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Monday, August 30, 1993
UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Fall TV schedule proves not all the world is a stage
By Frazier Moore
The Associated Press
NEW YORK — Miami gets "Empty Nest." St. Louis gets "The John Larroquette show." Massachussett's Nantucket Island gets 'Wings'
Or, shame to say, even your states!
But for all of you who live in Birmingham, Ala., or Hartford, Conn., or Rapid City, S.D. — well, prime-time TV doesn't know your towns exist.
In fact, not a single TV series on the fall schedule is set in any one of more than half of the United States. That means one-third of the population won't have a single home-state TV show to call its own. This, according to a new survey called "Hometowns of PrimeTime TV," compiled by the N.W. Ayer advertising agency.
Numbers crunchers there concluded that in the fall line, urban areas remain vastly overrepresented. Only 16 percent of all the nation's residents are city-dwellers, yet cities are the site of 44 percent of all regular series, says the report.
No fewer than 13 series will take place in the New York City metropolitan area. Nine are set in Los Angeles. Seven in Chicago. Four in Miami.
Meanwhile, much of the nation, including a wide swath of the heartland, will be out of sight and out of mind — on the networks, that is.
Of course, there's the empty honor of being a plug-in town for a series whose setting doesn't mean beans.
Or "Hangin' With Mr. Cooper"? (It's San Francisco.)
Or "Step by Step"? (It's Port Washington. Wis.)
For instance, do you even know where "Family Matters" is set? (It's Chicago.)
In the past, TV shows whose locale didn't matter were set in a generic netherworld in some unidentified Midwestern state. And funny how often the town names ended in "field." ("Leave it to Beaver") took place in "May"; "Father Knows Best" took place in "Spring."
On the other hand, Bostonians were, and probably always will be, proud to claim the highly indigenous "Cheers." Now that it's off prime time, Seattle residents are surely ready to embrace its new spinoff, "Frasier." Never mind that both series claim their real home in a Paramount Pictures soundstage in Hollywood.
But then, the state for most series locations is only a state of mind.
'Fugitive' runs up $14.4 million
Associated Press
LOS ANGELES — "The Fugitive" keep enough moviegoers running to theaters to remain atop the box office charts for a fourth consecutive weekend.
The film, based on the 1960s television series about a doctor wrongly accused of killing his wife, took in an estimated $14.4 million, an industry source said yesterday.
The new Stephen King's terror flick, "Needful Things," opened in second place, earning about $5.3 million. The Jean-Claude Van Damme action movie "Hard Target," took in an estimated $4.7 million for third place.
"The Man Without a Face," starring Mel Gibson as a disfigured recluse, had its debut in fourth place with an
expected $4.1 million in ticket sales.
Since its Wednesday opening, it has collected $5.2 million.
"The Secret Garden" earned $3.2 million for the No. 5 spot, followed by "Jurassic Park" with $2.9 million and "Rising Sun" with $2.8 million.
Rounding out the Top 10 were "In the Line of Fire" with $2.7 million, "Sleepless in Seattle" with $2.1 million and "Free Willy" with $2 million.
Debut films that didn't make the Top 10 were "The Son of the Pink Panther," "Only The Strong" and "Fatherhood," which each collected an estimated $1.2 million.
The figures are based on estimated tickets sales from Friday through yesterday. Final figures will be released today.
Many moods flow on Joel's 'Dreams'
New album plays both angry, light
The Associated Press
ALBANY, N.Y. — Billy Joel is still a New York driver.
A conversation from his car phone, as he drives from office to home in Long Island's swanky Hamptons, is punctuated by angry bursts at fellow motorists and dark mutterings about cars that have New Jersey license plates.
It's a mellower Billy Joel at age 44 — but not too mellow.
"Huh? What? You want me to run them over? OK, thank you."
In between shouts, Joel talked about a loss in faith brought about by long-running legal problems, his family's inspiration for his work and a desire to the songwriting chronicler of middle age.
At least initially, fans are responding. His new album, "River of Dreams," entered the Billboard album chart at No 1, following eight of 10 previous studio albums that hit the Top 10. The opening dates of what Joel said would be his last extended tour were immediate sellouts.
He spoke just before depositions began in preparation for a trial on the $90 million lawsuit he brought against Frank Weber, his ex-manager and former brother-in-law.
His legal problems were compounded early in August when a struggling songwriter filed a lawsuit charging him with cheating. He was offered to the singer years ago.
When Joel started writing songs for "River of Dreams" more than a year ago, he found the music reflected his mood — bitter, angry, wounded.
"I had the blues," he said. "I thought, who the hell am I to write that kind of stuff because the perception of me is that I'm this hugely successful pop
star who's married to Christie Brinkley and who the hell am I to have the blues?
"I didn't want to say that I did. And I put it off and put it off. I was in a quandary. I borrowed a page from John Lennon because he was never one to hold back the way that he was feeling. I thought if he could do that, maybe I could try to do that."
So it's an angry Joel as his album opens. He rants about crumbling suburbia in "No Man's Land" and proceeds into the fully veiled attack on Weber in "The Great Wall of China."
