From The Hollywood Reporter: Oscilloscope Laboratories, the production company headed by Beastie Boy Adam Yauch, has acquired the distribution rights to Yony Leyser's documentary, William Burroughs: A Man Within. The film, which premiered at Slamdance in January, features testimony about the late Beat author and counterculture icon from the likes of Patti Smith, John Waters, Gus Van Sant, Genesis P-Orridge, Thurston Moore, Lee Ranaldo, Laurie Anderson, Amiri Baraka, Jello Biafra, David Cronenberg, and, uh, "Burroughs' gun dealer," all set to a soundtrack by Smith and Sonic Youth. The movie will be broadcast on PBS as part of its Independent Lens series later this year and will see a theatrical release in the fall.
Here's the trailer; let's hope the film itself has more substance and less of this "Burroughs was a junkie messiah!/crusading gay dude!/wife-shooting wackjob!/greatest writer since Joyce!" boilerplate. (Oh, and don't blink or you'll miss Iggy Pop's typically articulate and eloquent insights.)