Founded by filmmakers John Watson and Pen Densham, Trilogy Entertainment Group enjoys a stellar decades-long track record, winning over a hundred awards, including Oscar Nominations, Emmys and even medals from the Queen of England.
Trilogy’s sixteen feature-length productions and nearly 300 hours of TV series were made collaborating with some of Hollywood’s most creative filmmakers and have grossed over a billion dollars. With a more recent release, Trilogy was involved in the Oscar-nominated movie HARRIET. John and Pen developed the film with writer Gregory Howard and they were Executive Producers when it went into production. Trilogy is now owned by Pen Densham and his son Nevin Densham.
The Trilogy Story
Trilogy’s unique hands-on creative tradition started in Canada, with numerous TV specials and culminated in two Oscar-nominated short films. When Pen wrote and directed the company’s first drama, IF WISHES WERE HORSES, about an owner fighting to save the life of his horse, it was reviewed by TV Guide as “the best film of any length that the CBC has ever screened.” The film spurred Norman Jewison to mentor Pen and bring him and John to Hollywood. Pen and John quickly became in-demand creative consultants on multiple studio films including ROCKY II, VICTORY, and FOOTLOOSE. They also created the feature films THE ZOO GANG, THE ADVENTURES OF A GNOME NAMED GNORM, and THE KISS, for Tristar, was Pen’s first film as a director for a major studio.
Their big break came after several studios rejected Pen’s revisionist vision for ROBIN HOOD: PRINCE OF THIEVES -- and he wrote it anyway. As producers, he and Watson shepherded their script, starring Kevin Costner and Morgan Freeman, into becoming one of the most successful films in the history of Warner Brothers Studio.
Many films followed including BACKDRAFT with Ron Howard, BLOWN AWAY with Jeff Bridges, THE DANGEROUS LIVES OF ALTAR BOYS with Jodie Foster, BUFFALO SOLDIERS with Danny Glover, TANK GIRL with Lori Petty and Naomi Watts, LARGER THAN LIFE with Bill Murray, PHANTOM with Ed Harris and David Duchovny.
Among the features that Pen wrote and directed was his personal version of MOLL FLANDERS for MGM, starring Morgan Freeman and Robin Wright, as well as HOUDINI, with Johnathon Schaech and Mark Ruffalo.
Most recently the Trilogy partners helped shepherd two heartfelt true-life stories: THE LAST FULL MEASURE and HARRIET. THE LAST FULL MEASURE told the true story of the struggle to get a posthumous Medal of Honor for a Vietnam-era Medic. It included an all-star cast with Samuel L. Jackson, Sebastian Stan, William Hurt, Peter Fonda and Christopher Plummer. HARRIET tells the story of American hero Harriet Tubman, the amazing slave-turned-freedom fighter. Led by Cynthia Erivo, the film was Oscar-nominated for both Best Original Song and Best Actress.
Television
After the success of Robin Hood, MGM asked Pen, a science fiction and fantasy enthusiast, to create a modern version of the OUTER LIMITS television anthology show. Trilogy assembled a team of creative talent and led the unique series into becoming the number-one rated show on both Showtime and the Syfy Channel. Winning multiple awards, the series starred a treasure trove of actors: Amanda Plummer, Joel Grey, David Warner, Josh Brolin, Marlee Matlin, Charles Martin Smith, Beau Bridges, Neil Patrick Harris, Catherine O’Hara, Mario Van Peebles, Ron Perlman, Graham Greene, Cicely Tyson, Leonard Nimoy, Lloyd Bridges, Kirsten Dunst and Mark Hamill. THE OUTER LIMITS ran for seven seasons and became the longest-running anthology series in television history and is still being aired in re-runs. Pen was then able to revive his other favorite anthology, THE TWILIGHT ZONE for UPN and produced 42 episodes, with Forest Whittaker as the iconic Host.
The Trilogy team has also produced an eclectic mix of series and TV events, including two seasons of THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN, based on the Western, and SPACE RANGERS, a science fiction adventure, both for CBS. They made four seasons of POLTERGEIST: THE LEGACY for MGM. 22 episodes of FAME-LA for NBC. A 3-hour special event of Stephen King's CARRIE for ABC. The four-hour mini-series of PETER BENCHLEY'S THE CREATURE. The television movie LIFEPOD with Jay Roach was an outer space homage to Hitchcock’s LIFEBOAT for FOX. For USA, the television movie BROTHER'S KEEPER, directed by John Badham.
The company is presently developing projects in both the feature and television realms including, WILL POWER, a comedy about three widows who go to a will reading only to discover they were all married to the same man, LAND OF ENCHANTMENT, a murder mystery set in New Mexico amid the Navajo culture and ANSEL’S ISLAND a film in the traditions of Tarzan and Free Willy, about a young boy stranded at age four on a remote Pacific island who grows up with a pod of dolphins as his only companions.
Television
