Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱

Film/TV Producer: Whiplash, Nightcrawler, Drive, Legion, Shotcaller, Stronger, The Guilty. Emmy Nominee for Oslo. CEO, Walters Media Group

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

@RhenSkya @sloyoroll01973 @cbouzy Edwards is an unaffiliated commentator offering his opinion, as is his First Amendment right. Political pundits are free to play the horse race game and analyze candidates’ strengths and weaknesses. Not sure why this is held against Talarico with such venom.

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

@sloyoroll01973 @cbouzy That doesn’t answer my question. What did Talarico or his campaign or surrogates say that was offensive? I only saw random Twitter trolls that should of course not be held against Talarico. I always liked Crockett, so her stance seems counter-productive here.

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

True story! Shooting Whiplash was a phenomenal experience. Damien Chazelle was incredibly in command and JK Simmons and Miles Teller gave career best performances. A highlight of my Bold Films tenure.

[Anish Moonka @anishmoonka]

No one would fund Whiplash. So its director shot one scene from his own script as a cheap short film and entered it at the Sundance Film Festival. It won. That single award unlocked the money for a $3.3 million feature that earned nearly $50 million and won three Oscars.

Damien Chazelle wrote the script in his twenties, pulling straight from his own years as a drummer in a punishing high school jazz band. It made the Black List, Hollywood's annual list of the best scripts nobody had agreed to film. The short he carved out of it ran 18 minutes, a single scene, with J.K. Simmons as the terrifying teacher he would play again in the feature. The drummer was a different actor back then; Miles Teller took over later. The money came from an independent backer, Bold Films.

The shoot was a sprint. Teller was only free in September 2013, and the feature's Sundance deadline fell that November, so they filmed the whole movie in 19 days. Days ran 14 hours, with the camera reset and relit as many as 100 times. A car crash sent Chazelle to the hospital in the third week, and he was back on set the next morning. The editor had a month or two to assemble the whole thing before the deadline. Teller did most of his own drumming, and shots of his hands actually bleeding stayed in the final cut.

It worked. The film opened Sundance in 2014 and won its two biggest prizes, the grand jury award and the audience vote. In the US it made a quiet $13 million. The real money came from overseas, almost three times what it made at home. In South Korea it became a word-of-mouth hit, selling close to $10 million in tickets on its own, nearly three-quarters of what the film earned in all of America.

A movie no one would pay for turned into one of the best returns in modern Hollywood, dollar for dollar, and it only exists because its director shot one scene to prove the rest was worth making.

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

I used to like Jasmine Crockett, but her petty petulance hurts the party and even more her reputation. She needs to get on board for Talarico and the rest of the blue Texas team. The stakes are existential.

[BeshearStan @BeshearStan]

Jasmine Crockett is so unserious and selfish. She refuses to go to the TX-Dem convention because she’s still salty about her primary loss to Talarico

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

Tolkien with the win!!! 🦅 🦅🦅

[LOTR Universe @Lordoftheringsu]

J.R.R. Tolkien's definitive answer on why the Eagles didn't fly the Fellowship to Mordor! 🦅

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

OOPS!!! 🇺🇦

[OSINTtechnical @Osinttechnical]

New footage confirms that an errant Russian surface to air missile was responsible for the tank roof toss at the Moscow Oil Refinery this morning.

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

Shocked to hear of Daveigh Chase passing. Such a sweet girl taken much too young at only 35 💔

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

Vozinha did an incredible job with EIGHT great saves, keeping Spain scoreless against Cape Verde!!! #WorldCup

[Hakeem Jeffries @RepJeffries]

The Cabo Verde national football team shocked Spain on the strength of a historic performance by goalkeeper Vozinha.

His Mom was unable to be there because of visa complications.

No mother should miss the chance to see her child make history.

I have asked Secretary of State Marco Rubio to do everything in his power to ensure that she can attend Cabo Verde's next match on Sunday.

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

@ChrisCillizza is such a putz

[Hunter Biden @HunterBiden]

Dear Chris,

I can start by telling you who my audience is not.

It is NOT you.

It is NOT the pundit class that rarely leaves the safety of its Georgetown cocktail parties.

It is NOT the chattering class who gets paid to pretend it knows the mind of the American people.

It is NOT for anyone who looks at everything through the lens of politics.

The people I am talking to are tired of the bullshit.

The people I want to speak with are the 50 million Americans still sick and suffering. The families fighting for the lives of the those they love.

Whether they are people living in the shame and fear of being canceled, or consumed by grief after the loss of someone they love, they are just looking for a slight glimmer of hope that they too can get back up again.

My audience is the people who feel unheard, unseen, and uninvited, just like me.

My audience also includes my perceived enemies, those pitted against me by you and your colleagues in the media. I want to meet them where they are and help build a bridge. A bridge built of that which connects all of us. That’s where we begin to actually heal.

And it’s not as if my intent is difficult to understand or discern. Just read and listen to what I have said on this platform, and the 18+ hours of unscripted pod casts I have done.

I think your shock as to why anyone would care says far more about you than it does about me. Take a look at the comments to your post.

And I also know this: people are tired of the bullshit. They’re tired of you and the chattering classes’ obsession with my family as Rome burns.

So instead of wondering why people care about what I have to say, Chris, maybe you should concern yourself with why no one cares anymore about what you and everyone you represent has to say.

