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Spokane’s Cheyenne Jackson has appeared on 30 Rock and Glee.
“FREE TRADE,” CONTINUED...
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Google Earth, where they hang in the lobby. Colfax’s TIM ELY, the subject of an Inlander cover story in late 2010, is a renowned book artist collected worldwide, not least by the Library of Congress and the Lilly Library at the University of Indiana, two of the most important rare book collections in America. And, of course, there’s Harold Balazs, the godfather of art in Spokane. “Harold has spread work out over the Pacific Northwest for over 60 years,” Gibbs says, “including a staggering number of large public art pieces.” Many of those public pieces weren’t exported at all, they breathe life into the nooks and the vistas of Spokane. In classical music, Tina Morrison, President of the Local branch of the American Federation of Musicians, cites composers William Berry, Robert Spittal and Tom Molter among a longer list of locals who have “written compositions [and] arrangements that have been performed ... all over the country.” ERIC SAHLIN, of Valleyford, is a sought-after luthier — a guitar craftsman. Michael Milham, the classical guitarist, says “Sahlin is one of the most highly regarded American guitar builders ever. His guitars (in addition to being played by a number of pros locally) have been sold all over the world.” Our most famous human export in classical music is probably the renowned baritone, THOMAS HAMPSON, who grew up in Spokane before absconding to study under (the) Leonard Bernstein and making impressions at the Metropolitan in New York and opera houses all over the world.
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he film industry is one where talented folks must — almost always — export themselves. The usual stops are in Los Angeles or New York, where the majority of film administration takes place, even if most films are now shot in Albuquerque or North Carolina or Vancouver, BC. Newport’s CHEYENNE JACKSON moved to New York, found fame on Broadway and worked that into a starring role in United 93
and stints on 30 Rock and Glee. Clarkston native BRYAN FULLER moved to L.A. and became a force in television in the late ’90s, creating the critically acclaimed, wonderfully written series Dead Like Me and Pushing Daisies — both of which died too soon. He is currently at the helm of Hannibal, which will bring the serial killer Hannibal Lecter to TV screens in 2013. In an odd bit of coincidence, Fuller created the concept for and wrote the screenplay for Mockingbird Lane, a TV movie reboot of The Munsters. Cheyenne Jackson is set to play a character named Steve. Less traditional, but no less not-in-Spokane, Liberty Lake native NEIL LABUTE is the playwright and filmmaker of such difficult, critically lauded films as In the Company of Men and Possession. When films do come calling to Spokane, they land at North by Northwest, which has become a large and diverse media company on the backs of productions like End Game and the Samuel L Jackson, 50 Cent war-comes-home thriller Home of the Brave. Finally, it’s beginning to look like a movie about Spokane (or a place very similar to it), based on a book about Spokane (or a place very similar to it), written by a Spokane author will become a film with some big names attached. Jess Walter’s 2009 novel Financial Lives of the Poets has made it through enough rounds of Hollywood wrangling and fisticuffs to survive a name change (to Bailout) and to get a semi-official announcement at Cannes this year. Michael Winterbottom (24-Hour Party People, The Trip) is attached to direct, and Jack Black (who needs no introduction) will star. Barring some sort of calamity, in other words, it will be a big, fat Hollywood deal. “You can never tell [in the film industry],” Walter told us in June, nodding his head in a slow, cautious affirmative, “and everything just takes so long there, but yeah ... Jack Black ... Michael Winterbottom...” Walter paused here, and smiled. “And they’re using my script — the script I wrote,” he said, as though that, for him, were the icing on the cake. n
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