The Balancing Game: From Manuscript to Movie

In December of 2006, my good friend Elliot Ellis spoke to me about an unpublished novel that his father Joseph Eliashvili had written called The Balancing Game. Elliot thought it could make a great movie. I told him to give me the manuscript and I’d check it out.

A week later, I gave the manuscript a read. I knew that it was something I’d want to adapt into a screenplay.

When I heard about the graduate bluelight opportunity and the script parameters, I had the idea to transform a large portion of the first act of The Balancing Game into a short film. While my collaborators and I believe this film stands on its own, we are also confident that we could build it into a full-length feature film – The Balancing Game, as it was originally envisioned. Our plan is to make the short film of The Balancing Game through Project Bluelight and to use the film to generate buzz and money to ultimately bring the full feature to fruition.

The Balancing Game represents a four-year creative journey of collaboration and exploration realized.  It will also mark the beginning of a new collaboration borne out of the Digital Cinema Graduate program at DePaul University.

- Peter Matsoukas, Co-Writer & Director