NO FEAR OF FLYING
Jodie Foster has two Oscars and a handful of $100 million blockbusters on her resume, but this is what she thinks about her 40-year career in Hollywood:
"Actual acting, it's just not in my personality," she says. "I never have been [drawn to it]. It's something that I've developed a skill for that's kind of contrary to who I am."
Perhaps that is why in the 17 years since she won her first Best Actress Oscar, for 1988's "The Accused," Foster has taken just nine marquee roles. But among that number are her second Oscar-winning performance, in "The Silence of the Lambs" and the mega-grossing hits "Panic Room" (2002), "Contact" (1997) and "Maverick" (1994), as well as her directorial debut, "Little Man Tate" (1991).
Foster was in Toronto to promote her first starring role in four years, as yet another unnerved mother in "Flightplan," which opens Friday. At 42, she's sporting a khaki suit and a new feathered-blond hairdo, radiating sensibility and class all at once. Sitting Indian-style on the couch with her shoes tossed on the floor, she smiles with warmth and ease - a sign of what producer Brian Grazer calls her "really, really, really self-confident" personality.
When complimented on her strong resume, Foster is surprisingly modest. "I've got some bad stuff in there," she laughs. True, her turn with Dennis Hopper in "Catchfire" resulted in a serious stinker, but generally the second half of her career has been stellar.
"I have pretty strong instincts about what I want to do and what I don't want to do," she says. "When I make a decision, I don't look back. At the same time, I haven't made as much money as everybody else. Some people would say, 'Well, that's not much of a trade-off - look at me, look how much money I got! So I made three bad ones. So what?'
"Good for them, but I can't do that."
The mother of two sons, Charles, 7, and Kit, 3, Foster says that motherhood has given her new strength and drawn her to different material in recent years. Like in "Panic Room," her latest role finds her in what would be any mother's waking nightmare.
Recently widowed aeronautical engineer Kyle Pratt (Foster) is traveling on a transatlantic flight from Berlin to America with her daughter. Her husband's coffin is stowed below in the lower level of a two-story plane she designed.
After a brief nap, she rises to find her daughter missing. Panicked, she leads the crew on a desperate search. Producers originally sought a man for the role, but Foster's ability to radiate strength changed their minds.
"I consider her powerful," says Grazer, who has known Foster well for the past 15 years. "She has a very strong human quality that allows you to get inside of her and care about her. I thought the way to make it interesting was to do it with a woman."
In a twist right out of "Gaslight," Pratt's own sanity is questioned when an examination of the passenger manifest reveals no listing for her daughter.
"There is something that I know really intimately about this experience, about feeling that your body and your identity is so connected with your [kids] and this primal, horrible frustration of feeling like you can't keep them safe."
In addition to her two lastest films, a good number of Foster's recent roles - "Anna and the King" (1999), "Nell" (1994) and "Little Man Tate" - have centered on children or their parents thrust into exceptional circumstances. It's something Foster knows a good deal about.
As an actress since the age of 3, she first appeared in commercials such as the famous Coppertone bare-bottom ads. Later, at 12, she took on an impossibly adult role that first revealed her exceptional talent - as the child prostitute "adopted" by an unstable Robert De Niro in Martin Scorsese's "Taxi Driver."
Many child actors wind up the subjects of revelatory documentaries on E! and VH1. Managed by her mother, Brandy, Foster managed to avoid that curse.
"That's not the kind of person I ever was," Foster says. "I was a good girl that got good grades and did what I was supposed to do. Thank god that there was somebody who loved me who was overseeing some of that.
"[My mother] prepared me for [a normal life] and assumed that once I went to college that that would be the end of my career. And I did, too."
But while attending university at Yale - amid the furor generated by John Hinckley's 1981 attempt to kill President Ronald Reagan, supposedly to gain Foster's "love and respect" - she made a "funny transition" from young to adult actor. The real turning point, though, came with "The Accused," an intense and brutal film in which Foster portrayed a rape victim who challenges both her attackers and the legal system.
"It was a funny experience, because I didn't think I did a very good job and I didn't feel good about the performance," she says. "I [had] the whole imposter syndrome, that I was gonna be found out and now I should just go to grad school immediately.
"And then I started understanding what it was that made me feel uncomfortable about the performance - she wasn't me. She's the kind of person that makes people feel uncomfortable. That experience was so complex psychologically that it gave me a whole new look at what acting can be, that it could be stimulating."
