ABOUT PETER McALEVEY
Peter McAlevey passed away today. I have lost one of my best friends on August 15, 2014. He will always be a partner to me as he helped me develop my business into Hollywood.
To view an article in The Hollywood Reporter, click on this link. RIP Pete.
Peter McAlevey is a longtime film executive, producer and marketer.
Mr. McAlevey’s latest film, “Kill Her, Not Me,” is a horror/thriller with a twist.
Currently making the film festival rounds prior to its US theatrical release next fall, “Kill Her, Not Me” stars thriller legend Tony Todd, international star JoAnna Pacula (“Gorky Park,” “Tombstone”) and third-generation horror ingénue Elizabeth Guest in her motion picture debut. (Guest’s aunt is the original “scream queen” Jamie Lee Curtis of “Halloween” whose mother was Janet Leigh of “Psycho”!) So far the reaction has been overwhelming, with “Kill Her, Not Me” winning the Audience Award as the “favorite film” of the first two festivals it’s entered!
McAlevey is currently in preproduction on another picture, a big-screen remake of Disney’s classic “The Three Lives of Thomasina” (now “Thomasina”) which he is producing in conjunction with Peter Hoffman’s 7 Arts Entertainment. Shooting on “Thomasina” is scheduled to begin in fall 2014 in Louisiana. At the same time, he and partner George Francisco (also the writer/director of “Kill Her”) and Keri Selig are preparing a pilot, “Sideshow,” for Asylum Entertainment and Animal Planet that follows the lives, loves and travails of a traveling carnival sideshow.
Following his graduation from Columbia University, McAlevey began his career as Newsweek Magazine’s entertainment correspondent, where he was recruited by legendary studio chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg to join the new regime at Disney. Together, they went on to turn a failing studio into an international multimedia behemoth encompassing everything from cruise lines to theme parks, movies to cable networks (including the most profitable in history, ESPN), ABC, DVDs and hotels.
While at Disney, two-time Academy Award-winner Michael Douglas asked McAlevey to help start his production company, Stonebridge, at Columbia Pictures. There Mr. McAlevey was charged with acquiring, developing and producing a series of pictures including multimillion-dollar hits like “Flatliners” (starring Julia Roberts, Kevin Bacon and Keifer Sutherland) and Jean-Claude Van Damme’s first studio hit, “Double Impact.” He also helped shepherd the careers of people like former footballer Brian Bosworth (“Stone Cold,” “Back In Business”) and future TV star William Petersen (“CSI”). With then-girlfriend Cyndy Chvatal, McAlevey produced the Toronto Film Festival-winning “Hard Promises,” based on a story by Mr. McAlevey and starring Petersen and Academy Award-winner Sissy Spacek. At Stonebridge McAlevey also produced such acclaimed pictures as “Radio Flyer,” starring Elijah Wood (“The Lord of the Rings”), Joseph Mazzelo (“Jurassic Park”) and Lorraine Bracco and the children’s classic “Heidi,” starring Charlie Sheen.
LEARN ABOUT THE MAKING OF ‘COCKTAIL’ with Tom Cruise in this Peter McAlevey article in the LA Times.
Following Stonebridge, McAlevey founded Thunderbird Pictures, devoted to supporting important, new independent filmmakers, such as Jasmine Guy and Giancarlo Esposito, whose film “Klash” debuted at the Sundance Film Festival. Later he produced a new American film by Israeli director Isaac Eaton, “Shadow Hours” (starring Balthazar Getty, Rebecca Gayheart and Peter Weller) which became the largest-selling Sundance hit of its era. “Shadow Hours” broke new ground by being the first picture to be “presold” (for a reported $2 million) to a major home-video company, Blockbuster Entertainment, prior to its theatrical release! (Foreign sales were handled by 7 Arts and likewise smashed expectations). McAlevey also worked with famed New York “indie” director Sam Kass, who matched Academy Award-winner Rod Steiger and multi-Emmy winner Michael Chiklis with “Flashdance”’s Jennifer Beals and former lightweight boxing champion Ray “Boom Boom” Mancini in an award-winning remake of the John Garfield boxing classic “Body and Soul.”
Similarly, in 2008 he took a small, BBC coproduction, “Screamers.” designed for English television and elevated it to an American Film Festival-award winner, a U.S. theatrical hit (#1 per-screen average its first weekend!) and Cannes Film Festival debut. Sir Elton John hosted the U.K. premiere of this under-$1 million production.
In short, Mr. McAlevey is among the handful of top independent film-and-television producers and distributors working in the U.S, today. He welcomes the opportunity to help new filmmakers find an outlet for their creative efforts and achieve the best possible reward for their investment that the current economic climate can provide.