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May 30, 2010
 Coyote
fans have been writing in inquiring about the new
iPad commercial - "is that Peter's voice?" Well, yes
it is! It debuted on May 12th during Fox's "American
Idol". If you haven't had a chance to view this new ad,
you can watch it here at
youtube.
 At
the end of last year Peter filmed the western,
THE
GUNDOWN, in Cochise County in Arizona. Fellow cast
members included William Shockley and Sheree Wilson. Set
in the Arizona desert in 1893, the plot focuses on an
ambitious and ruthless saloon owner, Travis McCain
(Shockley), who has come to oppose the more benign
Thomas Morgan (Coyote), who runs the other tavern.
Wilson plays Sarah, Morgan's wife. Gammons Gulch Movie
Set & Museum provided the location for the production,
overseen by Dustin Rickert, the director, co-writer and
co-producer. The signing of the film came about due to
an interest by the non-profit Southeast Arizona Economic
Development Group in re-establishing movie-making
efforts in that part of the state. True West Magazine
asked Peter how he got involved in the movie.
“Really it’s about supporting William Shockley,” he
admits, “because Bill and I did a TV movie [Last Will]
that hasn’t been released yet. We also have the same
voiceover agent, and we get along; we have a lot of
similar values.
“I do have a love for Westerns. My dad raised cattle,
and I grew up around horses and cattle in the Delaware
Water Gap in Pennsylvania. We had another ranch in
Harlingen, Texas, because he had a business partner down
there. All little kids want to be cowboys, and we had
cowboys running around the place. I was never a great
athlete, but I know how to rope and dally and I’ve
worked cattle, so it’s fun to come out here and work out
these fantasies and just get paid for it.
“And I like this guy Dustin. You know, my wife was the
film commissioner of San Francisco, and it cost her four
years and blood to get a two-percent rebate out of San
Francisco to attract production companies. So here we
are in Cochise County, and these guys have built this
little village - they’ve ponied up money, they’ve built
the bar. These cowboys and farmers, they understand the
utility of film. As much as anything I want to come here
and support that community.”
May 10, 2010
On
Thursday evening, May 13th, Peter will once again guest
star as President Dave Segovia on ABC's "FlashForward".
The episode is called "The Negotiation". He first
appeared on the successful sci-fi series last October.
  Described
as a story of deception, corruption and misguided family
loyalities, LAST WILL is now in post production.
Principal photography took place in Missouri in 20
locations around the Kansas City area in the fall of
2008. Directed by Brent Huff and based on a screenplay
by Alan Moscowitz, the suspenseful drama tells the story
of Hayden Emery (Tatum O'Neal), who is framed for the
murder of her wealthy husband Frank (Tom Berenger). With
all the evidence stacked against her, Detective Sloan
(James Brolin) arrests her and Hayden finds herself in
the fight of her life as she tries to uncover the truth.
Peter plays Michael Garner, the crooked judge who is
instrumental in the plot against Hayden succeeding.
The Coyote Howl: "I have a growing intuition that
the computer and online culture, as much as it has
made incredible amounts of information available to
citizens, has also served to fragment and pacify
them. We sit around blogging and 'communicating'
instead of being out in the street and making
governance impossible. I came of age at a time when
millions of young people were doing exactly that. In
the last months of his last term, Lyndon Johnson
could not govern. In the last three months of his,
George Bush was still making a lot of trouble.
What’s the difference? No one was in the streets. I
think we need to get boots on the ground and join
hands across social sectors and peer groups; get
back to old-fashioned organizing and bring things to
a halt until they begin to change. But hey, I’m an
old man now, and one of the things about being old
in a youth culture is that no one (or almost no one)
listens to you."
April 11, 2010
 Later
this month the Newport Beach Film Festival will be
featuring an exciting new British documentary narrated
by Peter. It's called "Free Wheels East" and
tells the inspiring story of two young Englishmen who,
without any experience of the world or any training,
forge a ridiculous plan to ride bicycles in every
continent without using airplanes. In this epic
three-year journey, beginning in 2005, cousins Ben
Wylson and Jamie Mackenzie defy the social order to set
out into the unknown. They battle through landslides and
over mountains; they cross deserts and somehow hitch
lifts across all of the world's great oceans. It seems
nothing can stop them. In filming this astonishing
adventure, Jamie and Ben have created a beautiful work
which carriers the viewers along with them. Their
pioneering use of on-bike photography and their
light-hearted approach make this a compelling 92-minute
documentary. To read more about this indomitable duo,
follow this link.
