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DREAM LOVERS
By RUSSELL SCOTT SMITH
What a weird summer for movie romance.
The hottest couple of the season was Albert Brooks and Ellen DeGeneres - playing fish, for goodness sake, in a G-rated movie.
Kate Hudson and Luke Wilson were a cute idea, but in the wrong film, the lackluster "Alex and Emma."
Renée Zellweger and Ewan McGregor never really were "Down With Love."
And the less said about Jen and Ben, the better.
But now that "Gigli" and the rest of the summer duds are gone, it's time to move on to fall movies and some on-screen couples with truly sparkling chemistry.
Here are the ones we're most excited about:
* JASON BIGGS & CHRISTINA RICCI "Anything Else" (Sept. 19)
No, Woody Allen does not romance the 23-year-old Ricci in his newest romantic comedy, contrary to rumor.
Instead, Woody's latest features a romance between Ricci - who plays a flaky Annie Hall type - and "American Pie" guy Biggs, 25. This wasn't the first time the pair got in bed together; Ricci and Biggs also have sex scenes in the yet-to-be-released "Prozac Nation."
"Jason is really sweet," Ricci tells USA Today. "I could say to him, 'Don't move that arm. See that nipple over there? Cover it.' "
* BEN STILLER & DREW BARRYMORE "Duplex" (Sept. 26)
This odd couple made the gossip pages last March while they were filming this dark comedy with director Danny DeVito in Brooklyn.
During a night out at Lotus, recently divorced Drew got out on the dance floor with the very married Stiller - even tearing off her cardigan.
It was all in fun, but test audiences say some of that goofy electricity translates to the screen. Barrymore and Stiller play a young NYC couple who plot to kill their upstairs tenant, a seemingly sweet old lady who's actually the neighbor from hell.
* GEORGE CLOONEY & CATHERINE ZETA-JONES "Intolerable Cruelty" (Oct. 10)
In this new comedy from the Coen brothers ("O Brother, Where Art Thou?"), Clooney plays a bulldog divorce attorney who meets his match in champion gold digger Zeta-Jones. She marries him, then they divorce and a heavyweight battle of the sexes occurs.
"We're very similar," Zeta-Jones recently said of Clooney, who became a pal during filming in Las Vegas last summer. "There's some movie magic there."
* MEG RYAN & MARK RUFFALO "In the Cut" (Oct. 24)
Remember that fake-orgasm scene in "When Harry Met Sally"?
Get ready for some real ones in this intense erotic thriller about an NYU English professor who falls for a tough homicide detective.
Test audiences are raving about Ruffalo and Ryan's explicit sex scenes - and not only because Ryan gets naked on screen for the first time.
Oscar-winning director Jane Campion has a way with non-exploitative but very realistic love scenes (Harvey Keitel and Holly Hunter in "The Piano" come to mind), and "In the Cut" has given many a new-found respect for Ryan.
"It's like when Michelle Pfeiffer took it to that next level in 'Dangerous Liaisons,' " says "In the Cut" producer Laurie Parker. "Meg finally shows us what she can do."
* NICOLE KIDMAN & JUDE LAW "Cold Mountain" (Dec. 25)
We're not so sure about Nicole's sweaty clinch with Anthony Hopkins in "The Human Stain," opening Sept. 26.
But we're excited to see Kidman with Law in this Civil War love story directed by Anthony Minghella ("The English Patient").
They play sweethearts from a Southern mountain village who must patch up their love after Law, a Confederate soldier, is wounded in the war.
Kidman won a libel suit last month against a British tabloid that ran a story about an alleged canoodle between them.
But we really want to see their on-screen chemistry, which has already sparked some Oscar buzz.
Beck To Start Work On Next Album
Next week, Beck plans to start working on his eighth album, the follow-up to last year's Sea Change. The new material is going to be louder and more rock-oriented than his last LP. Beck told RollingStone.com the upcoming release is "pretty aggressive. I've been working on it for a while, but I ended up doing Sea Change first. I've been wanting to do a record with loud guitars for a long time."
The new recordings will likely be a blend of some older material Beck wrote around the time of 1999's Midnite Vultures and songs that sound similar to his earliest recordings. Beck said, "My early stuff was a lot more punked out and noisy. I didn't really let myself use big guitars for a lot of years. The early '90s was so saturated by big guitars that I became really interested by what I could do if you took all the guitars out--with the space that was left."
