I came across this article that mentions Travis Wilson a bit. The article is about an NFL draft documentary that has been shelved for sometime. The Travis Wilson part is highlighted.
Article Lights, camera ...
How a film about the NFL Draft got stuck in red zone
By L. Jon Wertheim, SI.com
ACT I
The executive producer of the successful reality series The Biggest Loser, Dave Broome, seldom gets through a day without someone suggesting a topic for his next show. But in the fall of 2005, Broome was in his North Hollywood office when he received a call about a football-related concept. The idea tugged at him.
After their documentry, Two Days in April, got tangled in a web of politics, producers hope it will be released on DVD in 2008.
The pitch came through a chain of intermediaries, but it was the brainchild of Tom Condon, a prominent NFL agent whose clients include Peyton Manning, LaDainian Tomlinson and Adrian Peterson. The conceit was simple: cameras would trail a group of Condon's latest clients for four months as they prepared for the 2006 NFL Draft. Young, athletic males on the cusp of a professional sports career would make for compelling subjects. And there would be plenty of dramatic tension. As Condon would later remark on film, the interval between the end of a player's college season and the NFL Draft -- encompassing the Senior Bowl, the NFL Combine and individual team workouts -- is critically important and suffused with pressure.
"A player drafted in the middle of the first round is going to average $2 million a year on a five-year contract," Condon says. "A second-round draft pick is going to be averaging $600,000 a year."
Condon outlined his vision for the show and made clear that, while he had no expectation of getting paid for his work, he requested an executive producer credit. Broome recalls asking Condon why he was so passionate about the project. "He said it would be an incredible marketing tool," Broome recollects. "He was in a cutthroat business and this would be a way for him to get a leg up on the competition." (Condon declined comment for this story.)
Reflecting on the project, Broome decided it would be better suited for a documentary format. The film Broome envisioned would follow the subjects and intersperse personal vignettes with the natural narrative arc -- in this case, the journey to the climax of Draft Day. Condon agreed and Broome quickly lined up financing and distribution with Red Envelope Entertainment, the original entertainment arm of Netflix.
"We loved the idea and we were looking to the future," says Ted Sarandos, Chief Content Officer at Netflix. "I remember Tom saying, 'I represent the biggest athletes and they all have ideas for a reality show. This could be the start of a real relationship."
Sarandos recalls that when he asked about access, Condon responded, "Relax. The access will be unprecedented."
Red Envelope Entertainment greenlighted the project and, in December 2005, Broome hired a director, Don Argott, who had recently scored with the critically acclaimed 2005 documentary Rock School.
In the winter of 2006, Broom, Argott and Condon converged on the IMG Training Academy in Bradenton, Fla., to meet the players and start filming. They were charged with optimism. While others spoke vaguely and abstractly about the "crossover" between sports and Hollywood, here was an A-list NFL agent and an A-list producer collaborating on a concrete project.
At the time, anyway, it was inconceivable that two years, one lawsuit and millions of dollars in sunken costs later, the documentary would still be unreleased, screened only by a few dozen people. And that a project that began with such promise would devolve into a noirish drama that doubles as a parable for what can go wrong when sports and entertainment collide.
ACT II
Derek Hagan was drafted by the Miami Dolphins in the third round of the 2006 draft and has 48 catches in two seasons with the team.
The documentary was entitled Two Days in April, a nod to the NFL Draft Weekend, and it began auspiciously enough. Condon and other IMG agents procured signed releases from their players. As promised, Condon granted Argott and a small crew full access to the IMG Academy, where the prospects prepared for the draft. Cameras memorialized a mental strength coach asking the players about Moses and the Ark. ("You know it's Noah's ark. As soon as you hear a question about the ark you make an assumption and stop listening!") They filmed a media trainer conducting a mock interview. ("When you want to say, 'You know,' pause and give some kind of physical gesture without being over the top.")
Michael Johnson, the gold medal sprinter, helped the draft prospects whittle down their 40 times; Lionel Taylor, once an NFL star, issued tips on crossing routes. Some players were visibly uncomfortable in front of the cameras. Another, linebacker Mathias Kiwanuka, was wary about being distracted by filming during such a crucial time in his life.
After several weeks of shooting, Argott sent an email to Condon indicating that the film would center on four subjects:
• Derek Hagan, a genial, outspoken wide receiver from Arizona State.
• Travis Wilson, an emotionally sensitive receiver from Oklahoma, whose draft status was clouded by a recent foot injury.• Clint Ingram, a soft-spoken linebacker from Oklahoma who grew up at rural Longview, Texas.
• DonTrell Moore, a deeply religious, immensely charismatic running back from New Mexico, who's dogged by having gone to a school with a modest football program.
Inevitably, the project confronted some obstacles. At the 2006 NFL Combine in Indianapolis, the crew was denied access by the NFL to film the subjects' workouts. "We were suddenly looking at a huge hole in the movie," says Argott.
Frantic, they contacted Condon, asking that he intervene. "I'll take care of it," Broome recalls Condon saying. "Don't worry. You'll get that film." Shortly after that, Broome received a FedEx box from Condon's office. Enclosed were the requested videotapes that, Broome was told, had come from the Indianapolis Colts. (The Colts declined comment.)
Thrilled as Broome was to get the tapes, he was concerned about legal clearance and release. "Tom told me not to worry, that the teams can do whatever they want with their film," he says. "That was good enough for me."
