Section B · Page 4
The University Daily Kansan
Friday, March 16, 2001
Too much head is no good.
623 Vermont·749-5067
for an application!
Helen Sweetheart of the Internet
Kathie Lee's movie shows her bad side
The Associated Press
During lunch at an Upper East Side Irish pub where Gifford family photos are on the wall and the lamb chops are her favorite, Kathie Lee displays a hearty appetite, a knockout figure and a free-at-last glow.
NEW YORK — The opening moments of Kathie Lee Gifford's new film should give her audience a start.
"My challenge," she explains, "was to make a woman who on the surface looks like a cartoon seem sympathetic; to make her suffering real and her outrageousness understandable.
"I think E! wanted me for this movie for very different reasons than my reasons for wanting to do it," she acknowledges. "They're very honest about that: Whether I'm good or bad in it, there'll be a huge curiosity factor."
"When I read the script," she says, "I thought, this is the very reason I left my show."
Gifford, for her part, saw the role as a declaration of independence. "It's so much fun to be the bad girl!" she crows.
Amanda is beloved as America's TV sweetheart. This gives Gifford cardie blanche to spoof her own wholesome image that everybody either loves, hates, loves to hate or (in the case of tabloid newspaper reporters, for whom Kathie Lee is an irresistible target) loves to bash.
But it gets better. Off the air, Amanda is a fool-mouthed, pill-popping show-biz harpy. Explains her personal manager (played by Howie Mantel): "Success and money mixed with pressure, various spices, a lot of bad choices and a little bit of insanity can be a lethal combination."
First, she's in the sack with some guy. Then she goes into a hissy fit and terrorizes everyone in sight. Who IS this woman? And what have they done with Goody Two-Shoes Gifford?
All through the riotous black comedy Spinning Out of Control, Kathie Lee's fans and foes alike will find their heads spinning.
In the film (airing at 8 p.m. Sunday on El) Gifford plays actress Amanda Berkeley, star of the hit family sitcom Whaddava Want, Mom?
Sure enough, Amanda begins her plunge, and sometimes it's funny. But in a breakthrough performance as this diva run amok (snorting cocaine) burning down her house), the 47-year-old Gifford isn't playing it for laughs, and certainly not for glamour.
Crossword
ACROSS
1 Crocheted coverlet
2 Indy stop
10 Isinglass
14 Censorious address
15 King topper
16 Judah's son
17 Lukas' uncle Ustoff
"How" poet
16 Submissive
17 Kigali's country
18 Luau dish
19 Capesize
19 Clay, today
19 Lamprey
30 Individual
30 Bunco game
32 Churchill's estate
34 Ratty
39 Lofty
31 Asian capital
31 Plaintiff
32 Double curves
36 Calgary
Stamped, e.g.
38 Herbal quaff
49 in the bag!
51 Del Rey
32 Mata Hari or James Bond
53 Author of "Where the Wild Things Are"
59 Motel
60 Motel chain
61 Far from broke
64 Tracy/Hepburn comedy
66 Fifth U.S. President
66 Secretarial minister
69 Coming pipe
70 Newspaper bigw
71 Concerning
72 Sandwich bread
73 Handles
$ \textcircled{c} $ 2001 Tribune Media Services, Inc All rights reserved.
3/18/01
DOWN
1 Elemental unit
2 Cash penalty
3 Salutations
4 Japanese form of verse
5 State further
6 Proximity
7 Heather
8 Cake topping
9 Look after
10 Rabble
11 All thumbs
12 Christmas tune
13 Rolling Stones
tune
14 Dry-heat bath
15 More crafty
16 N.T. book
17 Coarse and
embon
18 Soreness
19 Clark Kent's Miss
Lane
20 Sentimental drive
21 Pushed gently
22 Edge of town
23 Chick's comment
24 Cafeteria carrier
25 VIP in a will
26 "Meet Me in St.
Louis" co-star
27 Mixes
Solutions to yesterday's puzzle
.. Quirk
54 Boo shouter
53 Mazda model
53 Williams and
   cars
55 Inappropriate
56 "The Single Hound"
poet Dickinson
7 Weasel's skim
8 Dolfer Palmer
9 Deli sub
10 Meadow bellow
16 Poetie poem
MOST KU STUDENTS
DRINK MODERATELY OR NOT AT ALL
0~5 DRINKS
WHEN TheyParty*
About one drink per hour over a 5 hour period
67% of KU students set a limit on the number of drinks they will have. One drink =12 oz.beer =4.5 oz.wine =1-1.5 oz.liquor on survey responses from 1,459 KU students.Survey operated by the KU Office of Institutional Research & Planning (2000)