Marc Hershon

Completing the screenplay for Hallmark Channel’s yet-to-be-produced Santa Baby bring to six the number of scripts Marc Hershon has developed and sold to the channel, including Santa Jr., Monster Maker and Wedding Daze . Hershon is currently developing a number of other projects along several lines, including features (such as Dork, a family comedy about a dad who ends up being the nerd he’s afraid his son has become) and The Basement, a real life suspense movie based on true events surrounding a fatal college hazing incident. In addition, he’s in talks to set up a TV dramatic series set in the world of big-time sports ticket hustling.

For the past year, Hershon has been working with comedian Dana Carvey to create material specifically designed for the internet, through Carvey’s soon-to-debut DanaCarvey.com. He is also working with Carvey to develop a low budget feature aimed at the PG market. Another internet project he’s involved with is to create 5 minute “webisodes,” taken from an unproduced comedy feature The Forgotten Voyage of Sinbad, in order to garner viewer interest in the project.

Last year Hershon headed up the team that wrote The Write Stuff, a 7-minute entry in the San Francisco field of the national 48 Hour Film Project. The movie won Best Script and Best Film, going on to be selected as one of the Top 5 films from among the 30 cities hosting the contest. He followed that up with a solo effort on Essence, a 5-minute short that was first runner-up in the Final 5 “Showdown” phase of the contest. (The Write Stuff can be viewed online at www.ourmedia.org/node/48145; while Essence is downloadable at http://snagle.net/?p=40)

Hershon has worked in the world of brand identity for almost 20 years, and was instrumental in the creation of many famous brand names such as the BlackBerry® device, Dasani® mineral water, P&G’s Swiffer® dry mop, Saturn’s VUE® utility vehicle, HP’s Pavilion® computer, Sony’s Metreon entertainment center in San Francisco, and HD Radio high definition broadcasting. He most recently created the brand nüvi for a high-tech travel aid from Garmin International, as well as consulted on the creation of Garmin’s new corporate logo. Additionally, he created the title Love Smart for Dr. Phil’s recent relationship book & TV special, the name InsideCrowd for an online advice network and AVAVA, the name for a new housing construction technology.

He also is a staff writer and performer with Fries On The Side, a live sketch comedy group that performs weekly at The Meisner Center in North Hollywood. The group recently completed its fourth season and has just completed editing a presentation pilot for a reality-style behind-the-scenes TV sketch show, Fries On The Air, which Hershon is producing.

Marc was bitten by the writing bug in 1984, when he was the general manager of The Comedy Underground nightclub in Seattle, Washington. He and comedian Franklyn Ajaye signed a development deal with Universal for their original screenplay, Ahead Of Our Time. Although it was never produced, the impetus was enough to get Marc to move to Los Angeles, where he continued to write screenplays, both in collaboration and on his own.

Once in L.A., he served as head writer on Ruckus, a game show produced by Merv Griffin & Columbia TV. He also was the producer of Gameworld a short-lived series on Game Show Network which was a Talk Soup-style wrap-up of the week’s game shows. Other TV dabbling included being head writer of a daytime talkshow pilot for Pat Sajak, supervising producer for Trade Ins, a relationship game show pilot, and ongoing contributing joke writer for The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.

Collaboratively, Marc has written and optioned a number of film scripts, including Vortex, a sci-fi action movie written with Rick Overton; Private Ice a detective comedy written with Brad Mirman; and Rim City a sci-fi detective comedy written with Mike Farrow. He has even worked on an uncredited basis several times, including doing a re-write with Tom Shadyac on a Fox TV film, Frankenstein: The College Years; and with Dana Carvey on the feature comedy Master Of Disguise.

In conjunction with A Wink And A Nod Productions, his previous films include Santa, Jr., starring Lauren Holly, Judd Nelson, George Wallace and Nick Stabile; and Monster Makers, starring Linda Blair, George Kennedy, and Adam Baldwin. Sold and awaiting a start date is Miss Cupid’s Beau, a Valentine’s comedy about the beautiful daughter of Cupid, who can’t seem to get a date. Also in development at A Wink And A Nod are the aforementioned Dork, and Once In A Blue Moon, a good-natured riff on a family fantasy. Other projects include an untitled mockumentary on the evils of permissive parenting (in collaboration with Dana Carvey), and the adaptation of a novel, A Guest In The Jungle, for Avenue Pictures.