And then a funny thing happens.
Joel lightens up. His mood improves appreciably, and by the second half of the album he's singing love songs to his wife and 7-year-old daughter, Alexa Ray.
The sequencing of the album mirrors the order in which the songs were written.
The key to the transformation is one line from "The Great Wall of China"
that Joel apparently took to heart:
"You only beat me if you get me to hate."
"There's a story about a loss of faith and a crisis and because of that, a philosophical realization and a reaffirmation of what is substantive and a reaffirmation of faith," he said. "In the end, that's the story of my life."
Joel updates "Uptown Girl" in a teen song about his wife. "All About Soul" is about the powerful, unspoken bond between husband and wife.
Joel originally began producing his album himself but realized he needed a musical foil.
His "Lullaby (Goodnight, My Angel)" was sparked by a conversation with his daughter as he tucked her into bed.
Danny Kortchmar, who has worked with Don Henley and Neil Young, was brought in. Musically, the result is an aggressive rock album — The Piano Man's favorite instrument is buried underneath a wall of guitars.
The Associated Press
Fall movie lineup caters to sophisticated, serious tastes
LOS ANGELES — When Hollywood wants to make serious movies, it knows just where to look — it looks elsewhere.
With Labor Day approaching and the summer film season winding down, the studios are making an artistic about-face. Instead of calculated crowd pleasers such as "Jurassic Park," "In the Line of Fire" and "The Fugitive," the fall movie lineup is filled with distinctly intelligent, high-minded works.
Broadway and bookshelves.
But only a handful of these films were born on the back lot. Some of the more notable fall releases — "The Joy Luck Club," "Short Cuts," "Six Degrees of Separation" — are not based on original screenplays. Instead, these and a half-dozen other autumn movies are adapted from hit plays, accclaimed novels or short stories.
With kids back in school, fall moviegoers are generally older and crave more sophisticated works. Trouble is a filmmaker rarely stumbles across a script that will satisfy this audience and these tastes. Most screenplays, in fact, are cookie-cutter variations on familiar themes.
So Hollywood producers turn to
"They sort of have to because they can't come up with anything that is serious on their own," said Robert Altman, who adapted "Short Cuts" from the pensive stories of Raymond Carver. "You don't just sit down and knock off a farther profound piece of work."
Fred Schepisi, director of "Six Degrees of Separation," said, "It's very hard to convince Hollywood to allow you to write original or different material. They also have this disease called the three-week rewrite. When you have something rewritten that fast, it can't be as deep as a novel that's taken three years to write."
Though there will be several lowbrow fall action films, including Bruce Willis in "Striking Distance" and "Demolition Man" with Sylvester Stallone and Wesley Snipes, adaptations will play a prominent role through November:
In "The Age of the Innocence," director Martin Scorsese retells Edith Wharton's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel. His performers include Michelle Pfeiffer and Daniel Day-Lewis.
David Cronenberg directs Jeremy Irons in "M. Butterfly," based on David Huwang's Tony-winning drama of sexual deception and obsession. It is only the second film Cronenberg ("Dead Ringers") directed that he didn't write himself.
"Even Cowgirls Get the Blues," Tom Robbins' wild novel about a hitchiker and a lot more, is being adapted by Gus Van Sant ("My Own Private idaho"). It stars Keanu Reeves and Uma Thurman.
The director-screenwriter-producer trio that made "Howards End" is adapting "The Remains of the Day," Kazuo Ishiguro's wistful novel about an English butler. The cast is headed by Anthony Hopkins and Emma Thompson.
Of course, simply adapting a play or novel is rarely a painless process. Some books, such as Michael Crichton's "Jurassic Park," are so straightforward and cinematic they translate easily to the screen.
Other works are far more complicated.
"The Remains of the Day" on paper is essentially an extended monologue of reminiscences. Thanks to Robbins' vivid style, "Even Cowgirls Get the Blues" is as much an exercise in writing as it is in storytelling. "And The Joy Luck Club" is a complicated compendium of many intersecting lives.
Altman's "Short Cuts" has 22 character units by experience, accident
and geography. It also runs 3 hours,
seven minutes.
Not a standard summer film but right at home in the fall.
"I would have hated my film to be released in the summer. I wouldn't have allowed it," Altman said. "The tenor of attitude changes in the autumn."
"I don't think this is a typical movie. But any progress or change has to come from something atypical."
Altman's film is an interpretation of Carver's prose. Similarly, "Six Degrees of Separation" starts in some places where John Guare's play stops.
Adapted by Guare, the film follows as wealthy New York family whose home and life is transformed by a visitor who proves too good to be true.
"I just think it is such a marvelous play of ideas," said director Schepisi. Nevertheless, he added, it needed to be adapted for the screen, not just filmed on stage.
"You'll be amazed at how much the same it is and how different it is in presentation." Schepisi said.
There's only one concern with so many refined movies coming out at the same time, Schepisi said. "All the good ones will come out and kill one another off."