Kenneth Atchity

Kenneth John Atchity
Atchity in 2017
Born	c. 1944 (age 73–74) Eunice, Louisiana
Nationality	American
Alma mater	Georgetown University;Yale University
Occupation	Author, professor, producer, literary manager, and editor.

Kenneth John Atchity aka "Kenneth Atchity" or "Ken Atchity" (1944– ) is an American producer^[1] and author,^[2] who has worked in the world of storytelling as a literary manager, editor, speaker, writing and career coach, columnist, book reviewer, brand consultant, and professor of comparative literature.^[3] At home among the many worlds of communications, he was labeled a "story merchant"^[4] by a visiting ambassador to the United States. "I believe in the power of stories to change the world," he said in a keynote talk at a Houston writers conference, "and I've been privileged to spend a lifetime helping storytellers get their stories to the widest audiences in book, brand, and film."

He and his story-focused companies, Story Merchant, Story Merchant Books,^[5] Atchity Entertainment International, Inc.,^[6] Atchity Productions, The Writers Lifeline, Inc.,^[7] and The Louisiana Wave Studio, LLC, in Shreveport, Louisiana^[8] produce films and develop, sell, and publish books, screenplays, and films to television and cinema; and consult with storytellers about their career strategies and tactics.

Personal

Atchity was born January 16, 1944 in Eunice, Louisiana, son of Fred J. and Myrza (née Aguillard) Atchity; he grew up between Louisiana and Kansas City, Missouri. He has two children, Rosemary and Vincent.

His son, Vincent Atchity, graduated from Georgetown College (Ph.D., USC) and his daughter, Rosemary Atchity, from Columbia University, (RN, MSN, FNP-c; Contra Costa College ). Both Rosemary and Vincent have two children, Meggie and Teddy; and Oliver and Eliot John.

Atchity is married to documentary filmmaker and former NHK producer Kayoko Mitsumatsu,^[9] founder of yogagivesback.org^[10] for which he serves on the board of directors. He resides in Los Angeles, California, and New York City.

Academic career

After receiving a Jesuit education from Rockhurst High School and Georgetown University, where he received an Ignatian Scholarship to study Greek and Latin classics, Atchity received a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship to Yale and received his MPhil in Theatre History and his Ph.D. Comparative Literature from Yale. His dissertation, Homer's Iliad: The Shield of Memory, was awarded the John Addison Porter Prize. He went on to become a professor of literature and classics at Occidental College, where he served as the chairman of the comparative literature department, distinguished instructor at UCLA's Writers Program, and as Fulbright Professor of American studies to the University of Bologna.^[11] During his teaching career he was a frequent columnist for The Los Angeles Times Book Review. With Marsha Kinder, he founded and edited Dreamworks. An Inter-disciplinary Quarterly. Its advisory board included John Cage, William Dement, Ann Faraday, John Fowles, J. Allan Hobson, John Hollander, Ursula Le Guin, W.S. Merwin, Denise Levertov and Robert L. Van de Castle. Atchity resigned his tenured professorship at Occidental in 1987 to devote full-time to entertainment and publishing.

His articles on English and American literature appeared in American Quarterly^[12], Comparative Literature Studies, Kenyon Review, Philological Quarterly; on Italian literature in Italian Quarterly^[13], Spicilegio Moderno^[14], and Italica'; and on classical literature in Arethusa, Classical Philology. His scholarly reviews were published in Ball State University Forum, Kansas Quarterly, Mediterranean Review, Queen’s Quarterly, Thought, University of Portland Review, and Western Humanities Review. In addition to The Los Angeles Times Book Review, reviews appeared in Contemporary Literary Criticism, Folio, Huntington Post, New Haven Register, Orpheus, Poem, Poetry LA, The San Francisco Chronicle, The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and The Washington Post.

