July 16, 1999

Edited by Lew Irwin
Copyright 1999, Studio Briefing. All Rights Reserved

Please support Studio Briefing by clicking on the above ad.
Lew Irwin's Sinatra: A Man Remembered is available online from Amazon Bookstore. For information, click here.

A CALL FOR PHIL MORRIS?

Castle Rock president Glenn Padnick has confirmed that his company is working on a Seinfeld spinoff featuring Phil Morris, who played the series' slick attorney Jackie Chiles. Morris originally let the cat out of the bag at a meeting with TV reporters at the summer press tour in Pasadena when he indicated that the show was being exec produced by Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David, co-creators of Seinfeld, and that it would formally be presented to NBC within the next two weeks. Today's Washington Post quoted Padnick as saying that while Seinfeld and David had given their blessing to the show, they have not agreed to be actively involved with it. He also said that, although NBC will be given first dibs on the series, it will not be pitched to them within two weeks.

PAYBACK TIME?

The NBC Today show was not given the opportunity to interview Tom Cruise or Nicole Kidman because it refused last April to agree to a condition for an interview with Calista Flockhart: that she not be asked questions about her weight, the New York Post reported today (Friday), citing media insiders. Flockhart, Kidman and Cruise are all clients of the PR agency PMK. The agency denies the claim.

CNN'S NEWSSTAND TO FOLD

CNN's NewsStand feature, which started off on the wrong foot with the "Operation Tailwind" report a year ago, is about to fold, the Hollywood Reporter reported today (Friday), citing sources familiar with the plans. The trade paper said that CNN intends to retain the title for a new 10:00 p.m. newscast that will use resources from Time Inc. publications. A formal announcement of the cable news network's plans is expected to be made over the weekend by CNN president Richard Kaplan at the summer press tour.

UMPS STRIKE OUT WITH NETS

TV networks and stations carrying major league baseball games claimed Thursday that they were not concerned about the prospect of an umpire walk-out. Electronic Media quoted Fox spokesman Vince Wladika as saying, "As long as the umpires know when to stop the game and when to start the game with regard to our commercials, whatever baseball decides we're fine with."

NETS BIDDING FOR RIGHTS TO COLUMBINE BOOK

A TV movie based on an upcoming book by the mother of one of the victims of the Columbine shootings is in the works, according to the New York Post. The newspaper reported today (Friday) that the TV networks are in a bidding war for rights to the book by Cassie Bernall, the mother of Misty Bernall, who reportedly was shot when one of the high-school gunmen asked her if she believed in God. The book, She Said Yes: The Unlikely Martyrdom of Cassie Bernall, is due to be published in September. Jonathan Lazear, the agent representing the book, told the Post: "There were some people who felt uncomfortable" about a Columbine movie, fearing they would be accused of exploiting the tragedy. "But once they read and understood the synopsis, they said it was not exploitative at all."

STAR TREK 101

In an apparent attempt to lure more students into science studies, the University of Glamorgan in Wales is offering a degree in Science and Science Fiction, in which courses about Star Trek and The X-Files will be included. Although students will have to complete conventional courses in such areas as math, physics, astronomy and chemistry, the overall program, as described in today's London Independent, "appears to be a sci-fi buff's dream," with students being required to watch the Star Wars trilogy "to explore modern mythology" and Star Trek episodes "to understand the ideals of utopian societies."

"SHELL SHOCKED"

Warner Bros. co-chairmen and CEOs Robert Daly and Terry Semel confirmed Thursday that they are stepping down. In a statement, the two gave no specific reason for their decision, stating generally that for them, "now is the right time for us to move on" and "if ever there were an appropriate time ... that time is now." In an interview with today's (Friday) Los Angeles Times, Daly and Semel denied that they were leaving the company under pressure or as the result of any contract dispute. DreamWorks principal David Geffen told today's Wall Street Journal, "They've been thinking about this for six months. It was a combination of wanting to leave on top and making so much money that they could literally do anything they wanted." Today's (Friday) Washington Post said that executives at the studio were "shell-shocked" by the announcement. It quoted one of them (unnamed) as saying, "I don't think 'shocked' is the word. I was stunned. Speechless, actually. ... The reaction here is very mixed emotions. Everyone loves Bob and Terry -- people are not here to work for a studio, they're here to work for Bob and Terry."

