’One of a Kind’ at WB

July 12, 2005 by Liam
Filed under: Movie News

One of a Kind Quick Fact… Did you know that an Empire Movies writer recently won $10,000 in a poker tournament? Fascinating, isn’t it?

Poker is all the rage these days. Even my mother is playing it. (Alright, she’s not really playing it, but it’d be damn funny if she was.) So, in true Hollywood style, the movies are turning to poker. Later this year, we’ll see Eric Bana and Drew Barrymore in Lucky You. Also, the story of the legendary Amarillo Slim will come to the big screen courtesy of Nicolas Cage. Now, Warner Bros. has acquired the screen rights to the book One of a Kind: The Rise and Fall of Stuey ’The Kid’ Ungar. A writer is expected to be hired shortly, by which time I’m sure they’ll shorten the title.

The movie tells the story of one of poker’s biggest stars and its most tragic casualty. Stu Ungar came from nowhere to best seasoned card players, winning back-to-back World Series of Poker crowns by his mid-20s. He cashed an estimated $30 million in chips over his short career. His self-destructive personality led him to run through that entire fortune, and he was penniless by the time he died of a drug overdose in Las Vegas in 1998.

The deal comes just as the World Series of Poker gets under way in Las Vegas and the book by Nolan Dalla and Peter Alson hits bookstores.