By David Poland poland@moviecitynews.com
Spielberg and More
According to the New York Post, home of many publicists’ fantasies, comes the story that Ray Liotta, who plays Frank Sinatra in HBO’s “The Rat Pack,” received a model of a bloody horse’s head (like in The Godfather) with a note signed with Tina Sinatra‘s initials. It could be true or it could just be a stunt. Having had some dealings with her in an early life, Tina is one of the people I would least like ticked off at me for something I published, and she is not happy about “The Rat Pack.” Upcoming gifts to be sent to the movie set could include a box with Sammy Davis Jr.’s eye, Peter Lawford‘s fingerprint-laden/Marilyn Monroe-killing syringe and Joey Bishop‘s career.
MORE SPIELBERG: Last week, Steven Spielberg bought a novel on Charles Lindbergh. This week, he’s contemplating New Line’s project, The Notebook. It’s a Jeremy Leven (Don Juan DeMarco) script based on the Nicholas Sparks‘ bestseller in which a man reads his diary to his sick spouse. Sounds more kind of like a soft core porn movie found at 3 a.m. on HBO than a Spielberg movie. If you hear later that Steve’s signed Tom Hanks and Shannon Tweed, watch out.
SEYMORE BUTTS: For those of you who love Dennis Franz in “NYPD Blue,” he’ll be repeating one of his most infamous TV moments by showing his butt in the upcoming City of Angels. I was looking forward to the film until reading that. I mean, Nicolas Cage, Meg Ryan (who gets a lot of words in tomorrow’s new The Whole Picture) and Andre Braugher, one of my favorite little-known actors on one hand. Semi-nude Franz on the other. Everybody else. Semi-nude Franz. OK, I’m still going to see the film, but I may avert my eyes.
ON THE MONEY TRAIN, AGAIN: After being reamed by Variety last week for reporting that Jim Cameron would get more than $100 million for Titanic from Fox and Paramount, The Hollywood Reporter reported Monday the deal was finally done on Friday. This, of course, is the second Fox story this month that was greeted with surprise by the trades when it happened. The other being the Star Wars deal. Yet every day both trades – and often The Hot Button – report news of deals that have yet to be signed. That is how this business works. Actors often don’t sign their real contracts until films are well into production or even after the films have wrapped. Who was it that said rumors were just facts that haven’t been confirmed yet? It’s not always true, but in the case of Cameron’s payday, it inevitably was.
ADVENTURES OF STUD BOY: Producer Tom Cruise has grabbed the English-language remake rights to the Spanish film, Open Your Eyes. The film is about an obsessive lover who gets back at the dumper after getting dumped. After being trained in obsessive love stories at the foot of director Stanley Kubrick, Cruise and his producing partner, Paula Wagner, have set a shooting schedule for the unscripted, uncast project for 17 months and 11 days.
JUST WONDERING: Anyone out there excited about The Players Club, The Big One, City of Angels or Species II?
FROM BIG SCREEN TO SMALL: Has Helen Hunt‘s Oscar helped open the door to TV for movie actors? Well, this year’s pilot season offers Nathan Lane, Samantha Mathis, Lori Petty, Julie Hagerty and Joan Plowright, plus Madchen Amick and Malcolm McDowell on the brand new “Fantasy Island.” The countdown to the Sharon Stone sitcom begins now. Meanwhile, Martin Scorsese is joining Barry Levinson as a TV executive producer, making a deal with ABC that includes a 13-episode commitment to a new series from novelist Nicholas Pileggi whose Wiseguys was turned into Goodfellas. Not a sitcom. And finally, TNT has increased its schedule of original films from eight to 13 for next year, filling the place of the lost NFL package. So the odds have increased significantly for “Dave: Portrait of An Obnoxious Columnist,” starring Meeno Peluce as the young Dave, Antonio Sabato, Jr. as the vain and egomaniacal current Dave and Robert Foster as the older/still-hasn’t-happened-yet Dave.
HER TWO CENTS: Every time you buy a Heather Graham doll from Lost In Space (OK, I guess it’s a Judy Robinson doll) Heather gets two cents from every dollar you spend. Heather’s Rollergirl doll from Boogie Nights gets $200 an hour and if you try and remove her head, she kicks you in the groin with her skates over and over again, screaming “You can’t disrespect me!”
AND HIS GOOD SENSE: Lost In Space director Stephen Hopkins and the LIS crew is already signed for the sequel, but Hopkins is already saying publicly that he isn’t “sure if [he] did a good job or not.” Reviews of Hopkins directing accomplishment are mixed, but he was smart enough not to say publicly what every man watching the movie was thinking, which was, “Who cares about his career as a director? He got Heather Graham in bed!”
READER OF THE DAY: From killcows: “I have discovered THE REAL TRUTH about Hollywood . THERE IS NO HOLLYWOOD. It’s just a big set built underground in L.A. where all the REAL sleaze hang out and have sex, push drugs and kill each other. All movies are actually chronicles of life on other planets that were discovered by the U.S. government in the 1890s, when the real first trip to the moon occurred. AND ALL HOLLYWOOD STARS ARE REALLY ALIENS AND ARE REALLY GAY. That explains everything.”
