Local film production company inks deal with Korea’s Story TV to bring Jamaican underworld legends to Hollywood
Local film production company Strike Star Entertainment has inked a deal with South Korea’s Story TV to produce a major motion picture based on infamous Jamaican personalities of the international underworld.
The script is set to be written by screenwriter Paul Eckstein of Narcos and Godfather of Harlem fame, the stakeholders announced in a joint release.
Story TV is best known for its Emmy nominated K-drama hit Netflix series, It’s Okay to Not Be Okay.
“We are so thrilled to be in Jamaica and to relate its well kept hidden stories to the world. We look forward to filming in Jamaica and believe Paul Eckstein is uniquely qualified to write this script in order to produce an iconic Hollywood film,” Story TV’s CEO, SunHae Bae, who was in Jamaica a few weeks ago to sign off on the project, said.
“This will not be the end of our commitment to Jamaica as we expect that numerous television dramas will follow and flow from our work here with the Hollywood screenwriter,” Bae said.
Eckstein has been writing, producing and acting for over 40 years and has already achieved international recognition for his work on such hit films as Hoodlum starring Laurence Fishburne and Cicely Tyson as far back as 1997, the release stated.
The screenwriter was brought into the project by local production company Strike Star Entertainment, led by Ricky Lee and his wife Raysa Lee, where he will round out the company’s Board of Directors along with Steven Golding, well known for his work and advocacy towards education, culture and youth development.
Eckstein’s most recent success with Narcos, based on the story of drug kingpin Pablo Escobar, and Godfather of Harlem, based on the life of crime boss Bumpy Johnson, reportedly fueled his desire to work alongside Strike Star Entertainment, which is dedicated to portraying powerful stories of Jamaica’s most influential and sometimes infamous personalities who helped shape the American underworld where notorious gangsters and Hollywood icons would sometimes collude, collide or cavort.
While not delving into the specifics of the upcoming project, the parties are all excited about bringing to screen an epic motion picture based on a “True Life Story” out of Jamaica in collaboration with Story TV, the release stated.
SunHae Bae and Cheol Yong Yoo are expected to direct the film alongside entertainment veteran attorney Bret D Lewis as a co-producer and Swedish documentarian Peter Rinaldo, the release added.
