WME Signs ‘The Pez Outlaw’ Filmmakers Bryan & Amy Bandlien Storkel And Their Non-Scripted Production Company Sidestilt Films

EXCLUSIVE: WME has signed the Emmy-winning husband-and-wife filmmaking team of Bryan Storkel and Amy Bandlien Storkel, as well as their non-scripted production company, Sidestilt Films.

The Storkels most recently directed and produced the award-winning documentary The Pez Outlaw, which claimed a Special Jury Prize at this year’s SXSW Film Festival and was recently acquired for the U.S. by Gravitas Ventures, with plans for a day-and-date release on October 21. The fish-out-of-water story follows the adventures of Steve Glew, a small-town Michigan man who boards a plane for Eastern Europe soon after the fall of the Berlin Wall. His mission is to locate a secret factory that holds the key to the most desired and valuable Pez dispensers. If he succeeds, he will pull his family out of debt and finally be able to quit his job of 25 years. Steve becomes the hero of his own adventure, smuggling the rarest of goods into the U.S. and making millions in the process. It was all magical — until his arch-nemesis, The Pezident, decided to destroy him.

The Pez Outlaw also claimed the Adrienne Shelly Foundation Excellence in Filmmaking Award at the Nantucket Film Festival and is slated to compete at more than 40 others. The Storkels produced via Sidestilt Films, in association with Library Films, Fostered Films and Paragraph Films, with Chris Smith (American Movie, Tiger King), Theo Love, Nate Larson and Jonathan Ignatius Green exec producing.

Sidestilt also recently premiered its documentary Butterfly in the Sky at the 2022 Tribeca Film Festival. The film currently seeking distribution tells the story of the beloved PBS children’s series Reading Rainbow and one of the most adored television hosts of all time, LeVar Burton.

The Storkels won a News and Documentary Emmy for their work on HBO’s Alabama Snake, and have also been behind such projects as The Legend of Cocaine Island (Netflix), the ESPN 30 for 30 film The Bad Boy of Bowling, and an Emmy-nominated episode of HBO’s State of Play.

“With WME in our corner, we finally have a partner that is as enthusiastic about our projects as we are,” said the Storkels in a joint statement. “We are thrilled to be joining the WME family.”

Sidestilt Films continues to be represented by Ziffren Brittenham.

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