Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment’s Screen Media Acquires North American Rights to Feature Film The Birthday Cake

Film Stars Shiloh Fernandez, Ewan McGregor, Val Kilmer, Lorraine Bracco, Ashley Benson, Aldis Hodge, Penn Badgley, Emory Cohen, Vincent Pastore and Jeremy Allen White

COS COB, Conn., April 13, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment, Inc. (Nasdaq: CSSE), one of the largest operators of streaming advertising-supported video-on-demand (AVOD) networks, today announced that Screen Media has acquired all North American rights to Jimmy Giannopoulos’ feature film directorial debut, The Birthday Cake. The mob crime drama features an all-star cast including Shiloh Fernandez, Ewan McGregor, Val Kilmer, Lorraine Bracco, William Fichtner, Ashley Benson, Luis Guzman, Paul Sorvino, Vincent Pastore, Aldis Hodge, Penn Badgley, Emory Cohen, and Jeremy Allen White. Screen Media will release the film in theaters and on demand in June 2021.

The Birthday Cake takes place on one fateful evening in the life of Gio (Shiloh Fernandez), the son of a murdered mobster and the nephew of Brooklyn mob boss, Angelo (Val Kilmer). On the 10th anniversary of his father’s mysterious death, Gio carries on the family tradition of bringing a cake his mother (Lorraine Bracco) baked to this uncle’s house for a celebration. Just two hours into the night, Gio’s life is forever changed as he begins to piece together what really happened to his father and ultimately comes face to face with the type of violence he has managed to avoid his whole life.

"We all grew up loving New York mob movies,” said Jimmy Giannopoulos. “It had been a while since anyone had made one, so we decided to explore the mob today. Where they currently stand. Dealing with gentrification, weakening power, rival gangs, the realities of the Feds knocking them off. But we wanted to combine their traditional world with modern day Brooklyn. A very different world from their glory days. We experience the ride all through the eyes of the son of a gangster who has avoided their world his entire life. But his past comes back to haunt him, and we join him for a night of chaos.”

“This was one tasty treat,” said Screen Media in a statement. “These exciting young filmmakers created a love letter to the great mob movies of the past and gave it a modern twist we know audiences are going to eat up.”

After years working in short films and music with artists including Miley Cyrus, A$AP Rocky and Kid Cudi, Jimmy Giannopoulos marks his feature directorial debut from a script he co-wrote with Diomedes Raul Bermudez and Shiloh Fernandez. The Birthday Cake is produced by Bermudez of Purpose Films, Fernandez, Siena Oberman of Artemis Pictures, Carlos Cuscó of Foton Pictures, and Danny Sawaf of Oceana Studios. Executive Producers include Damiano Tucci of Tucci & Co., Shaun Sanghani of SSS Entertainment and Capital, Andrew Davies Gans, Jamin O’Brien, Fernando Ferro, Kyle Stroud, Luke Daniels, Paola Paulin, Craig Butta, Sergio Rizzuto and Greg Lauritano