Blu-ray.com Supports Paul's Brain Trust

[Ben]

As we all go about our daily lives and enjoy the tremendous entertainment experience that Blu-ray gives us, it is important, from time to time, to think about the hard-working folks who bring this fantastic level of entertainment to our home theaters. One such talented individual is Paul Prischman. Paul has been a key factor in creating many of the DVD and Blu-ray special editions that we all know and love. Now we all have a chance to give something back to Paul - - Here's more from Bill Hunt of www.thedigitalbits.com:

"A couple of months ago, I received a phone call from a good friend of mine, a fellow by the name of Paul Prischman. I've known Paul for... wow, ten years now? To call him a friend of The Bits would be a significant understatement. I first met him back in 1998, when he was working at Dave Video: The Laser Place, a beloved (and now defunct) haunt for every L.A. area movie fan back in the day. Paul used to coordinate a lot of the DVD signing events for Dave's, as well as the infamous Studio Day events, at which I was a regular figure. When Dave's closed a few years back, Paul began working with another old friend of ours here, DVD producer Charles de Lauzirika. At the time, Charlie was working to finish the Alien Quadrilogy box set, so he brought Paul on to help with that. That was, I think, 2003? They've been working together on DVD projects ever since, with Paul serving as an associate producer on such special editions as Kingdom of Heaven (both versions), the Spider-Man 2: Special Edition, the Gladiator: Extended Edition and most recently, the outstanding Blade Runner: Ultimate Collector's Edition box set.

Anyway, so back to Paul's call. He'd been working from home in the previous weeks, feeling under the weather, but doctors hadn't been able to figure out what was wrong... until they finally did. He'd called to say that he'd been diagnosed with cancer, which turned out to be a really aggressive brain tumor, and that he was about to have it removed. What do you say when your friend tells you something like that? I think I swore a couple of times, and just listened as he talked about how upbeat he was, and that he had the best doctors and a great treatment plan. And all I could think about was my friend, and his wife Cristin and their two young daughters. Soon I called Charlie, who had been talking to a pair of Paul's other friends, Christopher Drake and Jared Rivet, both obviously determined to help Paul in any way they could. As it happens, Paul's insurance (not surprisingly) was only going to cover a small portion of the treatment he needed, which meant that Paul and Cristin were facing serious debt. What came out of all this was something called Paul's Brain Trust, an organized effort by Paul's friends to help raise money for him and his family.

We've established a website with information about Paul (hosted here at The Bits), where you can donate money to help his family through PayPal. We're also going to be hosting online auctions of one-of-a-kind movie collectibles (props, signed art and the like, donated by Paul's many friends throughout the film industry). What's more, tomorrow at Noon (Pacific) we'll be announcing the first of several fundraising events for Paul here in the L.A. area. What we're announcing tomorrow is EXTREMELY cool - a once-in-a-lifetime experience that will be of interest to almost any movie fan.

Paul has given so much to movie fans around the world through his film and DVD work over the years, that it's our hope those fans will want to give a little something back to help Paul in his time of need. So we hope you'll visit the Paul's Brain Trust website to learn more about him, that you'll consider making a donation, and that you'll help spread the word. And be sure to check back both here and on the Brain Trust site tomorrow at Noon (Pacific) for our special event announcement. If you're a fan of big screen science fiction, you're not going to want to miss it. And on behalf of Paul, and his many friends and family, thanks for listening."


Blu-ray.com fully supports Paul's Brain Trust... Thanks for your time and consideration.