Bay, who is best known for big-budget action flicks like Transformers and Armageddon, is working on Pain & Gain, a feature he is adapting from a series of Miami New Times stories on steroid-abusing bodybuilders who become criminals. According to an update on Bay's official website over the weekend, the film "is looking very possible."
Winners of the Florida Press Association's 2008 Better Weekly Newspaper Contest were announced last weekend, and two AAN members were well-represented amongst the winners. Miami New Times took home a total of 11 awards, including first-place wins for Community History, Criticism, News Story, Outdoor Writing and Website Development; its sister paper New Times Broward-Palm Beach won two awards -- both first-place finishes -- for Investigative Reporting and Serious Column.
SF Weekly's Katy St. Clair took home a first-place Humor column award from the National Society of Newspaper Columnists in its annual contest. Roy Edroso of The Village Voice, Stephen Lemons of Phoenix New Times, and Chuck Strouse and Elyse Wanshel, both of Miami New Times, were also recognized by the group.
Village Voice Media's two Florida newspapers fared well in this year's Green Eyeshade Awards, which recognize journalistic excellence in 11 Southern states. Miami New Times won five awards, including first-place finishes in four categories: Coverage of Politics, Crticism, Public Affairs Reporting and Public Service. Sister paper New Times Broward-Palm Beach took home three awards, winning first-place accolades for Non-Deadline Reporting and Sports Commentary. Started by the Atlanta Professional Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists, the contest is now administered by regional directors for the Society.
Miami New Times and New Times Broward-Palm Beach have a handful of contenders in the Society of Professional Journalists' 59th annual Green Eyeshade Awards. Miami New Times has five finalists, and Broward-Palm Beach has three, in a variety of categories, from Public Service to Sports Commentary. The Green Eyeshade Awards is a regional journalism competition covering Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and West Virginia. Winners will be announced this summer.
Miami New Times' Lee Klein and Seattle Weekly's Jonathan Kauffman finished first in the Newspaper and Internet categories, respectively, in this year's Bert Greene Awards. In addition, the Austin Chronicle's MM Pack was a finalist in the Newspaper category. The awards, which are organized by the International Association of Culinary Professionals, "recognize excellence in food journalism." Winners were announced last weekend in Denver.
Miami New Times' Francisco Alvarado, the Houston Press' Margaret Downing and The Village Voice's Elizabeth Green were all honored in the 2008 National Awards for Education Reporting. The competition, sponsored by the Education Writers Association, "honors the best education reporting in the print and broadcast media."
Rebecca Wakefield, who worked at the paper earlier in the decade, has signed on as manager for Maria "Beba" Sardina Mann's campaign for Miami city commissioner. "The journalism world is dying a horrible, hacking death," Wakefield says. "No one's paying me any more to snarkily opine on the local circus, so when Beba asked me to consider running her campaign, I thought I might as well grab a cigar and find out what's really going on in the smoke-filled rooms."
The North Central Florida SPJ chapter has announced the winners of its 2008 Florida Awards of Excellence contest, and Village Voice Media's two papers in the state won 20 total awards. Miami New Times staff writer Francisco Alvarado was named Journalist of the Year, and in competition among non-daily papers, his paper took home ten awards, including first-place finishes in Education Reporting, Environmental Reporting, General Reporting (single story), General Reporting (series) and Series Column Writing. New Times Broward-Palm Beach won a total of nine awards, including first-place wins for Business Reporting, Feature (non-deadline), Humorous Column Writing and Sports Reporting (non-deadline).
In the nineteenth -- and final -- installment of this year's "How I Got That Story" series, Gus Garcia-Roberts talks to Phillip Bailey about his award-winning short news stories for Cleveland's Scene. Garcia-Roberts, an Academy for Alternative Journalism alum who was transferred to Miami New Times after the Scene's merger with Cleveland Free Times in June, covers meth addicts, rural farmers, nightclub owners, and cultural phenomena with equal aplomb in his entries. He tells Bailey how each story came about, reveals his reporting process, and offers advice to other young alt-weekly journalists. "Think small," Garcia-Roberts says. "Find weird people in your area that have no idea why you're writing about them, and do their strangeness justice."
