“Someone asked me, ‘Are you following this prison break?’ At first, we were laughing, riffing on it,” he recalled. While otherwise busy with the Showtime drama “Ray Donovan,” Tolkin and his colleagues - writing partner Brett Johnson included - were watching the extensive news coverage. The seven-part production traces how two Clinton Correctional Facility convicts and their enablers kept Americans riveted for three weeks in 2015.Įven as far away as California. Tolkin is an executive producer and co-writer of “Escape at Dannemora,” a Showtime television mini-series that begins broadcasting on Sunday. In the 48 years since then, he’s become a successful novelist and Hollywood wordsmith, perhaps best known for 1992’s “The Player.” Recently, that filmmaking career brought him only as close to Vermont as the New York state side of Lake Champlain. “In the spring, you could smell the manure.” haven’t been to Route 7 in a long time,” lamented Michael Tolkin, who was quite familiar with the road and its rural setting before his 1974 graduation from Middlebury College. As she gets involved with Richard and David, and helps them with their plan, it grows to include the murder of her husband, Lyle (Lange).Īfter the jailbirds make their break, the chase is on, and will grow to include even the US Border Patrol.In a scene from “Escape at Dannemora,” David Sweat (Paul Dano) and Richard Matt (Benicio Del Toro) plan their prison break. The biggest boost to the duo’s plot is Joyce “Tilly” Mitchell (Arquette), a wife and mother who is employed as an inmate supervisor in the prison’s tailor shop. There are a number of factors working in Richard and David’s favor, including inept management and oversight, as well as a “culture of carelessness” which could be called criminal. It’s also its third-oldest prison, but until now, no one has ever escaped. Ĭolloquially known as Dannemora, Clinton is New York state’s largest maximum-security facility. Prone to violent explosions of rage, he is counting on his only friend’s plan to find the peace and quiet for which he longs. Beneath his aloof exterior lurks a truly dark streak, however. Mechanically inclined, Sweat prefers to spend his time repairing items like headphones, or quietly reading, to playing cards and mixing with his fellow prisoners. Matt met his co-conspirator, David Sweat (Dano), when they were living in the same prison block. When this believer in the power of positive thinking notices a place hidden behind his cell, he realizes it presents a route to freedom. Matt has been known to strike terror in the hearts of the other inmates. The brains behind the break, Richard Matt (Del Toro) is a self-taught artist, with a knack for painting portraits of celebrities including Julia Roberts, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama. Some of its notoriety was due to the involvement of a married female prison employee, who was alleged to have had affairs with both of the convicted murderers involved and helped them mount their escape. The events surrounding the escape, and ensuing manhunt, received a lot of media attention at the time. įrom creators Brett Johnson and Michael Tolkin, and director Ben Stiller, the Escape at Dannemora TV show is based on a 2015 real-life prison break from the Clinton Correctional Facility, in the village of Dannemora, New York. Performers include: Benicio Del Toro, Patricia Arquette, Paul Dano, Eric Lange, Bonnie Hunt, and David Morse.
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