When the University of Tampa professor John Capouya wrote Gorgeous George he knew the possibility of it becoming a movie was there. Even though he had a few obstacles along the way, he’s already co-producing both a feature film and documentary on the world-famous wrestler of the 1940s.
“I always thought it was a movie,” Capouya said of his book. “The story of Gorgeous George is a visual thing.”
Capouya, UT’s assistant professor of journalism, particularly thought his descriptions of George’s self-transformation would be effective on the big screen.
Gorgeous George is a story of George Wagner, an extremely talented athlete who helped change the wrestling world into what it has become today. Wagner married his wife Betty Hanson in the ring in 1939 and together they created “Gorgeous George,” a both flamboyant and effeminate character who helped launched his successful career beyond the ring.
Capouya and his literary agent hired a Hollywood film agent, Justin Manask, in September and October 2008 with the sole responsibility of selling the book and making it into a movie. Manask was recommended by Jeremy Schapp, writer of Cinderella Man.
For more than a year, everyone in Hollywood turned the idea down.
Capouya became less convinced that his book would make the big screen, even though the pitching was being done in the middle of a recession.
“Maybe it’s not a movie,” he said, remembering his feelings about the rejections. “Maybe I was wrong.”
Finally, an interested party left a message on his home phone in New York.
The company offered to “option” his book, meaning that they would begin to make the movie in exchange for a smaller amount of money over a period of time. If and when they actually complete the movie, Capouya will get more money. However, very few optioned books actually make it to the box office.
While Capouya was considering this option, another company that had been sent the book in the original search, waited for over a year before deciding that they were interested.
Competition ensued and one company outbid the other. Capouya stated that the outbidding company did not want to be named.
Capouya said that sometimes companies will buy the rights to a book and do whatever they want with it, but he has been asked to help co-produce both the documentary and the film.
As co-producer, he said that he won’t only get the title and the income from the rights of the movie, he will also get a producer’s fee.
He said he is very lucky to be involved in the production of something that he wrote.
“Selling the thing was lucky enough,” Capouya said.
As soon as Capouya signed the deal he flew out to Oregon with a film crew to interview Gorgeous George’s widowed wife, Betty.
Now John Posey, the screenwriter for the feature film, is meeting up with John Capouya in Tampa to work on the script. Posey has had a successful career on the screen, off the screen, as a screenwriter and on stage, recently guest starring on Boston Legal as Chief Justice John Roberts, Cold Case, E.R., 24 and others.
For Posey, it was the character of George Wagner that inspired him to make a movie out of the book. Wagner revolutionized wrestling at the time, which was much different than it is today. Wagner was the highest paid athlete in the ’30s.
“He did something so flamboyant and over the top that everyone wanted to watch,” Posey said.
Wagner was looked up to by Muhammad Ali, Liberace and James Brown, and the reason why is what he wants to capture in the movie.
“He changed a lot of the rules and influenced a lot of people,” Posey said.
Theoretically, Posey said he has to stay true to the events in the book. But he only has one hour and 55 minutes to tell the story.
“I have to focus on what he did and how he did it,” Posey said. “I have to focus on the most dramatic and cinematic parts of the story.”
Since many of the characters in the story are no longer alive, Posey has had to do additional interviews and shape their personalities from what he has heard about them.
As he writes he may run into certain events in the story that he has to go back and rewrite. These interviews often cause for the whole thing to be taken in from a new perspective.
Posey’s focus has been on Wagner’s relationship with his mother and his life as a product of the Great Depression.
In the next month or so, the writing should be finished, but he said that the bulk of the process comes in the rewriting process.
Learning the way that screenwriting is done has been a great learning experience for Capouya.
“It’s very exciting,” Capouya said. “It’s a whole new experience.”
The feature film is scheduled to begin filming next winter.
Capouya will be filmed for the documentary.
“’Well, what would that look like?,’” Capouya said has been a recurring question from Posey as he reads some of the scenes in Capouya’s book.
In the meantime, Capouya has been looking through his notes and reaching out to his sources to capture more of the scene for the screenwriter.
The only thing he’s a little concerned about, and has yet to ask Posey about, is how the film will portray the end of George’s life. His life doesn’t have the typical Hollywood ending. George dies as a result of alchoholism.
“He was an amazing guy in some ways, but a deeply flawed guy in others and he did some unsavory things,” Capouya said.
Although he is helping produce the movie, Capouya is not concerned at all about how different the movie is from the book.
“I write the book; that’s my creation and they are going to do what they are going to do,” Capouya said. “I’m a picture writer, not a screen writer.”
While in Tampa, Capouya asked Posey if he could come to UT and give a presentation to students about the business of turning a book into and movie.
On Monday, Feb. 22 at 6 p.m. in Reeves Theater students will have this opportunity. Not only that, but students will have the chance to learn more about Capouya’s book and John Posey.
“They’ll get a sense from two story tellers, how to tell a story,” Capouya said.
Andrew McAllister, assistant professor of communication, will be there to moderate and introduce the two speakers.
McAllister and Capouya are also working on developing a class for next year that will focus on the process of adapting a book to film.