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

You’re a QUEEN 👸🏻

[Carrie Coon @carriecoon]

And to clarify, I wish they were financed! I wish these astonishing filmmakers didn’t have to fight so hard for so long to get money for their dream projects. I attach to movies because they’re good. ✌️

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

A Righteous Gentile 😭 #NeverForget

[Crazy Vibes @CrazyVibes_1]

A Nazi commander loaded his pistol, pressed the cold metal barrel directly against the forehead of an American soldier, and gave a chilling ultimatum: "Order the Jewish soldiers to step forward, or I will shoot you right now."

What happened next in that frozen prisoner-of-war camp changed history forever, yet the man who stared down death kept it a secret for the rest of his life.

It was January 1945, and the bitter winter of World War II was at its peak. Inside Stalag IX-A, a notorious German prison camp near Ziegenhain, thousands of American soldiers were trapped behind barbed wire. Among them was Master Sergeant Roddie Edmonds, a twenty-five-year-old from Knoxville, Tennessee. As the highest-ranking non-commissioned officer in his section, Edmonds was responsible for the lives of 1,275 men.

One day, the camp commander, a fanatical Nazi major named Siegmann, issued a terrifying directive.

He ordered that the following morning, all American prisoners of Jewish faith must step out of the ranks during roll call. Everyone knew what this meant. Separating the Jewish soldiers was the first step toward sending them to extermination camps.

Inside the dark, freezing barracks, the prisoners panicked. Some of the Jewish soldiers considered stepping forward willingly to protect their Christian brothers from Nazi wrath. But Edmonds refused to let that happen. He looked at his men and gave a clear, definitive order: "Tomorrow, everyone steps forward. Everyone."

The next morning, the ground was thick with snow. Major Siegmann walked out onto the parade ground, expecting to see a small, isolated group of Jewish soldiers standing apart from the rest. Instead, he stopped dead in his tracks. All 1,275 American soldiers had stepped forward together in perfect unison.

The commander turned red with anger and stormed over to Edmonds. "They cannot all be Jews!" Siegmann screamed.

Edmonds stood completely still, looked the Nazi straight in the eyes, and replied: "We are all Jews here."

Enraged, Siegmann drew his Luger pistol and pressed it against Edmonds' forehead. The tension was suffocating. Hundreds of men held their breath, waiting for the gunshot. But Edmonds did not blink.

"According to the Geneva Convention, we only have to give our name, rank, and serial number," Edmonds said, his voice steady and calm. "If you shoot me, you will have to shoot all of us. And when the war ends, you will be tried for war crimes."

Edmonds knew the German army was collapsing and the Allies were advancing. Siegmann knew it too. The Nazi commander looked at the wall of unified men, realized he could not break their spirit, and slowly lowered his gun. He turned around and walked away without saying another word.

Because of that moment of defiance, two hundred Jewish-American soldiers survived the Holocaust. When the war ended, Edmonds returned to Tennessee, married his sweetheart, and raised a family. He never bragged about his actions, never looked for medals, and never even told his own children what he had done. To him, protecting his men was simply his duty.

Decades after his death in 1985, his son uncovered the truth by talking to the survivors. In 2015, Edmonds was officially recognized as Righteous Among the Nations, the highest honor Israel bestows upon non-Jews who risked their lives to save Jews during the Holocaust. He remains the only American soldier to ever receive this recognition.

True heroism does not look for applause, and love will always be louder than hatred.

By standing together in the snow, those soldiers proved that when we refuse to abandon each other, ordinary human beings can become absolutely invincible.

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

@DrNeilStone If you want to be respected for your vaccine advice Doc, try to avoid spreading conspiracy theories. Makes you look a little crackpot tbh. Be as conservative or contrarian as you want, that’s no issue for me

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

At the “Find Your Friends” premiere with Jessica Amlee at the beautiful Vista Theater in Hollywood. Thanks Shudder! Airs June 12 on Shudder.

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

@AntiToxicPeople Adam Miller is excellent even if he won’t win. Why not boost a strong candidate? You can always vote differently in the general

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

Brilliant insight from Marlon Brando about the American value system.

[cinesthetic. @TheCinesthetic]

Marlon Brando's response to being called 'the greatest' actor ever 🎥

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

Anything Guillermo approves is going to be awesome! The story line and animation look extraordinary! Saw Guillermo on my flight to Cannes. He was lovely as always ❤️

[Guillermo del Toro @RealGDT]

Made by humans for humans.

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

What morons will believe this pack of lies?

[Aaron Rupar @atrupar]

RNC Chair Joe Gruters: "Tala-freako is a creep. He's a vegan. He thinks God is nonbinary. He wants to mutilate children."

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

As Talarico notes, you can be highly moral without being slightly religious.

[Marco Foster @MarcoFoster_]

James Talarico: “My two rules are be yourself and tell the truth. My faith is central to who I am. That said, I’m very cognizant how organized religion has hurt a lot of people. There are a lot of agnostics and atheists who are a lot more Christlike than Christian politicians”

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

@storyshowing Absolutely agree

[Gary Michael Walters 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 @garymwalters]

Producers can only dream of a result like this. Jason Blum living the dream along with virtuoso director Curry Barker.

[Jason Blum @jason_blum]

Obsession is the ONLY wide-release horror film on record to grow in its second weekend at this scale — $22.4M, up 30% over opening. This doesn't happen in horror. Grateful to Focus Features, Blumhouse-Atomic Monster, & Divide/Conquer for championing this movie from the start.