The Forger

Two- time Academy® Award Nominee John Travolta (SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER, PULP FICTION) is set to star in BAFTA and Emmy Award-winning director Philip Martin’s THE FORGER produced and co-financed by Code Entertainment (Code) alongside The Solution Entertainment Group (The Solution), it was announced by Code’s Al Corley and Bart Rosenblatt and Lisa Wilson and Myles Nestel, co-founders and partners of The Solution.

Plans are being made to shoot later this year, in between festival honors for his work in his upcoming release Killing Season. Code’s Al Corley, Bart Rosenblatt, and Eugene Musso will produce THE FORGER, along with Prospect Park’s Rob Carliner. Jonathan Dana and Randi Michel are executive producers with The Solution’s Myles Nestel and Lisa Wilson who will handle all international rights to the film and introduce it to buyers at the upcoming Cannes Film Market. Anson Downes and Linda Favila will serve as Co-Executive Producers. Siren Studio’s Craig Chapman, Kyle Jackson and Brandon Nutt are also executive producing the film.

Written by Richard D’Ovidio (THE CALL), THE FORGER tells the story of a former child art prodigy and second generation petty thief, Ray Cutter (Travolta) who arranges to buy his way out of prison to spend time with his ailing son, only to be forced to change his plans and commit one last big job for the syndicate who financed his early release.

Al Corley comments, “It’s most inspiring for us as a creative and financial entity to match such a gifted director like Philip Martin with the enormous talents of John Travolta.”

“John Travolta is one of the great actors of our times with exceptional appeal worldwide. We are overjoyed to bring THE FORGER to life with such a dynamic lead in this classic heist movie,” said Nestel and Wilson.

Two-time Oscar® nominee and Golden Globe winning actor John Travolta has one of the most impressive list of credits that spans over 40 years. Travolta first became known in the 1970s, after starring in the box office successes SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER (where he received his first Oscar® nomination) and GREASE. Travolta’s role in Quentin Tarantino’s PULP FICTION earned him his second Oscar® nomination for Best Actor and he won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy for his performance in GET SHORTY opposite Gene Hackman and Danny DeVito. Travolta recently completed filming the action movie KILLING SEASON co-starring Robert De Niro and directed by Mark Steven Johnson.

BAFTA and Emmy Award Winner Philip Martin’s credits include the BBC’s television drama “Hawking” starring Benedict Cumberbatch and two episodes of BBC’s “Wallander” starring Kenneth Branagh, which won the BAFTA for Best Drama Series and earned Branagh an Emmy nomination. Martin won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing for a Miniseries Movie or Dramatic Special for the final installment of the ITV drama “Prime Suspect.” Martin also directed Channel Four’s “Mo” starring Julie Walters, which won him the BAFTA Award for Best Director Fiction/Entertainment.

Richard D’Ovidio’s THE CALL starring Halle Berry was a box office hit distributed by TriStar Pictures. Additional credits include Warner Bros.’ THIR13TEEN GHOSTS and EXIT WOUNDS starring Steven Segal. His next film is the upcoming horror, GALLOWS HILLS starring TWILIGHT’s Peter Facinelli.

John Travolta is repped by Personal Manager- Randi Michel, Principato Young and WME.

Philip Martin is repped by WME. Rich D’Ovidio is repped by Paradigm.

WME Global packaged and will handle domestic sales with ICM Partners.

Philip Martin is something of an expert in reality, launching his career as a documentary director in 2000 with “Richard Hillary: A Fighter Pilot’s Story” and “Double Helix: The DNA Year.”

He also directed the British TV movie “Hawking” in 2004 with Benedict Cumberbatch scoring his first major role, and 2008’s “Einstein and Eddington,” about the discovery of the theory of relativity.

But Martin is at the Toronto Film Festival this year with fictional heist movie “The Forger,” in which John Travolta portrays a former art prodigy and second-generation petty thief who buys his way out of prison to spend time with his ailing son (Tye Sheridan), only to be forced to commit one last crime. The director was amazed at how well Travolta painted.

“John is really good,” Martin said. “He’s almost a savant. He really produced a lovely impressionist painting, which is what his character does in the movie. He’s a master of the physical side of capturing characters.”

Martin said the movie, shot late last year in Boston and set in the gritty world of organized crime, owes part of its success to the script by Richard D’Ovidio.

“The character is called upon to make a very calibrated journey from ugliness to beauty,” he added.

“The Forger” also stars Christopher Plummer as the father of Travolta’s character along with Jennifer Ehle and Abigail Spencer. Code Entertainment’s Al Corley, Bart Rosenblatt and Eugene Musso produced the film.

The Solution is selling international rights at Toronto. WME and ICM Partners are hanlding domestic rights.

Despite having been working in the industry for nearly forty years, actor John Travolta has been laying low in the past few years, his last major movie being Oliver Stone’s Savages in 2012. (Since then, he did a movie with Robert De Niro called Killing Season, which very few people had a chance to see.)

This Friday, Travolta can be seen in the drama The Forger playing Raymond Cutter, an art forger who has spent the last few years in jail but whom makes a deal with a local drug boss to be released early when he learns his teenage son (Tye Sheridan) has cancer. With the help of his father (Christopher Plummer), Ray tries to reconnect with his son until he’s called upon to repay his debt by forging a famous Monet painting as part of an elaborate art heist.

The film had a fairly low-key premiere at last year’s Toronto International Film Festival where it got lost in the shuffle of higher profile movies, but it’s a very touching film that proves Travolta is more than capable as a dramatic actor as he continues into his 60s.

ComingSoon.net got on the phone with Travolta for a very rare exclusive interview, which was far too short, although we did get to talk briefly about his upcoming turn as Robert Shapiro in Ryan Murphy’s “American Crime Story” which will focus on the infamous O.J. Simpson trial, as well as ask him whether he may ever do another movie with Tarantino since there had been talk of a follow-up to Pulp Fiction for many years.