For
those fans who are awaiting Peter's second guest
appearance on ABC's "Flash Forward", his name is NOT on
the cast list for the next two episodes airing April 15
and 22. I'll continue to keep your posted.
April 8, 2010
In
his continuing effort to share his voice in the
political arena, Peter offers his opinion today at
AolNews.com. Over 65 years ago, President
Franklin Delano Roosevelt had a dream for a better world
with his suggestion of a second Bill of Rights, which
sadly never materialized. Obviously Harvard Law
professor Cass Sunstein agrees with Peter with his 2004
book, "The Second Bill of Rights: FDR's Unfinished
Revolution - And Why We Need It More Than Ever". It's
worth noting that Mr. Sunstein is presently taking a
leave of absence to work for the Obama administration.
Kudos!
There's
an interesting behind-the-scenes interview with Peter
regarding his recent work on the Mexican-financed film,
THIS IS NOT A MOVIE,
directed by Olallo Rubio. I originally posted news on
this project back in the summer of 2008 when it was
being shot in Mexico. In this new interview, Peter
speaks highly of his co-star, Edward Furlong, best known
for his role in the 1991 action thriller, "The
Terminator: Judgment Day." If you click on the above
poster, it'll take you to the video link.
March 17, 2010
 As
many of you know, Ken Burns has become one of the most
influential documentary makers of all time. Back in the
fall of 2009, PBS broadcast "The National Parks:
America’s Best Idea". The six-part
series, narrated by Peter, focused on the ideas and
individuals that helped propel the parks into existence.
Ken Burns will once again enlighten us with a
three-part, six-hour documentary called "Prohibition".
The film series, now in production, will again be
narrated by Peter and is tentatively scheduled to be
broadcast on PBS later this year.
The story of Prohibition’s rise and fall is a compelling
saga that goes far beyond the oft-told tales of
gangsters, rum runners, flappers, and speakeasies, to
reveal a complicated and divided nation in the throes of
momentous transformation. According to Peter,
"The parallels to today are frightening, especially in
how Prohibition created 'organized' crime, and increased
the value of liquor logarhythymically."
Earlier this month
it was announced that Warner Bros. has acquired Spanish
rights to Peter's latest film,
DI DI HOLLYWOOD,
the showbiz-set drama by helmer Bigas Luna. Starring
Spanish sex-symbol Elsa Pataki, the film follows an
actress who travels to Hollywood pursuing her dream of
success. "Di Di" is the second part of a trilogy focused
on young women trying to escape their humble pasts. The
film's producers include Spain's Malvarrosa Media,
Canica Films and El Virgili Films. Spanish pubcasters
TVE and TV3 and Gallic paybox Canal Plus have all nabbed
TV rights. Warners Bros. will release the film in Spain
in the fall. Peter says he became fast friends
with Elsa and co-star Paul Sculfour during production
and is "looking forward to seeing the film with
eagerness." If you click on the above photo, the link
will take you to a short teaser trailer. The photo below
is a candid one of Peter with his female pals from the
film crew -
Claudia, Alva, and Vanessa.
Coyote
man will soon be headed to LA to tape another episode of
"FlashForward" reprising his role as President
Dave Segovia. The sci-fi TV series premiered on ABC last
September with Peter making a guest appearance in "Gimme
Some Truth", the fifth episode. The second season will
have a two-hour opener tomorrow evening and a two-hour
finale on May 27th. I will try to give a heads up when I
have any info on which episode he will be appearing in.
Here are some photos from the episode that aired on
October 22, 2009:
After
spending two years of extensive reading and research,
Peter, the writer, is hard at work on
the third draft of a new book called "Lies That
Blind: The Education of an Angry Man." He describes
it as a political book written in narrative form telling
how he learned certain things as a child and how those
lessons have affected how he sees the world as an adult.
His memoir, "Sleeping Where I Fall" was published back
in 1998 and a second edition was released last summer.
 "Crimes
of Opportunity", one of Peter's film scripts is
getting a re-write these days with hopes that it will
finally be seen on the big screen. What an exciting
thought! The drama was originally co-written with Sylvia
Peto, a
Seattle-based author. It involves a character called
Eddie Malick, modeled loosely on Jack Henry Abbott, the
convicted murderer and would-be writer whose case was
championed by Norman Mailer. Less than six weeks after
Mr. Abbott's 1981 release from a Utah prison, while on a
parole partly sponsored by Mr. Mailer, Mr. Abbott killed
an actor and playwright working as a waiter at an East
Village restaurant. "Crimes of Opportunity" links the
convict and his literary aspirations to an equally
ambitious local television personality, adding a love
story to the mix.
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