Movies - Spellbound

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	Movies - Spellbound

Spellbound is a 2002 documentary nominated for the Academy Award for Documentary Feature. The movie is set in 1999 at the Scripps Howard National Spelling Bee. It followed eight competitors in the 1999 Scripps National Spelling Bee. The competitors were Harry Altman, Angela Arenivar, Ted Brigham, April DeGideo, Neil Kadakia, Nupur Lala, Emily Stagg, and Ashley White. The film's director was Jeffrey Blitz. Disney Theatrical is due to adapt the film for Broadway in 2006.

Characters

As they appear from left to right on the DVD's cover:

Neil Kadakia

Neil Kadakia is currently a junior in the Haas School of Business at the University of California-Berkeley. He plans to attend the USC's Marshall School of Business upon graduation for his MBA. Neil (as speller 139) missed "" in the bee to get ninth place. Other words Neil spelled:

(spelled incorrectly as "helebore")

Emily Stagg

Emily Stagg (speller 148) was sponsored by the New Haven Register in New Haven, Connecticut and spelled:

(spelled incorrectly as "clavison")

Ashley White

Ashley White (speller 149) represented The Washington Informer in Washington, DC in the bee.

(spelled incorrectly as "eccleastical")

April DeGideo

April DeGideo, who lives in Ambler, Pennsylvania, participated in the 1998 and 1999 bees, the latter of which she placed third, representing the Times Herald of Norristown, Pennsylvania. April is now a junior journalism major at New York University. She was speller 61 and spelled the following words:

(spelled incorrectly as "terrine")

Harry Altman

Many critics who reviewed Spellbound singled Altman (speller 8) out as its most interesting "character". Roger Ebert wrote that he "has so many eccentricities that he'd be comic relief in a teenage comedy... He screws his face up into so many shapes while trying to spell a word that it's a wonder the letters can find their way to the surface." He went to the Academy for Engineering and Design Technology in Hackensack, New Jersey. He enrolled in the University of Chicago in autumn 2005. The phrase "What time is it?" has been time and again referred to within Tufts House, a dormitory at the University of Chicago as an expression of mirth, intellectual sarcasm, and sheer love for Harry. He missed "" in the bee featured in the film and spelled these words:

(Harry laughed when the judge described this word's definition as "a pain in the head")

(on which he spent more than five minutes contorting his face; Harry was reminded several times to hurry before spelling it "bands")

Angela Arenivar

Angela Arenivar is a junior at Texas A&M University. She is studying Spanish with minors in Classical Studies and English. Arenivar plans to attend graduate school in Spanish and teach at a University level. She is currently studying abroad through Texas A&M at the University of Salamanca in Salamanca, Spain. Angela (as speller 85) missed the word "" and spelled the following words:

(spelled incorrectly as "helioplankton")

Nupur Lala

Nupur Lala was the champion of the 1999 Scripps National Spelling Bee (as speller 165), spelling "" to win. All of the words she spelled were:

(with which she asked the judges whether it related to a Corolla)

(the winning word)

Ted Brigham

Ted Brigham, from Rolla, Missouri, represented the Rolla Daily News, based in the same town. One of the more notable stories from his experience in the spelling bee was the congratulation posted by students of his school, where they misspelled "champ" as "chapm." He was speller 243.

(spelled incorrectly as "distractable")

Other notable spellers

George Thampy was speller 245 in the bee and was mentioned several times within the film. He misspelled "kirtle" as "curtle" for third place, tied with April DeGideo. Thampy eventually won the 2000 national bee.
David Lewandowski finished second place in the spelling bee, spelling "opsimath" as "opsomath." Nupur spelled his word correctly and went on to spell "logorrhea."
Allyson Lieberman was originally slated to be featured as one of the spellers in the documentary, but it never went through; the scene involving her can be found in the special features of the DVD. The youngest contestant in the entire bee, she misspelled "purblind."
Frances Taschuk and Ann Foley are shown in the final set of scenes prior to the last round of the spelling bee. Frances mispells "acoelous" and Ann "quinquevir."
Vinay Krupadev is in a scene involving Harry's mother feeling "sorry for the boy who got 'yenta'." She was referring to Vinay, and his pronunciation of "yenta" is shown in the film. He eventually spelled it "yente."

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