By Steve Friess

he ultimate bad boy of poker is now 44, owns a record 11 World Series of poker bracelets and has netted more than $10 million in tournament prize earnings. of course, that’s not enough for Phil Hellmuth, the Madison, Wisconsin-born college dropout whose antics have become legendary. ever since he won his first hand, Hellmuth has wanted to become the first to transcend his game and become a well-known pop-culture icon on par with a Michael Phelps or Tiger Woods, something that could happen if two film projects come to be—namely the biopic The Madison Kid and the star studded documentary Quest for Twelve, about Hellmuth’s effort to extend his WSOP bracelet record. both have seen stumbles; the biopic stalled in 2006 when Hayden Christensen dropped out, and the documentary failed to get a berth at this year’s Cannes Film Festival.

Still, Hellmuth’s already got one up on Phelps and Woods. Last year Miller Brewing Company put his face on 12 million beer cans as a promotion. “That was one of the coolest things that ever happened to me,” he enthuses ...

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