Entertainment career

In 1976, Atchity founded L/A House, Inc., a consulting, translation, book, television, and film development and production company whose clients included the Getty Museum and the US Postal Service. L/A House began by extending Atchity's teaching of creative writing to manuscript consultation and soon moved on to publishing with the production of Follies, a magazine covering creativity, and CQ: Contemporary Quarterly; Poetry and Art of which he was editor. In the 1980s L/A House moved into television, with a syndicated television pilot of BreakThrough! of which Atchity was executive producer and co-writer.

In 1985, L/A House began development of a set of video/TV romance film projects entitled Shades of Love, which became 16 full-length films, produced in 1986–87 with Atchity as executive producer, that aired throughout the world, distributed by Lorimar, Astral-Bellevue-Pathe, Manson International, and Warner Brothers International, nominated for Canada's Gemini Award; in the U.S. they premiered on Cinemax-HBO.

In 1989 he sold L/A House and founded AEI (Atchity Editorial/Entertainment International),^[6] a literary management and motion picture production company. Chi-Li Wong,^[15] formerly Associate Director of the Ft. Lauderdale Film Festival, joined him as AEI partner in 1992. AEI was incorporated in 1996, its name changed to Atchity Entertainment International, Inc. in 2005.

In 1996 Atchity also founded The Writers Lifeline, Inc.^[7] (incorporated in 2002) to continue the consulting work of L/A House and to prepare intellectual property for representation: "bringing your craft and skills to the level of your vision and ambition."

In 2006, he and manager-partner Fred Griffin of Houston's Griffin Partners,^[16] along with a group of investors from Louisiana and Texas, acquired The Louisiana Wave Studio,^[8] LLC in Shreveport, Louisiana from Walt Disney Productions. The LWS is the only tank specifically designed to make waves for motion pictures in North America. Films produced at the LWS include The Guardian, Mayday—Bering Sea, Shark Night 3D, Streets of Blood, and I Love You, Philip Morris; along with numerous government and industrial films.

Responding to changes in the worlds of entertainment and publishing, in 2009 AEI shifted its energies to raising independent financing for motion pictures to advance its clients' interests. In 2011 Atchity and Wong were nominated for an Emmy for producing The Kennedy Detail (Discovery)^[17] based on their clients' Jerry Blaine and Lisa McCubbin's New York Times bestselling book by the same title published by Gallery/Simon & Schuster in 2010. AEI's films include Joe Somebody (Tim Allen, Julie Bowen), Life Or Something Like It (Angelina Jolie, Edward Burns), and The MEG (Jason Statham).

A Thriller by Kenneth John Atchity

In 2010, Atchity also founded Atchity Productions for independent film productions, and Story Merchant^[5] for representation and strategic coaching for writers.

The Messiah Matrix

In 2012, Atchity published his completion of William Diehl's Seven Ways to Die and his first solo novel, The Messiah Matrix.^[18] The novel centers on a fictional marine archaeological find of a rare Herodian coin honoring Augustus. A romantic interest develops between the American archaeologist who has discovered the coin, and a young Jesuit priest intrigued by its implications. A powerful faction of the Jesuits has been preparing to announce that the fictional character Jesus of Nazareth was inspired by the life of Caesar Augustus, and the coin is crucial evidence for their claims.^[11] Regarding the premise of his novel, Atchity said that it is based on actual historical facts linking Jesus and Augustus.

Producing filmography

• The Meg ^[19] (Jason Statham) (2018) (Warner Brothers)
• Angels in the Snow^[20] (Kristy Swanson) (2015) (UpTV "Most watched" movie).
• 14 Days with Alzheimer's^[21] (Documentary Short) (film festivals)
• Erased ^[22] (Aaron Eckhart) (2012) (Informant Media Entertainment)
• Hysteria^[23] (Maggie Gyllenhaal, Rupert Everett) (2011) (Informant Media Entertainment)
• The Lost Valentine^[24] (Betty White, Jennifer Love Hewitt) (2011) (Hallmark Hall of Fame/CBS)
• The Kennedy Detail^[25] (narrated by Martin Sheen) (2010) (Sunday Night Special) (Discovery)
• Gospel Hill^[26] (Danny Glover, Angela Bassett) (2008) (Fox)
• The Madam's Family^[27] (Ellen Burstyn, Annabella Sciorra) (2004) (CBS)
• Life or Something Like It^[28] (Angelina Jolie, Edward Burns) (2002) (Fox)
• Joe Somebody^[29] (Tim Allen) (2001) (Fox)
• Stalker: Shadow of Obsession^[30] (Veronica Hamel, Jonathan Banks) (1994) (NBC)
• Falling Over Backwards^[31] (Saul Rubinek) (1990) (Astral)
• Amityville 4: The Evil Escapes^[32] (Patty Duke) (1989) (NBC)
• Shades of Love Romance TV movie series (1987–1988) (Cinemax/HBO), Genie Award

