Producers' Biographies

The talented team behind the creation of American Utopia is Beverly Lewis and Rick Blackwood. Graduates of the School of Film and Television at UCLA, Lewis in production and producing and Blackwood in production and screenwriting, this duo hasproduced award-winning works ranging from documentaries to commercials, television movies and independent films. They are recipients of the Hortense Fishbaugh Award, the Jack Nicholson Award, and the Hollywood Foreign Press Award, among others. Their first joint production, the film Whalesong, received the 1990 Bronze Apple from the National Educational Film and Video Festival and was a finalist in the 1990 Pacific Festival of International Nature Films where it was one of only two American films accepted in international competition. The film received broadcast requests from KCET and National Geographic Explorer.

In co-producing, writing, and directing American Utopia, Lewis drew upon her past experience as a research archaeologist to sort through the vast archival and contemporary sources used to tell this story. Location shots, photos, and information were found after extensive exploration which ranged from coast to coast -- in this case, the Pacific Coast, the East Coast, and the Gulf of Mexico. A native Californian before moving three years ago to Louisiana, Lewis was intrigued by the Llano Cooperative Colony and how it fit into the picture of our American history which seldom, if ever, mentions it. In becoming familiar with the uniqueness of Louisiana politics, she and Blackwood were even more inquisitive into how such a Socialist colony could be accepted and thrive for so long in this state. These questions became the basis of Llano's story in American Utopia.

Besides co-producing American Utopia, Blackwood also assisted with the script. It is his expertise in this area that brought the two to Louisiana when he established the screenwriting program at LSU in Baton Rouge. His list of network and film scripts is extensive. His most recent work includes "Deadlockquot; for Lauren Schuler-Donner Productions at MGM, quot;Dead but Alivequot; produced by ABC, and quot;Pyramiderquot; which was purchased/optioned by Paramount Studios. Blackwood is a member of the WGA.