Beck will record the tracks at multiple studios and plans to work with the Dust Brothers, Dan The Automator, and Timbaland on the production of the new album.
As David Letterman celebrates his 10th year on CBS, he might be thinking of moving on
A few weeks before David Letterman went on an extended vacation he conducted an interview on "Late Show" with a young man by the name of Aron Ralston.
Ralston is an extreme mountaineer (unlike Dave) and Indiana native (like Dave), who - with the aid of a pocketknife - severed his lower right arm, which had been pinned beneath an 800-pound boulder in a remote Utah canyon for five days. After rappelling down, he walked three hours, was spotted by a helicopter and three months later was on national TV explaining all of this to a profoundly moved TV host.
With the interview wrapping up, Letterman wondered, "Could everybody have done this?" Ralston, 27, replied, "If you had a choice to go through an hour of pain to live another 60 years, you'd do the same thing."
Letterman didn't even bother to respond with a quip, the usual antidote to an interview that's suddenly veered into uncertain terrain. He instead leaned on his elbow, settled himself into his chair, peered at Ralston through those primly professorial spectacles and asked, sotto voce: "Is that what you know about life that I don't know necessarily?"
Some members of the audience tittered, unsure whether they'd just heard a joke or whether they had actually heard television's most deeply serious funnyman ask the least funny question of them all. As in: What's the meaning of life? What's it all about? Why are we here and where are we going? You have some answers, Aron? You've been to the brink and back, so lemme have 'em.
Letterman has broken his neck twice in car accidents in years past, so maybe he just wanted some practical advice about how to deal with chronic pain. But more likely he was talking about something else, like this thing called life and how to make the best of it.
And for some reason, a contemplative David Letterman - a rare bird, to be sure, when he's on the air - is an especially provocative Letterman. At least in popular imagination he remains TV's Everest of insecurities: the self-loathing comic (an old cliche that just won't die) who is rarely satisfied with his performance and who is never truly happy except when the little red light on the camera is on (OK, likely still true). He is arguably our most gifted and most human TV performer - the guy who was ravaged by shingles and felled by heart disease and exhausted by the grind and tormented by sometimes mediocre ratings and soulless networks. You prick him, he bleeds. Admirers have long cherished the quaint notion that maybe there's a little bit of Dave in each of them, but God forbid, not too much.
And now, on the eve of the 10th anniversary of CBS's "Late Show With David Letterman" (it premiered Aug. 30, 1993, in a deluge of media overkill that rivaled, then surpassed, the sinking of the Titanic), the stark humanity of Dave is sprawled out before us once again. Big anniversaries tend to force some people to think big thoughts, to make dramatic gestures. In 1972, on the eve of his 10th anniversary hosting "The Tonight Show," Johnny Carson married his second wife, Joanna Holland.
Et tu, Dave? What are your cosmic thoughts these days, your grand designs?
This has been a challenging year for Letterman and for "Late Show." He lost his closest friend, George Miller, the veteran comic (and a regular on "Late Night With David Letterman," which ran on NBC from February 1982 to June 1993), to leukemia in March. The shingles then cost him nearly five weeks on the air, the longest hiatus for Letterman since early 2000 when he was sidelined a full five weeks after heart bypass surgery. After the shingles episode in April, he returned to acclaim; the show predictably enjoyed a brief ratings spike and then lost steam - big-time. "Late Show" is averaging 3.5 million viewers this summer, or 2 million below Jay Leno's "Tonight Show," which means that for all practical purposes, the late-night race (such as it is) is over.
Meanwhile, Letterman, who turns 57 in April, is weary, very weary, from the intense grind of a daily show. In an attempt to stanch the fatigue, he impulsively decided to add a series of Friday guest hosts in June. Because of the taping schedule, it was a ridiculous move that effectively spelled Letterman only one hour per week. He still ended up working essentially a full schedule. Worse, he never bothered to tell CBS, which watched helplessly as ratings crumbled (about 500,000 viewers on average were lost for each guest-hosted show). Letterman dumped the idea after only four attempts, but the damage was done. The relationship with CBS - still tenuous a year and half after ABC's abortive raid to attract the host - got only shakier (both Letterman and CBS declined comment).
