In the days after the June 2009 wedding party that took place at the 284-acre Sarsden estate, 75 miles northwest of London in the Oxfordshire countryside, it would be noted by the British press how remarkable it was, considering who the guests were, that the bride had managed to keep the event a secret from the media. There were no tabloid journalists hanging around the nearby village of Churchill, no paparazzi hiding in the bushes on the morning of June 13, the day Rebekah Wade, the editor of The Sun, Britain’s largest daily newspaper, celebrated her marriage to the former racehorse trainer and “international playboy�? Charles Patrick Evelyn Brooks. 
 
 The prime minister, Gordon Brown, and his wife, Sarah, attended, as did David Cameron, the Conservative Party leader and prime minister–to–be, and his wife, Samantha. Rupert Murdoch, The Sun’s owner, had flown in. Murdoch’s daughter Elisabeth and her husband, the P.R. man Matthew Freud, who had helped to orchestrate the “media blackout,�? had driven over from Burford Priory, their $7 million, 22-bedroom country home, 15 miles away. The guest list attested to the power Rebekah Wade had achieved, at the age of just 41, as the editor of The Sun, a tabloid with three million readers, and as the first woman to hold that job. But it also attested to her charm, “her warmth,�? her “gregariousness,�? and “her straightforward, sympathetic manner,�? because the guests were also close friends. Sarah Brown had her for “sleepovers�? at Chequers, the prime minister’s country retreat. David Cameron was so close he reportedly signed his letters to her “Love, David.�? 
 
 That the media blackout had been so successful was even more surprising, considering that, by 2009, Wade had become something of a celebrity herself, with her first husband, Ross Kemp, a star of the hugely popular soap opera EastEnders, and then with Charlie Brooks. Endlessly written about and photographed—at Ascot, sitting in the royal box at Wimbledon, helicoptering to the Glastonbury Festival—she was instantly recognizable with her pile of red ringleted hair. In the competitive, ruthless, often cruel, and largely male culture of the British tabloids, Wade stood out. She spoke French, and had attended the Sorbonne; she and Charlie Brooks were at the center of the social scene in Chipping Norton—the weekend hub of the wealthy and powerful in Oxfordshire. 
 
 The wedding party at Sarsden’s lake—where, according to a friend, Brooks’s father had proposed to his mother—was, as one guest recalls, “incredibly romantic and lavish.�? It was “all very Disney-esque, where everything looks right.�? And at the time, everything was going right for Rebekah Wade—now Rebekah Brooks. In just 20 years she had gone from being a secretary at one of Rupert Murdoch’s newspapers to running his Sunday tabloid, the News of the World, at the age of 31, to running The Sun at 34. Her ambition had been described by the British media as “terrifying�? and “phosphorescent,�? but in her ascent up the ladder, it seemed she had never put a foot wrong. And just 10 days after her wedding party, she would climb even higher, when, on June 23, she was promoted to C.E.O. of News International, Murdoch’s newspaper empire in the U.K., which would make her one of the most powerful women in Britain. 
 
 As the 200 guests sipped champagne by the lake that day, few could imagine how fast Rebekah Brooks would fall. On July 15, 2011, two years after she became C.E.O., Brooks resigned. Two days later she was arrested “in connection with allegations of corruption and phone hacking�? and interrogated by Scotland Yard detectives for nine hours before she was released on bail. Almost overnight—ever since it was revealed in early July that employees of the News of the World had hacked into the cell phone of Milly Dowler, a missing 13-year-old who was found murdered in 2002—Rebekah Brooks seemed to have become the most reviled woman in Britain, the woman at the center of what had begun as a phone-hacking scandal but has spread to include allegations of bribes to police, e-mail hacking, surveillance by private detectives of politicians and lawyers, and questions about a massive cover-up at News International. No charges have been filed against Brooks, and there have been no specific allegations of criminal wrongdoing against her, but the intensity of the anger toward Brooks has been accompanied by a growing number of questions as the judicial and parliamentary investigations have expanded and the extent of her influence has slowly emerged. 
 
 Brooks was the woman almost everybody had heard of, but about whom almost nothing was known. She rarely spoke in public or gave interviews, and when she did, she revealed nothing about herself. She was said to be closer to Rupert Murdoch than any of his six children, but of that relationship she never uttered a word, leaving it to Murdoch to raise questions about his own grip on reality in a remark he made on July 10. In an effort to stem the public rage, he had just shut the 168-year-old News of the World and put 280 people out of work. While walking with Brooks in Mayfair, he was asked by a reporter what his top priority was. Looking at Brooks with what seemed like deep affection, he answered, “This one.�? It was a stupefying remark, but what Rebekah Brooks thought of it, no one could tell. She just smiled at the cameras, the cryptic Mona Lisa smile that could be seen in so many of her photographs—“as if she knows something she’s not telling,�? says one journalist. 
 