Books by Atchity

• Sell Your Story to Hollywood: Writers Guide to the Business of Show Business (Story Merchant Books) (2017); ISBN 9780996990875
• The Meander Tile of Lisa Greco (Romance of Mythic Identity Book 2) (as Andrea Aguillard) (Story Merchant Books) (2017) ISBN 9780998162898
• The Twaesum Aik of Brae MacKenzie (A Romance of Mythic Identity Book 1) (as Andrea Aguillard) (Story Merchant Books) (2016) ISBN 9780996990844
• The Messiah Matrix (Imprimatur Britannica/Story Merchant Books) (2012); ISBN 9780957218901
• How to Quit Your Day Job and Live Out Your Dreams (Skyhorse Publishing) (2012); ISBN 9781616086862
• Seven Ways to Die (with William Diehl) (AEI/Story Merchant Books) (2012); ISBN 9780615608068
• How to Publish Your Novel (SquareOne) (2005);
• How to Escape Lifetime Security and Pursue Your Impossible Dream: A Guide to Transforming Your Career (Helios) (2004); revision of The Mercury Transition, below.
• Writing Treatments That Sell: How to Create and Market Your Story Ideas to the Motion Picture and TV Industry (with Chi-Li Wong) (Holt/Owl Books; Quality Paperbacks, Writers Digest Book Club) (Second Edition, 2003);
• The Classical Roman Reader (Holt 1997); (Oxford University Press 1998);Independent Publisher Book Awards, 2017
• The Classical Greek Reader (Holt, 1996); (Oxford University Press, 1998);
• The Renaissance Reader (HarperCollins, 1996); (Harper paperback, 1997). ISBN 9780062701299
• Cajun Household Wisdom (Longmeadow Press, 1995). ISBN 9780681007727
• The Mercury Transition: How to Escape Lifetime Security to Live Your Impossible Dream (Longmeadow Press, 1994).
• (editor) Homer: Critical Essays, including essays "Greek Princes and Aegean Princesses: The Role of Women in the Homeric Poems" (with E.J.W. Barber) and "Andromache's Headdress" (G. K. Hall) (1987);
• A Writer's Time: A Guide to the Creative Process, from Vision through Revision (W.W. Norton) (1986) (Quality Paperbacks, Book of the Month Club, Writer's Digest Book Club) (David & Charles paperback, United Kingdom, as Writing: Make the Most of Your Time New revised and expanded edition, A Writer's Time: Making Time to Write (1995) Christopher Lehmann-Haupt, in The New York Times review, called AWT "the best recent book on writing"; ISBN 0-393-31263-1^[33]
• Sleeping with an Elephant: Selected Poems, 1965–1976 (Valkyrie Press)(1978);
• Homer's Iliad: The Shield of Memory Introduction by John Gardner (Southern Illinois University Press) (1978);
• (co-editor and contributor) Italian Literature: Roots & Branches including his essay, "Dante's Purgatorio: The Poem Reveals Itself" (Yale University Press) (1976);
• In Praise of Love Libretto for choral symphony premiered at Lincoln Center (1974).
• (editor) Eterne in Mutabilitie: The Unity of the Faerie Queene (Archon) (1972).

References

Memberships

• American Comparative Literature Association
• The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences
• The Producers Guild of America

External links

• Kenneth Atchity on IMDb