Press Release: Shannyn Sossamon

For Immediate Release: June 3rd, 2002

Shannyn Sossamon to co-star with Stephan Paternot and Linda Hamilton in Independent Film

World-Class Talent Attached To Picture

New York, NY, June 3rd, 2002--Stephan Paternot (co-founder theglobe.com, author of A Very Public Offering, and now filmmaker & actor) is pleased to announce that Shannyn Sossamon (A Knight's Tale, 40 Days & 40 Nights, The Rules of Attraction) will be co-starring as Max, a raven haired Latin beauty, in the upcoming independent short film, Wholey Moses. Shannyn will be joining an already world class team including Linda Hamilton (Terminator 1 & 2, Dante's Peak) playing Valerie, a sultry French bakery proprietress, and Cinematographer David Phillips (The Basketball Diaries staring Leonardo DiCaprio & Mark Wahlberg, and the Sundance hit Lift). Wholey Moses, a story about donut addiction colliding with the search for love, is written & directed by filmmaker Todd Heyman, and is set to begin shooting in late May.

Sossamon, 22, headed from Reno to Los Angeles to dance, just one day after her high school graduation. While holding down the turntables for a friend at a birthday party, she was spotted by the casting director for A Knight's Tale. Six auditions later Sossamon earned the key role of Jocelyn, opposite Heath Ledger. In 2002 she was seen in 40 Days and 40 Nights co-starring Josh Hartnett, and the Rules of Attraction, for director Roger Avary. Shannyn has recently completed principal photography in Rome on The Sin Eater for director Brian Helgeland.

Stephan Paternot, in his second starring role, has a slightly more roundabout story about breaking into showbiz. At the tender age of 24, Paternot was already an overnight hero of his generation, starring on Wall Street as a real-life founder and CEO of one of the world's most visible Internet companies. With a supporting cast of investment bankers, experienced advisors and a brilliant partner, he took his company, theglobe.com, to a record-setting IPO and a market value of a billion dollars. In a single day, his personal worth zoomed to almost $100 million, but eventually the bottom dropped out. In the sequel, Paternot is still going strong, forging his second career as an author and actor. Leaving both his company and his paper millions behind, he picked himself up, dusted himself off and chronicled his wild ride in A Very Public Offering: A Rebel's Story of Business Excess, Success and Reckoning. The book is a tale of following your dream, taking risks, exceeding your wildest expectations... and then starting all over. While AVPO is a coming of age story for the Internet generation, like a good movie, the story has inspired people of all backgrounds.

It may be unusual that Paternot is an ex-CEO pursuing his dream of being an actor but there's no question, he's taking a sturdy path - the last couple years, he's knuckled down and taken intense acting lessons with film and television actor Neal Lerner. Film producer Brad Fuller is his manager. UTA, one of Hollywood's most influential talent agencies, is representing him on several fronts, most notably to turn his book into a feature film. Paternot recently produced and starred in Shutter, a finalist at four festivals, including the Avignon International Film Festival of 2001.

Contact: donuts@wholeymoses.com