 But that smile wasn’t on display on July 19 as Brooks told the parliamentary committee investigating the hacking scandal that she had never “condoned or sanctioned�? hacking or even known that it was taking place at the News of the World while she was the editor. She said she had learned about the allegations that Milly Dowler’s phone had been hacked only when they were revealed in a story in The Guardian two weeks earlier. At the hearing she appeared exhausted, her trademark hair stringy and disheveled, but she testified calmly and coolly for nearly two hours. She said she had never met or had any dealings with Glenn Mulcaire, the private investigator whose files, seized by the police in 2006, would trigger the national scandal with some 11,000 pages of notes and 690 audiotapes, indicating that nearly 6,000 people—including politicians, celebrities, police officers, and crime victims—may have had their phones hacked by the News of the World. 
 
 Like Rupert Murdoch and his son James, who both testified before her that day, Brooks would say there were facts she could not recall, matters she could not discuss, issues for which she had not been responsible. But her testimony was more impressive—she didn’t fumble like Rupert Murdoch, showed none of the testy defensiveness of James. Some would say her testimony was “masterful�? and “deft.�? Critics would go so far as to suggest that she had hired a makeup artist in order to make her appear so wan and worn. “She looked so vulnerable,�? says one prominent author. She was “amazing,�? says a woman who has known Brooks for more than a decade. “Here she is, the most hated woman in Britain, on national television, and the only sign that she was nervous was that she blinked a little more than usual,�? says this friend. “She is completely nerveless.�? But her testimony would also raise a question: if she knew as little as she said she did, how had she risen to such power? 
 
 Road to Ambition 
 
 In the many press accounts of Brooks’s life there would be a number of facts on which everyone seemed to agree. She was born Rebekah Mary Wade in 1968 in Warrington, a town in the North of England situated between Liverpool and Manchester. She was an only child, and growing up she had lived in a tiny village south of Warrington. 
 
 She went to the area high school, Appleton Hall County Grammar, and studied French. She had been so passionate about becoming a journalist that when she was 14 she began to spend her weekends and school holidays at the local newspaper “making tea,�? she once said, “and helping out.�? Although she later attended the London College of Printing, after high school she took off for Paris, where she worked for a French architecture magazine. 
 
 Frequent mentions of her Sorbonne education would come later, after she became editor of The Sun, in 2003. One or two press stories over the years would note that Brooks appeared only to have taken a class at the Sorbonne, not studied for a degree. However, few questions were asked, even by her friends. “She never introduced us to people from her past,�? says one. “That was a little creepy, as if there was no past.�? Only recently did the media begin to focus on what the BBC referred to as her “startlingly brief and opaque�? biography in Who’s Who. It was not that Brooks ever lied. She simply “allowed myths to grow and never challenged them,�? says Roy Greenslade, the media commentator, who has known her for two decades. ||||| The project is one of the first for BiteSize Entertainment, a multi-platform studio unveiled by Mevio CEO Ron Bloom and producer Gene Kirkwood. 
 
 The story of Rebekah Brooks, the former CEO of News Corp.'s U.K. newspaper unit that is at the center of the phone hacking scandal, is in development as a feature film. 
 
 
 
 The film is one of the first projects of BiteSize Entertainment, a multiplatform entertainment studio unveiled in Cannes by Ron Bloom, CEO of online video site Mevio, and producer Gene Kirkwood (Rocky, New York, New York). 
 
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 Kirkwood and producing partner Ross Elliot are folding their independent film production firm Kirkwood-Elliot Productions into the new venture and making it the company's feature film production arm, providing it with a pipeline of commercial movies for wide theatrical release. 
 
 
 
 The partners are hoping to bring Hollywood and Silicon Valley closer together with franchises that can play across platforms, from shortform online content to feature-length. 
 
 
 
 Kirkwood-Elliot has optioned the rights to the Vanity Fair article "Untangling Rebekah Brooks" by Suzanna Andrews and is developing a feature film about Brooks under the BiteSize banner. 
 
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 Kirkwood told The Hollywood Reporter that the project is still in its early stages. There is no writer or director, or talent for that part, attached to the project yet and there is no budget at this stage, he said. 
 
