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For Immediate Release on Entertainment Drive
Released By Beck/Smith
Cat Fight Thrills Producer
Hollywood -- March 18, 1996 -- "Central Park West" creator-producer
Darren Starr is thrilled with the footage collected last
week in New York's posh Four Seasons restaurant -- where Raquel
Welch and Lauren Hutton engaged in a cat fight that ended in
the decorative pool of the famed eatery. "We had been looking
for a classic New York place for their squaring-off. At one
point, we were thinking about a snowball fight -- but the snow
from the blizzard melted too soon." There's been no cat fighting
between Lauren and Raquel off camera, he wants us to know.
"They're both total pros, and had a good time playing the
conflict between their characters." That conflict: fighting over
Gerald McRaney, a media tycoon in the revamped "Park." Lauren
loves him, but Raquel, his ex, has her fingernails embedded in
him, figuratively speaking. It'll be a while before viewers get
to see the Four Seasons femme fracas. CBS isn't bringing
"Central Park West" back until summer, and the sequence won't be
seen until the closing episode of the season. By the way, Starr
assures that although the new version of the series focuses on
powerful families, there's still plenty of action centered on the
younger crowd in the saga.
Rotten Time Had By All
Hollywood -- March 19, 1996 -- Sure, it's only Tuesday, but we
think there's already a lock on honors for the bizarre showbiz
event of the week. That is, yesterday's London press conference
announcing the return -- and world tour -- of the Sex Pistols.
Our source on the scene relates that at the conference there were
transvestites serving jellied eels -- jellied eels are a working-class
delicacy, in case you didn't know. And, of course, Johnny
Rotten and the other Pistols went out of their way to make
everyone in attendance very uncomfortable. Here are some sample
exchanges: One of the gigs they're going to play in England,
June 23, is at Finsbury park, which is essentially a large field.
The press asked, "Do you think your older fans are going to be
there?" Rotten replied, "I hope it rains and all the geriatrics'
wheelchairs get stuck in the mud." On another front, a reporter
asked if the group was reuniting for the money. Rotten said, "I
don't really need the cash. Well, maybe just a little bit more.
The tax man will make all the money anyway." Rotten told press
people who harped on the money issue: "You never attack all your pop
stars here who are making all this money, just because the Sex
Pistols emerged from the working class, are you trying to suggest
that we're not authentic because we want money?...The working
class fucking deserves to make money!" The name of the tour is "Never
Mind the Sex Pistols, Here's the Filthy Lucre," which is British
slang for ill-gotten gains. They reportedly called the tour what
they did because it takes away the sting that anyone could
accuse them of doing it for the money -- but obviously, that plan
wasn't foolproof. The Sex Pistols begin their U.S. tour in July
for six weeks. No opening acts have been set as yet, but you'd
better believe they'll be hotly contested.
Chaos Part of Process on "NewsRadio" Set
Hollywood -- March 20, 1996 -- Dave Foley, who stars as the news
director on "NewsRadio," reveals, "Chaos continues to be a
big part of our creative process. The writers and actors are
constantly trying to improve the material. Everyone is changing
things to the last minute -- sometimes even during shooting.
It's not unusual for the producer or the writers to change
something while we're taping. So everyone has to be sharp."
With such a system, taping of the half-hour show can take hours --
literally. "Sometimes taping takes five hours -- which is too
long for anyone to be forced to watch a TV show. I think the
U.N. should step in at that point." The average taping time for
the sitcom, says the former member of the Kids in the Hall
comedy troupe, is about two hours. As far as reports that he's
estranged from the old troupe, he says, "We don't have time to see
one another. We're all working solo careers. The group went its
separate ways, but then we didn't really get together socially
since we started out working clubs and would hang out together."
Berenger's Substitute Drama
Hollywood -- March 21, 1996 -- Tom Berenger, who has decades of
credits in productions including "Platoon" and "Gettysburg," says
that the April 12-debuting feature "The Substitute" was among
his most unforgettable experiences in making a film. The Live
Entertainment feature casts Tom as a former mercenary who becomes
a substitute teacher of an inner-city high school after another
teacher is incapacitated in a gang shooting. They used 26 kids
in the movie who had formerly been Miami gang members,with ages
ranging from 17 to 20. Berenger agreed with the film's director
that it was vital to prep their young cast. "We did two or three
weeks of rehearsals and costumes and all that....Every morning we
did acting classes with them." Berenger focused on warning the
group about the chores of making a film. "I told them, 'The days
are going to be extremely long, at least 12 hours.' I wanted
them to be prepared that the process would probably be more
grueling and grinding than they might expect...maybe 120 setups
in a day, doing each scene over and over and over and over
again." He also told them, "The windows will be closed as much
as possible to keep the noise out. The air conditioning will be
turned off because we can't have the sound on the soundtrack.
And the lights will pump up the heat, so it could get to be 110
degrees in here. You are going to get tired. You should try not
to wear yourselves out at the beginning of the day; pace
yourselves. The 10th and 11th hours will really get grinding..."
What was the response? "They listened, they were quiet,"
Berenger says. And when the camera started rolling? "They were
pretty good, I have to admit, for rambunctious young
kids....Actually, they were pretty wonderful. And they were
fun. They got me laughing quite a few times. It was different
for me." Despite Berenger's warnings and the arduous work
itself, several of the novice actors have apparently been bitten
by the thespian bug -- and have gone on to more theater arts
training, auditions, etc.
Animator Up for Triple Oscar
Hollywood -- March 22, 1996 -- Double Oscar winner Nick Park,
up for Academy Award honors again for his "A Close Shave"
animated short film, is now poised to make the move into a full-length
animated feature. The Englishman, whose charmingly quirky
fare usually involves his man and dog characters named Wallace
and Gromit, says he's leaving the two behind for the 90-minute
film. "I've been doing them on and off since my college
graduation film in 1983. It's time to work on something else."
He doesn't want to give away his feature storyline -- "It's top
secret" -- but will go so far as to say it's about animals. Park
considers the forthcoming Disney release "James and the Giant
Peach" potentially helpful to him -- if it's successful.
"James" will help get audiences used to stop-motion animation,
although, as he points out, "We use clay as opposed to latex and
cloth, the materials they used. But both techniques involve
figures with metal skeletons that are moved in an excruciatingly
painstaking process." Adds Park, "As an animator you begin to
appreciate what a second really is, and how much can be put into
a second." On a day in which he's moving very quickly, "we can
do maybe 3 seconds' worth of filming in a day. It sounds very
little, but for animators it's very good."
Copyright (c) 1996 Beck/Smith Ent.
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