Charles Webb has signed a book deal to write Home School, a sequel to his popular The Graduate novel that became the hit movie starring Dustin Hoffman and Anne Bancroft. Unfortunately, Charles Webb never saw a penny of the money made from the popular film.

The movie version of The Graduate made millions, but Webb did not get a share of the film rights and did not receive any of the money.

"Mercifully I wasn't written into that deal," Webb said of the film. "Nobody understands why I felt so relieved, but I count my longevity to not being swept into that. My wife and I have done a lot of things we wouldn't have done if we were rich people.

"I wouldn't have gotten to the point of writing this. I would have been counting my money instead of educating my children," he said.

Asked about a possible film deal for the sequel, Webb said he plans to seek legal advice on whether he holds the copyright to the film characters, or whether those rights were signed away with the rights to The Graduate film itself, now held by French media company Canal Plus.

Pulitzer Prize-winning film critic Roger Ebert, who has battled cancer in recent years, will undergo cancer surgery again, according to a published report. In Thursday's Chicago Sun-Times, where Ebert has been the movie critic for nearly 40 years, columnist Robert Feder reported that Ebert will have surgery June 16 to remove a cancerous growth on his salivary gland.

"It's not life threatening, and I expect to make a full recovery," the 63-year-old critic and host of the nationally syndicated movie review show, Ebert & Roeper, told Feder. "I'll continue to function as a film critic during this time." Ebert has undergone cancer surgery three times before -- once in 2002 to remove a malignant tumor on his thyroid gland and twice on his salivary gland the next year.

But Feder reported that Ebert is not expected to require radiation treatment as he did when he underwent the previous procedures. "This is known as a slow-growing and persistent cancer," Ebert said. "You live with it." Ebert recently returned from the Cannes Film Festival in France. He said he plans to tape enough shows with Sun-Times columnist Richard Roeper that the program will continue to air during his recovery.

"When I was asked if I wrote from a political point of view, I used to tell people that I didn?t. In fact, I do?I have a strong political position on almost everything I do. I?ve been writing books about the environment and drug usage and stuff for years, so how could I pretend that I'm not taking a political point of view? My vision for this new series was going to be this: If this world that we're living in actually follows its thread that it's currently on and eventually implodes under the weight of its own mistakes, mismanagement and poor decision-making, what would happen? What would be left and how would the world rebuild? And what shape would it take? I'm thinking that this may run nine books. At the moment, I?m looking at three trilogies."

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"Most of the ideas I get come from reading newspapers and magazines and op-ed pieces and looking at what?s going on. To me, the best thing about fantasy-writing is that you can take current issues and you can re-plant them or replace them in an imaginary world in different terms and let people take a second look. And it's amazing how people will read things in a different context entirely and find themselves reexamining how they feel about different issues."

Anderson Cooper has a savvy enough sense of irony to know that terrible tragedies sometimes can be very good for journalistic careers. The year 2005, framed by the horrors of the Asian tsunami and Hurricane Katrina, made Cooper a media superstar. And got him a $1 million book deal.

Gawker.com cynics may have smirked at the time, but Cooper is no airhead pretty boy in need of a ghostwriter. (Actually, a ghostwriter, or a firmer editor, might have fixed some of the book's flaws.) Cooper is Gloria Vanderbilt's son, and he has experienced his own personal tragedies. His beloved father, Wyatt Cooper, died during heart bypass surgery when Anderson was 10. A decade later, his older brother, Carter, threw himself off their mother's penthouse balcony as Vanderbilt watched in horror.

The most powerful parts of Dispatches from the Edge: A Memoir of War, Disasters and Survival deal with these two deaths and their impact on the future CNN anchorman. Passages about his father's premature death at 50 and the guilt Anderson experienced over his brother's suicide pack a visceral punch, even if Cooper sometimes seems at a loss to understand what he's feeling - or not feeling. "For years I tried to swaddle the pain, encase the feelings," he writes. "All I managed to do was deaden myself to feelings, detach myself from life. That only works for so long." Cooper compares himself to a shark that has to keep moving. "I sometimes believe it's motion that keeps me alive as well."

"After I stopped screaming, I was absolutely devastated, I thought the chances that they would even try to save him were very, very slim. I have to say, when I saw him win the Kentucky Derby I was crying because Barbaro was demonstrating all that racing has to offer, and when I saw the Preakness I was crying because he was demonstrating all that can be taken away. It was really devastating to see him in such pain, in such distress."

"He really embodies everything ... I thought he would be a Triple Crown winner. I thought his Derby was one of the greatest ever, and to see such a sound horse, so well-managed, end up like this right at the start of the race, it was stunning, it hasn't sunk in yet. I think everybody in America loves horses to some extent. They are very tied up with our history and the Kentucky Derby becomes the icon of horses in America."

"And his Derby win was very heavily covered because it was so emphatic, and it was so easy and beautiful and effortless, and I think we all had good reason to believe this was a Triple Crown winner we were looking at. We've been waiting a long, long time, and to see this beautiful creature stricken in the middle of the racetrack, its something I think grabs everyone's heart, and everyone in America is pulling for him right now. I think this horse was a story capturing everyone's heart. The trainer had a wonderful story himself, he had rescued three kids from a plane crash, and the horse was such a gorgeous creature, and unbeaten. Everyone can be attracted by that kind of story - the unbeaten horse and, boy he looked like the horse for the ages."

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Barbaro is actually now quite comfortable. He's flirting with the girls in the intensive care unit. He's a happy horse right now, so he did have to go through some awful times for about 24 hours, but he's OK now, and he's under the best possible care, so I think it was the right move. Whether or not he is going to be a breeding stallion, they need their hind legs to work well to be a breeding stallion I don't know, but boy I think we would all be happy just to see him just be a pony in someone's backyard if he could live a nice long happy life.

Schultz, speaking with media following a speech to the Detroit Economic Club, said the company is looking to branch out to book sales in its stores, much like its move to sell music and promote films. He did not give details on how the company will specifically partner with authors or publishing firms, but said the work of popular authors could be featured. Starbucks has been selling various music collections in its stores and some exclusive albums have won multiple Grammy awards.

In addition, the company could within 12 to 14 months begin offering proprietary content for customers to download via wireless internet connections that are already available in stores. The content would include music or video that could be viewed on a laptop or downloaded to an MP3 audio player. Schultz said customers typically utilize in-store wireless connections to access email accounts, but the executive said the wireless connections are "a unique asset" that can be a bigger revenue generator.