And here's the punch line: There's now widespread speculation among Letterman observers that he is contemplating retirement. When? There are plenty of guesses out there, but Letterman's two-year contract ends in March, and then he goes to a year-to-year arrangement, which could tie him to CBS through 2007. This essentially means that by early spring, Letterman could say "adios" - or stick around another year. Tellingly, his idol and mentor, Johnny Carson, did precisely the same thing. After a series of multiyear deals, Carson went to a series of year-to-year contracts, and then officially gave NBC notice during a dramatic announcement at Carnegie Hall in May 1991.
Famously private, Letterman, of course, is saying nothing and has said nothing to the press in five years. He's also instructed his staff to keep quiet, which just feeds the speculation monster. But there's also a logical explanation for the silence: CBS tentatively has scheduled a 10th anniversary special for November, and that's when Letterman, et al, want to pretend the real 10th anniversary arrives.
But divining Letterman is an old and notoriously error-prone sport. Perhaps the only reliable guidepost is what went on in Carson's head. Steve O'Donnell, head writer for "Jimmy Kimmel Live" and "Late Night" head writer for nearly a decade, says, "In terms of your conduct as a host and as someone who is responsible for a show and franchise, he looks to Carson."
This is problematic, too. Foremost, Carson lasted 30 years on "Tonight." Letterman, who's spent 21 years on late-night TV, said in an interview five years ago: "Even if I wanted to [do 30], I'd be kidding myself that I could achieve that. I understand why [Carson] was working three days a week [toward the end]. I mean, if you can have the luxury of doing that kind of schedule, it's easier to do 30. But 30? Heavens, that's like two generations of people. Thirty!"
Carson mulled retirement for more than two decades, though apparently never gave it serious thought. And as Ed McMahon now recalls: "It was like a running gag with him. ... He was teasing the audience, measuring the crowd [and] what they thought might work and what might not. He was having fun with them." Carson was also teasing NBC, which desperately wanted to hold on to the man who brought in 17 million viewers a night during "Tonight's" heyday in the mid-'70s.
Few believe Letterman has any real intention of leaving, and while there may not be any hard reasons why this may be so, there is a sound reason of the heart. O'Donnell says retirement speculation is "definitely fascinating," because Letterman has "all the contradictions and complexities of a Hamlet or Winston Churchill, [but] I really do think [the show] is the purest satisfaction he gets." He also cites a "subcategory" to Letterman's thinking: "When we were in New York, he had had several opportunities to socialize with Jack Paar, and as much as he admired him, I think he was a little disappointed that he had done so little with the decades of his life following the early retirement [from 'Tonight']."
O'Donnell, who adds that he's speaks only occasionally with Letterman these days, says he's probably "collecting all the information and feelings that he has to collect to make a decision, and he's not going to make his decision until he's ready. And it may be that he has conflicting impulses. But the larger one is to stay the course. He's also seen where unexpected things have been for him great opportunities to show what he has, and you think not only of his personal health problems, but also [after] 9/11, where he did such a fine and unpretentious job."
"I don't think he knows, but one day he'll wake up and say, 'I've done this, and [now] I'll do something else," says Hal Gurnee, "Late Night/Late Show's" longtime director, who himself retired from "Late Show" several years ago after a decade and a half with Letterman.
There is, naturally, another point to be made. What else would Letterman do with his life? Yes, he has far-flung business interests (his production company, Worldwide Pants, and a management interest in Bobby Rahal's motorsport racing team, among many others) and far-flung estates (including one jewel hidden on Martha's Vineyard). But for Letterman, the tautology is simple: The show is his life, and his life is the show.
At the end of his classic profile of Carson published in the New Yorker in 1978, Kenneth Tynan wrote that Carson "is the grand master of the one show-business art that leads nowhere. He has painted himself not into a corner but onto the top of a mountain. Long - or at least as long as the air at the summit continues to nourish and elate him - may he stay there."
And long may Dave also stay.
Top 10 Moments in the Last 10 Years
So many moments - more than 100,000 minutes, or thereabouts - on "Late Show With David Letterman" these last 10 years. How to select the most memorable?