MOVIE REVIEWS: THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT

There is something revealing about the nature of movie making in the fact that an odd horror film made on a shoestring budget and starring unknowns is receiving better reviews, by and large, than one of the most hyped films of the year, starring a superstar couple and directed by one of the most respected figures of the medium. Indeed, many critics are suggesting that The Blair Witch Project is not only a more inventive film than Stanley Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut, but that it may also become more successful at the box office. Desmond Ryan in the Philadelphia Inquirer describes the film as "that rarest of accomplishments in a field notorious for tedium and repetition -- an original horror movie." But originality for its own sake is no great virtue. Lloyd Rose in the Washington Post pays the film the ultimate honor, calling it: "The scariest movie I've ever seen." Even the fact that much of the movie is shot on Super 8 video apparently works for it, since the plot hinges on a group of student filmmakers who are investigating reports of ghosts. Jay Carr in the Boston Globe writes that the "graininess, blurriness, and jerky camera movements" help make the creepiness "as real and as terrifying as you could hope for." But it's all too much for Edward Guthman, who writes in today's San Francisco Chronicle: "The Blair Witch Project is neither fun nor exhilarating in that adrenaline-inducing way we're accustomed to from horror movies. It's just dreadful and draining and, for some of us, literally sickening."

MOVIE REVIEWS: EYES WIDE SHUT

If Stanley Kubrick had lived to read the reviews of Eyes Wide Shut, he would have found them familiar, a mixture of high praise, fault-finding and outright derision -- in other words, the kind of reviews his films have generally received. On the one hand, there is Geoff Pevere, who writes in the Toronto Star: "As a last word, Eyes Wide Shut is a good one, as good as any we might have imagined." And there is this from Janet Maslin in The New York Times: "There is consolation for having to read the words 'The End' on the posthumous work of Kubrick: As a literally spellbinding addition to the Kubrick canon, Eyes Wide Shut would have been greeted with the same fascination had its director not died four days after completing it. And it would go on to rattle audiences in the same quietly devastating way." On the other hand, Jonathan Foreman in the New York Post calls the movie, "Stanley Kubrick's Hindenberg. It's not thrilling. It's not sexy. It combines all the flaws that marred his earlier work." And Steve Murray in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution agrees that the audience for this film will probably be Kubrick fans. "Nonfans," he writes, "will likely have their eyes bored shut." Still, most of the reviews are positive, if weighted with caveats. The London Daily Telegraph sent its film reviewer Quentin Curtis to the U.S. to preview the film. In his review, which appears today, he concludes: "Whether it will win over popular audiences is uncertain. There was some derisive laughter in the packed auditorium where I saw the film. Most, though, seemed held by the movie, if not necessarily convinced. To my mind, it is a worthy addition to one of the most dazzling directorial bodies of work. At any rate, in an age where the infantile rules the multiplex, this adult, intelligent film is the most stimulating of the year so far."

MOVIE REVIEWS: THE WOOD

Virtually all of the critics are giving high marks to The Wood for drawing attention to a neglected segment of the population -- the black middle class. Some further note, however, that any film whose principal characters are black and who aren't either violent or buffoonish ghetto dwellers rarely, if ever, does well at the box office. "So when an African-American romantic comedy like The Wood comes along," writes Vanessa E. Jones in today's Boston Globe, "one is tempted to light a candle to give it some good karma." She then adds: "Unfortunately, that candle probably should be saved for a more worthy candidate." Jonathan Foreman in the New York Post writes similarly, "The mere existence of The Wood is remarkable. Which makes it a shame that The Wood doesn't really work." But Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Time gives the movie a thumbs-up, calling it a "sweet, lighthearted comedy" and commenting that the flash-back scenes in which the main characters recall their youth are "kind of wonderful." And Carrie Rickey in the Philadelphia Inquirer, noting that, like American Pie, the film involves a wager about which friend will lose his virginity first, writes: "But because, finally, it believes in the absolute congruence of physical and romantic love, it is possible to characterize The Wood as the thinking man's American Pie. [Director Rick] Famuyiwa's movie is more interested in the banquet of love than in the dessert tray." And Kevin Thomas in the Los Angeles Times sums it all up succinctly: "The Wood is a winner."

Studio Briefing is also available by fax and e-mail. For information, click here

From: STUDIO BRIEFING
Phone: (818) 865-0044
Fax: (815) 333-2765