 
 
 "We will make a film and also use it as a porthole into [Rupert] Murdoch's world," Kirkwood said. "I see it as a Citizen Kane approach." 
 
 
 
 Bloom said the story of the controversial Brooks is "a story everyone is afraid to tell." Kirkwood emphasized that he wants the story told "with empathy." 
 
 
 
 Added the producer: "She's a great story. Her rise…is almost like Great Expectations -- with a moral." Echoing themes in the stories of Richard Nixon and Boss Tweed, he said she rose from nothing to real power, which can lead to a person's fall. 
 
 
 
 Who does he want to play Brooks? "Right now, I would do it with all unknowns, all English actors," he said. 
 
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 And when could the project make it to the screen? Kirkwood said work on the project could kick into high gear soon, and he hopes to move quickly when that stage is reached -- as in the case of other films. "As soon as there is an ending [or major development in her story], we're going forward," he said. "Murdoch might retire -- who knows?" 
 
 Earlier this week, Brooks was charged with "perverting the course of justice." 
 
 
 
 As far as distribution goes, BiteSize will determine partners on a case-by-case basis, he said. 
 
 
 
 The company has also partnered with Bob Odenkirk's Odenkirk-Provissiero Entertainment and Mary Jane Skalski for the production of Girlfriends Day, a dark comedy directed by and starring Odenkirk with Bryan Cranston, David Cross, Amber Tamblyn, David Koechner and Fred Armisen attached to play lead roles. Written by Odenkirk and Eric Hoffman, it is expected to shoot this summer. 
 
 
 
 Kirkwood says he expects the company to make a handful of low-budget comedies for a total budget of around $10 million. "I don't see the need to spend $30 million on a comedy," he said. 
 
 
 
 Also in the production pipeline is dramedy Mad Dogs and Englishmen, the story of Noel Coward’s historic two weeks at The Desert Inn in Las Vegas in 1955. 
 
 
 
 The partners in BiteSize envision the company as "a top-tier supplier of commercial projects for both the studios and major independent distributors worldwide, as well as a conduit for the development of 'born on the web' franchises," they said. The company initially will target to produce four to six higher-budgeted commercial feature films a year, as well as a unique slate of “microbudgeted” theater-quality features. 
 
 
 
 The team also is working to create a new format that Bloom calls “cross-platform programming,” which will center on theatrical releases but also utilize Mevio's online entertainment network. 
 
 
 
 “We are witnessing the emergence of the first new platform for entertainment distribution and consumption in the last 100 years," said Bloom about the Internet. "But Hollywood has barely begun to take advantage of it." 
 
 
 
 Just as Silicon Valley was the center of the social networking revolution, which reached a new stage with Facebook's IPO on Friday, "I believe Hollywood will be the epicenter of this entertainment revolution," Bloom said. 
 
 
 
 “Welcome to the new era of the entertainment entrepreneur," said Kirkwood. "It's not just about the Internet. It's about reaching a new type of audience and finding better ways to entertain them. With BiteSize, we are combining the best of Hollywood with a new economic and distribution model that brings talent closer to the bottom line. We look forward to forming important and successful alliances with filmmakers, actors and distributors around the globe." 
 
 
 
 BiteSize broke ground this week on a state-of-the-art studio, expected to open for business in 90 days, at the W Hotel in the heart of Hollywood. The company will be based in Los Angeles, with satellite production offices in New York, Miami and London. 
 
 
 
 Mevio.com, which Bloom said is profitable, is producing and distributing a slate of premium shortform entertainment shows viewed by millions every month. The company, backed by big venture-capital firms Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Sequoia Capital, as well as Sherpalo Ventures, DAG Ventures and Crosslink Capital, says it is on pace to deliver more than 1 billion streams per month by the end of 2012. It has more 40 shows in production, ranging from technology to comedy and general entertainment. 
 
 
 
 
 
 Gene Kirkwood and Ron Bloom
– Rebekah Brooks, the woman who ran Rupert Murdoch's British newspaper unit and is now facing criminal charges in its phone-hacking scandal, is going Hollywood. But not exactly in a good way. A new studio called BiteSize Entertainment is developing a feature film about Brooks and her fall from power, says the Hollywood Reporter. It will be based on Suzanna Andrews' Vanity Fair article about "mystery woman" Brooks, which, among other things, calls her the "fantasy daughter" of Murdoch, “the daughter he always wished he had, the one who never argued with him, who devoted her life to pleasing him." It's still so early in the process that no writer, director, or actors have been hired. The Telegraph, though, thinks Nicole Kidman would do nicely.