Here's Newsweek's Top 10 list (in chronological order).
1. Aug. 30, 1993. The show premieres on CBS, with first guest Bill Murray spray-painting "Dave" on the host's desk. Billy Joel also appears, and so do Tom Brokaw and Paul Newman.
2. Sept. 8, 1993. Vice President Al Gore wears goggles, smashes ashtrays. Very odd.
3. March 31, 1994. Madonna becomes "Late Show's" most notorious guest, using expletives a half-dozen times and offering Dave her panties. (A couple of days later guest Elvis Costello gives Dave one of his socks.)
4. May 13, 1994. Johnny Carson makes his only late-show appearance after retirement (and does a Top 10 list). Music group Traffic reunites for this broadcast.
5. April 12, 1995. Dave gets unsual birthday gift from Drew Barrymore, who hops on desk, dances and flashes her breasts.
6. Oct. 28, 1996. A salute to manager Joe Torre and the Yankees after their first World Series win in 15 years.
7. June 6, 1997. Second-most notorious guest appearance, when a disoriented Farrah Fawcett chats somewhat incoherently for about 17 minutes.
8. Jan. 12, 2000. After years of Dave's bugging her, Hillary Rodham Clinton finally gives in to his invitations and appears to talk about her decision to run for the U.S. Senate.
9. Feb. 21, 2000. Dave makes a big return, hosting perhaps his best show in 10 years, after recovering from Jan. 14 heart surgery.
10. Sept. 17, 2001. "Late Show" returns to the air for the first time after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Arguably the host's finest moment in nearly 20 years on the air.
MTV gets 20th-anniversary party started
It may seem like only yesterday that the moon-man trophy made its bow. But tonight, MTV's Video Music Awards will celebrate its 20th birthday.
An appearance by Eminem and a performance by Metallica, described by an MTV spokesman as "a medley of classic VMA songs by other artists," are among the attractions scheduled for this year's ceremony, which airs from New York's Radio City Music Hall at 8 p.m. (live ET/tape-delayed PT). The VMAs are a perennial MTV ratings champ; last year the show hit a high of nearly 12 million viewers.
Chris Rock, who emceed in 1997 and 1999, will return to host the anniversary party. Guests are set to include Britney Spears, Beyoncé, Jay-Z, Avril Lavigne, Christina Aguilera, Mary J. Blige, 50 Cent, Good Charlotte, Coldplay, Sean Paul, Mya, Missy Elliott, DMX, Nelly, Ashanti, P. Diddy, Ludacris, Snoop Dogg and Iggy Pop.
Other stars expected to appear include 2002 host Jimmy Fallon, Ben Stiller, Jason Biggs, Pamela Anderson, Hilary Duff, Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen, LeBron James and Serena Williams, as well as cast members from Bravo's Queer Eye for the Straight Guy.
If few of those celebs were familiar names back in 1984 — indeed, several were not yet born — that's in keeping with the philosophy espoused by Van Toffler, president of MTV and offshoot channel MTV2.
"MTV's tradition is to be in the moment, looking forward, and we take our connection to our youthful audience very seriously," says Toffler, who defines MTV viewers as generally 12 to 34 years old but primarily 18 to 24. "They go to more movies and consume more music and pop culture than any other segment of the population.
"We made a decision early on not to grow old with our audience, so we've probably alienated some of the folks who got turned on to MTV when it launched back in 1981. ... In some ways, we were happy to see the freaky hair-metal fanatics grow out of us and to embrace what's current in music and pop culture."
So the 2003 VMAs "will for the most part reflect what has happened this past year in music. But there will be some unique performances acknowledging prior classic moments on the VMAs."
Though Toffler is keeping mum about exactly what those moments will entail, he suggests that they may reflect connections between MTV's past and present.
"You don't have a Britney Spears without a Madonna or Good Charlotte without Green Day. And we have a host who has done the show twice before, who has definitely added an immense amount of volatility.
"It's a live, unpredictable, train-wreck kind of show. I mean, it's safe to say I didn't have an ulcer before I started working here."
NEW MATRIX TRAILER NOW ONLINE!!!
Friends, Family Share Bob Hope Memories in L.A.