But soon another complication arose: during the filming, Condon abruptly left IMG for the Creative Artists Agency (CAA), an L.A.-based mega-agency, taking his clients with him. CAA figures prominently in Hollywood and, ironically, counts Netflix among its clients. The filmmakers were hopeful that these new ties to CAA might facilitate the entire process. On the other hand, as a condition for filming IMG athletes at the IMG Academy, the movie was subject to IMG's final artistic approval. Initially, Broome and Argott had thought little of this provision; but now that Condon was an ex-employee, would IMG invoke this clause to torpedo the project?
"We decided we couldn't worry about that," says Broome. "We just had to get the movie done."
On the last weekend in April 2006, Argott obtained credentials to film the NFL Draft, held at New York City's Radio City Music Hall. Meanwhile, separate crews shadowed each of the four players in their hometowns as they awaited their selection. Despite optimistic projections by the IMG football agents, none of the film's four subjects was selected within the first two rounds.
The tension was sufficiently thick that Wilson, ringed by family and friends in a suite of a Dallas Hilton, sat crying into a towel.Strangely enough, in the middle of the third round, Wilson, Ingram, and Hagen were each selected within four picks of each another. Wilson (78th overall selection) went the Browns, Ingram (80th) to the Jaguars and Hagen (82th) to the Dolphins. The players and their families rejoiced, equally elated and relieved.
Moore, however, sat idly at a draft party held in his honor in the Roswell, New Mex., Hampton Inn. In anticipation of playing in the NFL, Moore had already consulted a financial advisor and been told by his pastor, "You have to give Him glory in front of the coaches! You have to do it on the field and give Him glory in front of the cameras!" But there would be no coaches or cameras. Moore went undrafted. It makes for one of those scenes that's, at once, excruciating to watch and cinematic gold.
Argott spent the next several months editing more than 150 hours of video into a 92-minute film. Red Envelope Entertainment executives were busy pitching the movie to potential home video and television distribution partners. Executives at Red Envelope Entertainment had discussions with ESPN about trimming the movie to a 42-minute version the network would air as part of its 2007 NFL draft coverage. The filmmakers were further relieved when, in spite of Condon's departure, IMG signed off on the project.
As the movie was in the post-production stage, Broome got a call from a Netflix employee preparing the standard "book" of legal clearances. "Who's Tom Condon?" Broome was puzzled.
"He's the football agent who brought the project to us in the first place. How come?"
"He not signing the agreement to appear on film."
ACT III
According to Condon's lawyer, Adam Kaiser, when the agent screened Two Days in April he was not happy. "He didn't believe it reflected his clients well or the process well," says Kaiser. "He thought it would be one thing -- an upbeat movie about the NFL and draft process -- and it was not. To him, it was a bad portrayal of the sport where he earns his livelihood."
What's more, Condon claimed that the filmmakers had verbally promised him a right of final artistic sign-off; now, he was withholding that right. Broome contends that something entirely different was afoot. "I think Tom Condon wanted to sabotage this film because he didn't fare well in that draft, and he thought other agents might use it against him in recruiting," he says.
Further, Broome rejected the notion that he'd promised Condon any right to a sign-off. "A producer would never give away final approval to a subject in a documentary," says Broome. "But if they did, it's a huge deal. They'd never do it verbally. That's unheard of. "
In the spring of 2007, the NFL and NFL Properties expressed concerns to Broome about the movie and particularly whether the filmmakers had obtained rights to the leaked Combine footage. It was at the same time that Netflix's discussions with ESPN abruptly broke off. ("We looked at it and we passed," says an ESPN spokeswoman. Red Envelope Entertainment doesn't believe any of its potential partners did anything inappropriate.)
"I'm sure ESPN was saying, 'What's going here?'" says Broome. "You've got a movie where one executive producer -- the guy who orchestrated the whole thing and promised the access -- doesn't want to be a part of it. And the then the NFL is saying, 'You don't have proper rights.' It's not just alarm bells going off: it's flares and fireworks."
The 2007 NFL Draft passed without anyone seeing Two Days in April. The following week, Broome's production company, First and Ten Productions, filed suit in L.A. Superior Court against Condon and NFL Productions on four grounds, including "intentional interference with a contractual relationship." Among other charges, the suit alleges, "Condon willfully and maliciously interfered ... by falsely representing to the National Football League that Plaintiff had not obtained all necessary rights to the combine footage or to the use of Condon's name, image and likeness."
Condon's representatives not only consider the allegation "absurd," but claim it shows how little the filmmakers understood about the workings of the sport. "They make it sound like Tom Condon is telling NFL Properties -- this powerful arm of the NFL -- what to do," says Kaiser.
After settling with the NFL for undisclosed terms, First and Ten removed the NFL as defendants in the lawsuits. (NFL spokesman Greg Aiello confirms that the dispute with First and Ten was "resolved amicably.") The suit against Condon, however, persists. Condon's attorneys filed a motion in September compelling arbitration, which was granted by the judge.
Rather than arbitrate, Broome's lawyers asked Condon to cover the costs of removing him from the film -- he appears on screen for two minutes and 22 seconds -- as well as reimbursing legal fees, which by this point exceeded $100,000. Condon responded with a counteroffer, which was rejected.
"This whole thing is ridiculous," says Kaiser. "Did my client like the movie? No. Did he do anything to stop it from getting distributed? No."
Timeless as some of the movie's themes might be, an unreleased documentary about the 2006 NFL Draft is akin to a melting ice cube. Argott, the director, knows that, realistically, even through Red Envelope Entertainment plans to release the movie on DVD and as an on-line download in January, Two Days in April will have limited currency. "To spend a year of your life making a film you're proud of that then sits on a shelf, that's been tough," he says. "I guess you could say I have a new appreciation for what DonTrell Moore went through on Draft Day."
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