VAULTING INTO THE MOVIES

This article was published in the August 23, 2025 issue

The seeds of their partnership were planted in 10th grade. In a geometry class. Matthew Lehman was on the track and field team at San Dieguito high school  – a pole vaulter. He urged Chris Lieber to come out and try his hand. 

“He dragged me out there. I was terrible,” said Lieber. 

But an important pattern had been set. When Lehman had a crazy idea, he knew he had a guy he could call. 

Fast forward three decades, give or take. By this point, Lehman was a successful realtor/broker in Mammoth Lakes. 

And yet, he had a little Chili Palmer in him (The mafioso gone Hollywood in Elmore Leonard’s “Get Shorty”). “I’ve always had a passion for film,” Lehman told The Sheet this week, “Particularly Westerns.” 

And Lehman had just finished Jim Reed’s fine book, “The Fatal Affair in Convict Canyon.” (An excerpt from Lunch’s 2014 review appears on the facing page.)

Lehman thought to himself, “Damnit, this would make a good movie.” 

So he called his buddy Lieber, who had ventured into film around the turn of the century when the proliferation of digital cameras were democratizing the entertainment industry. 

He has since built a nice little resume.

The pair kicked the idea around for awhile, spoke to Reed … but then life intervened. Covid intervened some more. 

But then the parties revived the idea. 

And in the interim, Lieber had met a man named Michael MacBride, a PhD in 19th century American literature who hails from Shakopee, Minnesota just south of Minneapolis. 

MacBride is one of those guys who just thrives on research – as a hobby. He reads century-old newspapers for fun. 

I liked him instantly. And I especially liked the roundabout tale that introduced him to Lieber. 

MacBride had uncovered a random story about a vandal who shot a painting by one Merton Clivette (1868-1931).

The painting was supposed to be worth $50,000 at the time. 

But further research stumped MacBride. He couldn’t find an image of the painting in question, though he did uncover a lot more about the artist, a Renaissance man who was also a magician, writer, vaudevillian and entertainer. 

MacBride eventually located some of Clivette’s surviving family members, including a great-grandnephew – Chris Lieber. 

The two became friends and MacBride ended up writing a book on Clivette (A website dedicated to the painter: clivette.com, is curated by Lieber). 

Anyway, the film vet and the Ph.D decided to collaborate on a screen adaptation of Reed’s book, and as MacBride told The Sheet, it’s been a rewarding experience, but not without its challenges, as you’ve essentially got four chefs in the kitchen (including Lehman and Reed), each with their own vision. 

While the movie, whose working title is “Death in Convict Canyon,” largely hews to Reed’s well-researched book.

“It would be pie in the sky to be entirely historically accurate,” says Lieber. “But we got pretty close.” 

One concession they made was in relation to one of the main masterminds 

of the train robbery. In real life, he was caught and never made it out of jail – he wasn’t part of the later prison break that eventually ended at Convict Lake. 

But as Lieber says, “You don’t hire Brad Pitt for half the movie.” The character couldn’t simply disappear. 

This weekend the would-be filmmakers will have a booth at Mammoth Rocks – a longstanding Mammoth summer event which Lehman co-founded in 2009 to drive business coming out of the Great Recession and the Town’s near-bankruptcy (due to losing in litigation. The damage: $47 million over 23 years). 

As Lehman says, “We just want to let people know what we’re doing, and there’s a crowdfunding opportunity if they’d like to be part of it.” 

As Lieber says, “You don’t know who might be interested until you tell them about it.” 

Lehman has already done some location scouting and was very keen on  Virginia City, which he thinks will be perfect for several scenes. 

Virginia City is where Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) cut his teeth as a young journalist. 

And Mr. Clemens was also the subject of Michael MacBride’s doctoral dissertation. 

One can only assume he’ll make a cameo!

So stop by at Mammoth Rocks and pay Mssrs. Lehman and Lieber a visit. At the very least, you can ask about Lehman’s high school-best 15’7” vault in 1988.