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Former President Gerald Ford and former first lady Nancy Reagan were among hundreds of friends and family who attended a memorial Mass for comedian Bob Hope on Wednesday as Hollywood said farewell to its "king of jesters."
Eulogies at St. Charles Borromeo Church, where Hope regularly worshiped until his death of pneumonia at age 100 on July 27, were delivered by California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff and TV producer Larry Gelbart, one of Hope's long-time writers.
"His impeccable timing, on stage, backstage or on no stage at all, he was always at the top of his game," Gelbart said, saluting Hope as "a king of jesters .... Like the best of his breed, Bob knew that life without laughter was life without parole."
During a mostly somber service punctuated with lighter moments recalling some of Hope's best lines, Gelbart drew the biggest laugh by recalling a telegram Hope once sent to one of his secretaries on her wedding night, containing just two words of advice: "Act surprised."
Los Angeles Cardinal Roger Mahony, who presided over the two-hour Mass, said Hope lived up to his name.
"Through the humor that led to inner joy and peacefulness, he brought hope," Mahony said. "He brought hope in the midst of turmoil, anxiety and uncertainty ... His name is another element of who this great man was."
Mahony said many stand-up comics come and go, but Hope's legacy will endure. The cardinal recalled telling the one-time Protestant Hope that he should join the Catholic church, to which Hope replied: "I don't need to become a Catholic because (wife) Dolores does enough praying for both of us."
The British-born Hope converted to Catholicism in 1996, according to Hope's longtime spokesman Ward Grant.
Myers spoke at length about Hope's patriotism, saying the comedian was beloved by the military because it was clear that "he honestly and sincerely appreciated" the millions of troops he entertained.
"Bob Hope is an American hero ... a hero to those who serve our nation. Bob hope is a hero to America's heroes."
Among the more than 500 people attending the Mass were close friends Phyllis Diller, who appeared in three of Hope's movies, and Barbara Eden, who joined Hope on his last overseas show for U.S. troops during the 1991 Gulf War.
"To work with him was wonderful, to know him was truly wonderful, and I'm not just saying that because he's dead. He was truly special and we'll miss him," Eden told reporters outside the church before the service.
Among other show business figures attending the Mass were Lonnie Anderson, Brooke Shields, Ed McMahon, Tom Selleck, Connie Stevens, and Raquel Welch.
Later on Wednesday, Hope was remembered at a special tribute at the nearby Academy of Television, Arts and Sciences, where a parade of celebrities delivered tributes and recalled memories and some of the entertainer's greatest quips. Comedian Diller recounted two jokes that Hope liked to tell about her: "A peeping Tom threw up on my window sill" and "He was asked what my bra size was and he said '34 long."'
Sid Caesar delivered a gibberish tribute to Hope in four "faux" languages and later many of the celebrities gathered on stage to sing Hope's theme song, "Thanks for the Memory."
Selleck told reporters he thought Hope would be most remembered for the "personal sacrifices" he made for his country.
"This guy worked every Christmas. Bob did it out of a sense of duty, and that may turn out to be his greatest contribution."
CIA Recruiting TV Spy Garner for Promo Video
LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - The CIA keeps a lot of secrets, but its opinion of ABC's "Alias" is not one of them.
The spy show's star, Jennifer Garner, said she has been asked to contribute to an official video promoting the government agency.
"It's not a commercial," she said. "It's a recruitment video (to show) university graduate students."
Chase Brandon, film industry liaison for the CIA, confirmed that the project was in the works.
"We very much would like to continue our discussions with Miss Garner and possibly other cast members to work with us on a recruitment video," he said. "We feel that Miss Garner, both in character as agent Sydney Bristow and as herself, embodies the intelligence, enthusiasm and dedication that we're looking for. Our continuing efforts to enlist the best and the brightest would be admirably served by having her support."
Garner would provide an introduction to the video that the CIA shows to prospective agents. "It talks about the nature of the work, the context and the qualities we're looking for," Brandon said. "Her participation would add a human touch to the message we're trying to convey."
Producers on "Alias" worked with Brandon in the early stages of the show, and the writers still occasionally contact him to check facts and details. Beyond that, Brandon said, "Miss Garner has a standing invitation to come by the agency, where she is guaranteed to meet a vast number of fans."