CSI
"Do not read this book. Experience it. Welcome to the Dark side," says CSI creator Anthony E. Zuiker, referring to his latest project: it's a book he calls the world's first digi-novel because it combines words with video footage.
Dark Origins is the first in a series of crime thrillers debuting online that follow hero Steve Dark in his quest to track down a serial killer. The interactive experience can be found at Level 26.com.
Watch full episodes of CSI here.
"About every twenty pages of this crime novel, I will provide the reader with the option of logging in to www.level26.com to watch 2-3 minutes of motion picture footage which will bridge the story from one chapter to another," Zuiker says. "Before your eyes, the characters will come alive." Bringing the 20 episode series to life is ...
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Anthony Zuiker by Steve Granitz/ WireImage.com
CSI mastermind Anthony Zuiker has inked a seven-figure deal to launch a trilogy of "digital novels" in an effort to encourage reading among youths, Variety reports.In an effort to catch up with the times, the project incorporates interactive media, with the use of two-minute online videos and a social networking site, which readers can access after every five chapters. At each book's conclusion, readers can discuss the novel on community message boards and make suggestions for future manuscripts.The books will be a crime series, and the first, Sqweegel, is targeted for a fall 2009 release date by Dutton."I want to give traditional crime novel readers a more immersive experience," Zuiker said, adding that multiplatform experience "offers publishing a chance to catch up with the YouTube generation that has lost passion for reading." —Joyce Eng
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Anthony Zuiker by L. Cohen/WireImage.com
Anthony Zuiker has inked a deal to pen his memoirs for a division of HarperCollins, detailing among other things his rise from Las Vegas bellhop to CSI auteur/Hollywood power player, and opening up about his gangster dad. "Most shocking is Zuiker's recollection of his father's suicide... which happened the night he was on stage at the People's Choice Awards collecting his fourth statue for CSI," the publisher previews for the Reporter. "In a scene that could have been pulled from [CSI], Zuiker flew right to the scene and attempted to piece together his father's last hours." The tentatively titled Mr. CSI is eyed for a fall 2009 release. — MWM
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Gary Sinise, CSI: NY
CSI mastermind Anthony Zuiker wants to take over the world. Not the TV world — with three ratings-hot procedurals, he pretty much already has. We're talking about the virtual online world known as Second Life. The computer-generated alternate universe, where millions of players have signed up to chat, shop and even simulate marriage and sex, is at the heart of tonight's CSI: NY (10 pm/ET, CBS) mystery.
Lab geek and Second Life devotee Adam Ross (A.J. Buckley) realizes that an oddly attired corpse is a dead ringer for a virtual character — aka an avatar — named Venus. When he discovers that despite the death of her look-alike, the avatar still exists on the site, the question becomes: Is the real-life person who's controlling
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LL Cool J by Mark Von Holden/WireImage.com
CBS is said to be thisclose to granting a midseason, six-episode pickup to The Man, the Anthony Zuiker (CSI)-created series starring hip-hop artist LL Cool J as an undercover LAPD cop who juggles his job with his role as self-appointed guardian to an orphaned boy.If The Man does in fact get a green light, the pilot — which was passed on for this fall — will likely be rejiggered and reshot.
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Hill Harper and Melina Kanakaredes by Mitchell Haddad/CBS
Because just watching TV is so passé, CSI creator Anthony Zuiker is taking his franchise to a whole new level this fall. In Second Life, an Internet-based, open-ended virtual world that its residents shape using different tools, fans will soon be able to explore the CSI: NY crime lab without supervision. In the fifth episode of the new season, a killer on the show will escape into Second Life and he will not return to television until spring. In the meantime, the audience can help investigate the crime online. “What I’m creating is this multimedia, virtual crime lab that will actually take place and be live and active that same weekend for the next year. You’ll now be able to actually solve one crime per month, like a real investigator,” says Zuiker about his newest creation.“The future of television in my opinion really is television, mobile, gaming and Internet. If I can incorporate all four of them with the television show as a center conduit, what w...
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Anthony Zuiker, creator of the CSI franchise, is teaming up with LL Cool J to develop The Man, a CBS drama starring the rapper-actor as a lawman who juggles his nights as an upper-echelon crime-stopper with his days as a parent lording over a trio of adopted children, Reuters reports. Zuiker says he was influenced by LL Cool J's own dual existence as a "multiplatinum rapper and an amazing father" of four. Upon pitching the concept to LL Cool J, Zuiker says, "He loved it, and we're now officially in business."
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