2018 IUFOC Lecture: Fear and Loathing on the Trail of the Saucers

The 2018 IUFOC marks the twenty-fifth anniversary of Bryce’s first produced Hollywood film about the UFO subject (Official Denial, Syfy). He’ll take the audience through his journey into the wilderness of mirrors that defines both Hollywood and Ufology.

Most significantly, Bryce created a 20-hour dramatic television series for NBC, Dark Skies, now an iconic part of the UFO landscape and mythology because of its fearless interweaving of UFO events with 1960s historical realities. Bryce will also discuss the full details of the real attempt to stop the series from airing, as well as the frighteningly covert approach of extremely serious men who claimed to be part of the government, during the filming of the series. Bryce has also written the UFO cover-up into Lois & Clark, worked with Steven Spielberg on Taken, and is currently developing Unidentified, based on the books and life stories of both Stanton Friedman and Donald Schmitt; and Captured, based on the true life events of Betty and Barney Hill back in 1961.

While working so deeply on the subject, Bryce has also met the royalty, or at least the usual suspects, of Ufology. He’s watched its institutions, characters and myths with the eye of a journalist, trained as a correspondent at CNN and an investigative reporter at PBS. He’ll provide a blunt assessment of the state of Ufology and the agenda it needs to pursue.

Woven into this narrative, Bryce will also talk about the status of Disclosure, or the official acknowledgement that at least some of the things flying around in our skies are from somewhere that isn’t here and are flown by someone who isn’t us. Bryce is an expert, having co-authored the seminal non-fiction book, A.D. After Disclosure: When the Government Finally Reveals the Truth about Alien Contact with UFO historian Richard Dolan. Bryce believes that some form of Disclosure is closer than ever, but will not be the end of the story, only the beginning.

Fear and Loathing on the Trail of the Saucers will be a compelling first-person account about a quarter-century long brush with the nature of reality, and what might be coming for us, right around the corner.

Bio: A winner of the prestigious Writers Guild award for screenwriting, Bryce Zabel has created and produced five primetime television series, including fan favorites Dark Skies and The Crow, and worked on a dozen TV writing staffs (Lois & Clark, Taken). A produced feature (Atlantis, Mortal Kombat) and miniseries writer (Blackbeard, Pandemic), Bryce’s latest film, The Last Battle, based on a New York Times bestseller, will be shot by StudioCanal next year in Europe. He was the first writer since Rod Serling elected to serve as Chairman/CEO of the Television Academy. He has taught screenwriting as an Adjunct Professor at the USC School of Cinematic Arts, reported on-air as a CNN correspondent, and won multiple awards for investigative reporting for PBS. His Breakpoint alternate history book series is the winner of the Sidewise Award and continues this Christmas with the publication of Once There Was a Way, a novel about The Beatles staying together. He is developing Unidentified about the race to break the Roswell story, and Captured about the Betty and Barney Hill abduction. His book A.D. After Disclosure with Richard Dolan was the first book devoted exclusively to the Disclosure topic.