Bios

Carol Iovanna

Sam Snape

Marcia Pontius

An Emmy Winning Broadcast Journalist with 29 years of on air and producing experience. Her AWARD WINNING career includes news REPORTING and ANCHORING for stations owned and operated by ABC and CBS in New York. Then as an Anchor and Show Host at THE FOX NEWS CHANNEL with their launch in 1996 until the fall of 2006. As a reporter, she has covered the biggest news stories of the past two decades, and at the anchor desk for Fox she was the first to report the CAPTURE OF SADDAM HUSSEIN and the SEARCH FOR JOHN F. KENNEDY'S MISSING PLANE. In addition to reporting she has been successful at producing specials...including LETTERS FROM THE GULF, a series she created for TV during the first Gulf War and TRUE BELIEVERS for FOX NEWS CHANNEL.

Through Illumination Productions she has been adapting popular novels to screenplays for the purpose of theatrical release and creating original screenplays beginning with A THOUSNAD MILE PATH. The true and remarkable story of a WWII hero, who happens to be a 24 year old Belgian Girl.

Sam started his career as an actor. Then, having proved to his (and everyone else’s satisfaction!) that his talents lay elsewhere, he directed more than 40 professional theatre and musical productions in repertory, commercial tours and on the fringe before settling down as a writer for stage, radio, television and film. After a successful TV writing career which included episodes for many popular British TV Series including ALL CREATURES GREAT AND SMALL, NO BANANAS and SOLDIER SOLDIER, he has concentrated recently on the stage and film. His European Drama award winning play: PFLEGEFAL (Deutsches NationalTheater) ran for 18 months in Weimar. His short film 3 HOURS (Mercury Bay Pictures) last year won “Best International short Film” at the Oscar qualified Foyle Film Festival. And “Best dramatic short” at the Rincon film festival, Puerto Rico. URN -a powerful London based short film- is currently in Post production in LA and, alongside A THOUSAND MILE PATH, he is developing feature film projects in NZ, USA, UK, SA and Germany.

Sam is passionately delighted and excited to be working with Carol Iovanna and Illumination Productions on the excellent ‘A Thousand Mile Path’. This inspiring and rare story of a war heroine is creatively challenging and will make a wonderful film.

Marcia Pontius, the former  Vice President of Acquisitions and Corporate Development for Blyth, Inc. (a NYSE company based in Greenwich Connecticut) and, prior to Blyth, Inc., a Director of Investments  for Sumitomo Corporation of America ( a  subsidiary of a multi-billion dollar Japanese conglomerate)  has joined Illumination Productions as a financial advisor and consultant in charge of development funding. She has a record of success in strategic, market, financial and operational analyses as well as legal negotiations and development, and financial planning and budgeting.