For Immediate Release on Entertainment Drive Released by Beck/Smith Bruce Campbell Goes Online Daily Hollywood -- May 13, 1996 -- Bruce Campbell is down in Mexico in "a little sleepy town called Barra de Navidad" shooting "McHale's Navy" with Tom Arnold. "I bought some very thick books and my computer," he says. The former "Adventures of Brisco County, Jr." star took his computer with him because he likes to go online on the Internet daily. "I do a lot of fan correspondence," explains Campbell. "It's the closest to grass-roots sort of stuff you can do. Other fans have set up Websites on me and if I want to find out a fact about me I can look it up. It's great fun to leave cryptic notes saying, 'Aah, you didn't quite get that fact right, but nice try!'" Then whenever they send me an e-mail back I have to take the next three e-mails to convince them it's really me who's e-mailing them. I usually play the trivia game -- I say, 'All right, ask me three questions you figure only I would know.' Then of course, their response is, 'If only you would know, then how would I even know to ask that question?' I just say, 'Okay, it's not me.'" Campbell, who also stars in the upcoming Disney remake of "The Love Bug," says that sometimes he reads strange things about himself on the Internet. "I worked with director Sam Raimi for a hundred years. We went to high school together and we're good friends. Then one day I read on the Internet that we had a falling out. So it's like, gee, I wonder what we argued about? The Internet is the modern-day version of that telephone game where 30 kids stand in a line and you whisper something into one kid's ear, then he passes it along and by the end it comes out completely different." Campbell says that's part of the reason he likes to go online. "I actually do ten percent of it just as damage control. The Internet is a great big gauge of what people's perception of you is," he notes. "If they haven't seen everything you've done, they figure you must be sitting on a corner drinking Woolite or something. One guy said he was wondering if I was working the night window at Taco Bell. My response was, 'I got fired from Taco Bell. Now I'm working the night window at Burger King.'" Patti LuPone: Broadway Mom Hollywood -- May 14, 1996 -- Patti LuPone's had to rearrange several singing dates to take over from Zoe Caldwell as Maria Callas in Terrence McNally's hit Broadway play "Master Class" on July 2. However, she's more concerned about juggling her schedule to optimize her time with her five-year-old son Josh. "It's a bit of a dilemma," says LuPone, who lives in Connecticut with husband Matt Johnston. "I don't live that far out of the city, so I'm hoping I can commute occasionally. If I ever become comfortable in the role and find out I have the physical stamina to commute, that's just what I'll do so I can be home with my family. It's difficult. I can't even say I think I have it under control -- I'm doing the best I can." Fortunately, says LuPone, young Josh "has got a great father who's right there for him. So it's not that we've sort of shoved him off on a nanny. He's got one of his parents there while I perform." And when she can't make it home, LuPone says at least her husband will be able to bring Josh into New York on occasion since he'll be out of school for the summer. She says the youngster has already become a theater rat. "When we were doing 'Patti LuPone on Broadway' he would love coming into the city so he could go backstage. He hung out with the musicians and stagehands. I'm sure he'll be backstage [this summer] as much as possible." LuPone recalls that the first time Josh saw her on stage was in London in "Sunset Boulevard." "He was only three and a half and I told my husband, 'Take him out of the theater before the gunshot scene.' " That's not what happened. She says that father and son "sat in a box during the matinee and my husband told me that 20 minutes into the show Josh turned around and said, 'This is good!' -- and I wasn't even on stage. Then he sat all the way through the gunshot scene, which I thought was going to freak him out." She adds that Josh has already started warbling on his own. "He actually sings some of my songs." Boxleitner Says There Is Now Closure on "Babylon 5" Hollywood -- May 15, 1996 -- "Babylon 5" fans are finding out what actually happened to the show's original Commander played by Michael O'Hare in the special two-part "War Without End" segment airing in syndication this week. When the show's current Commander, Bruce Boxleitner, initally took over from O'Hare, there was no explanation given for the change. "His whole story line had to come to closure because he sort of disappeared, and this answers a lot of those questions people had," says Boxleitner. He says he has nothing but praise for O'Hare for returning. "He was a total gentleman to come back and do this," says Boxleitner. "I thought it was very brave of him because if I was let go or had to leave a show I would probably tell them to F.O. and put a lot of distance between us. But he didn't, and I commend him for that." Boxleitner says he and O'Hare hit it off great. "I'm sure people want to think there was animosity and all that but there wasn't anything like that....We sat and comiserated on the pressures of doing this show." He and O'Hare will have even more time to get together and comiserate in June when they head to Blackpool, England, for the "Babylon 5" convention. "The much-awaited two Commanders are going to get up and talk," says Boxleitner, adding with a laugh, "I can't wait -- I'll probably be hearing a lot of 'I like him better!'" Former Cop-Cum-Author Wambaugh Defends Cop Hollywood -- May 16, 1996 -- Joe Wambaugh has never been the biggest fan of Hollywood -- although the 14-year LAPD veteran used to be a big dog in town, what with movies like the adaptation of his "The Onion Field" and TV including the acclaimed "Police Story," on which he served as consultant and frequent writer. Now living in San Diego, and launching his 15th novel, "Floaters," Wambaugh's concerned that the movie and television industry's depiction of cops -- especially L.A. cops - - is soon to go downhill. That's because projects developed in the wake of the Rodney King beating case and the O. J. Simpson trial have had time to gestate and are now about due. Says Wambaugh, "These world-famous lawyers Alan Dershowitz and Barry Shech and the rest were out there claiming large numbers of cops and civilians conspired to frame an absolutely innocent celebrity. That gives anyone in Hollywood who feels so inclined more license to make denigrating movies about the police, to paint rogue cops as the norm....And it's such a shame, because the department has never needed support more badly than it does now." "Independence Day": Like Nothing We've Seen Before, Says Producer Hollywood -- May 17, 1996 -- "Independence Day" producer Dean Devlin promises us, "You'll see things in the movie you've never seen before -- like 150 fighter planes doing battle with 200 alien airships in the skies over New York, L.A., and Washington, D.C." As far as special effects, over 6,000 shots were taken to create 400 visual effects shots, he says. Devlin, who co-wrote the film with its director, Roland Emmerich, points out, "There are over 140 speaking roles in the movie -- and not one ego among them. I've never seen anything like it." The "Independence" cast includes Will Smith, Bill Pullman, Jeff Goldblum, Mary McDonnell, Randy Quaid, and Robert Loggia. Devlin says that he and Emmerich wrote the script in a month, "in a house we rented in Puerta Villarta, Mexico. We finished it on a Tuesday, our agent received it on Wednesday and sent it off to Fox, who bought it on Friday. The following Monday we were in pre-production." Asked if he isn't concerned about so much competition for the box-office dollar this summer among action pics, he says, "I believe event films help each other. If you enjoy one, you want to see another. My only hope is that the rest will be the of the quality that will make audiences want to see ours." Copyright (c) 1996 Beck/Smith Ent.