Producer Pitch

Payment is due to the North Side Gang. ERICH WEBER sits outside in a Lincoln L-Series driver seat and waits. He notices a MAN across the street, oddly interested in Erich and the car. Suddenly the rest of his squad plops into the car with payment in tow; SEAN O’GRADY, QUINN MCGREGOR and NOLAN FERRELL.

They shoot the shit but are called out by the man and a slew of detectives. Erich slams on the gas and a car chase ensues. Eventually, Erich manages to do some quick maneuvers in the car and they get away. Celebrate! Erich is honored at a local Gin Mill by the squad and their boss EDDIE FLYNN for his quick-thinking and loyalty to the North Side Gang. His reward: his next phase of training in the gang and a pretty prostitute to play with. That night, at the urging of his bunkmate and friend, Quinn, Erich reads a letter from his sister back in his hometown. His best friend and grandfather is on his death bed. They discuss the consequences of desertion. Erich decides against it but has a dream that night about what caused him to run away. Still conflicted with what to do, Erich, weighs the pros and cons and decides to go. Quinn wakes up and says he’ll cover for him. Erich slips away out of the house homeward bound. Little does he know, the newest member of the squad and all out Erich-hater, KIERAN, sees the escape.

Almost missing the train, Erich eventually makes it home to Crystal Lake. His arrival is met with anything but open arms. He sees his grandfather before he passes. As the undertaker takes his grandfather away, hurt feelings and confusion stirs up and arguing ensues with his mother but disregard from his father. Erich escapes into town. Since prohibition began, the pub he used to work at has changed and isn’t doing well with its no booze policy. An old “flame” RHIANNON BYRNE approaches him. He’s delighted to see her but not so much her new beau, LIAM NILSSON. They’ve become hardcore prohibitionists, but Erich is still infatuated. As they walk away, his old boss SCOTT MCGINNIS closes the pub. He offers his condolences but also a little information about the local Mineola Hotel and its knack to break the rules. Following along with McGinnis, Erich visits the hotel but is also followed by some shady characters. When he finally returns home he is greeted by Nolan, Sean and Kieran in his kitchen with guns to his family’s heads. Erich is paralyzed and doesn’t know what to do. His father steps forward with a plan: the family will make alcohol for the North Side Gang in exchange for their lives.

Two years ago, Erich Weber ran away to Chicago’s North Side where he joined the North Side Gang. When he receives a letter that his grandfather is dying, Erich rushes home. The gang catches up and he must decide: distill alcohol or die with his family.

Gin Mill is Peaky Blinders, Boardwalk Empire and Road to Perdition meets elements of This Farming Life, Babylon Berlin and the family and mob elements of The Sopranos.

With the exit of Peaky Blinders and the rise of contemporary family drama/crime fiction series such as Yellowstone, Gin Mill is the newest and much needed 1920’s period drama that combines the family drama with mob stories. It uses the coming-of-age journey to highlight the parallels between the happy American farming family and the dark American Irish mob family of Chicago. Gin Mill shows how blood family or chosen family can bring hope and stability but also fear and uncertainty from their beliefs and choices that result in different consequences like restoration of the family or murder.

Gin Mill is a period drama set in Chicago and the farming communities of Chicagoland. It is a lower mid-tier series story based around and focusing on drama caused by and surrounding two different types of families and the choices they must make. Although period the excitement and mystery comes from the actions of the story and not from extreme CGI or special effects.