Foster's longevity in Hollywood could also be explained by the fact that, despite many years in business, she avoids the clich‚s of stardom. She shuns L.A.'s scene-making machinery and keeps her personal life to herself, never discussing publicly the father of her children, nor her romantic life.
"Some people do that thing where they go out of their way to know other celebrities," she says. "I don't. I think it's weird to always acknowledge other famous people. Why? 'Hey, you and I, we've got something in common.' (Laughs) What's that about?"
Instead, Foster has transitioned to other aspects of filmmaking, including producing and directing. Over the past seven years, she has struggled to bring her most personal project to the screen, "Flora Plum," about a young girl who joins the circus in the 1930's. Stars including Ewan McGregor, Claire Danes, Meryl Streep and Russell Crowe have all been linked to the project at one point or another.
"I don't know that it's going anywhere any time soon," says a slightly dejected Foster. "[It will take] time, and just total tenacity."
For now, Foster is putting "Plum" on the shelf as she puts together her next directorial work, a part that will re-team her with "Taxi Driver" co-star Robert De Niro. The story, with the working title "Sugarland," is about migrant Jamaican canefield workers.
As an actor, Foster immediately accepted a follow-up to "Flightplan" in Spike Lee's next film.
"I play a rich, elegant Madison Avenue lawyer who's a fixer, meaning, like, if you were like a state senator and you had four dead hookers in your room, you'd call me and I'd take care of it," she says. "I know [these people] exist in publicity firms. I know they exist in the political world."
With her acting jobs becoming more infrequent and her increased interest in directing, Foster can see her career shifting entirely behind the lens in the future - even if it might aggravate her.
"I think I probably could," she says. "Every once in a while [directing], you get exhausted trying to communicate what you want and sometimes you'd just like to go, 'Argh, let me do it.' But no, I think I probably could."
Rock Hall Snubs 1980
Apparently, 1980 just wasn't a rockin' year.
In the way of the music world, acts that have seen 25 years elapse since the release of their first record become eligible to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
However, the Rock Hall nominating committee snubbed the newly eligible class of 1980 entirely, seemingly unable to find a band worthy of putting on the ballot sent out to voters this week.
That left room for perennial nominees such as Black Sabbath (now on their eighth bid), Lynyd Skynyrd (seventh bid), the Sex Pistols and the Stooges (five bids apiece).
Grandmaster Flash & the Furious Five, which last year became the first rap act nominated to the Rock Hall, has another chance this year to become the first rap act inducted.
Other holdovers from previous years include the J. Geils Band, John Mellencamp, the Patti Smith Group, Chic and Joe Tex.
First-time nominees to the eclectic ballot include Miles Davis, Cat Stevens, Blondie, the Paul Butterfield Band, the Dave Clark Five and the Sir Douglas Quintet.
The 2006 induction ceremony will be held in New York, though no other details have been released. Inductees will be announced before the end of the year.
Davis, known for his jazz mastery, may seem an odd choice for the Rock Hall. However, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame CEO Terry Stewart, who also sits on the nominating committee, said that Davis influenced many rockers musically and in terms of his attitude.
The trumpet player was born in Alton, Illinois, and raised in St. Louis. From the 1940s until his 1991 death from pneumonia, respiratory failure and a stroke at age 65, he pushed the limits of jazz, experimenting with everything from bebop to jazz fusion and beyond.
Stevens, who is now known by the name Yusuf Islam, sold scads of his gentle folk ballads in the 1960s and '70s, including "Moonshadow," "Peace Train" and "Wild World."
In 1977, the singer abandoned his musical career and became a Muslim. Last fall, he was deported from the United States after his name popped up on a federal no-fly list while he was on a plane bound from London to Washington D.C.
New wave rockers Blondie, led by Debbie Harry, topped the charts in the late '70s and early '80s with hits such as "Heart of Glass" and "Call Me."
The Paul Butterfield Band, led by harmonica-blowing singer Paul Butterfield, earned a place in musical immortality when the blues band backed Bob Dylan at the Newport Folk Festival in 1965. Butterfield died of a heroin overdose in 1987.
Disco scenesters Chic scored their first massive hit in 1977 with "Dance, Dance, Dance." Frontman Nile Rodgers later went on to produce hits for artists including Madonna, Debbie Harry and David Bowie.
The Dave Clark Five was a wildly successful British Invasion band in the 1960s with 24 hit records Stateside, including "Over and Over" and "I Like It Like That." In the height of the band's fame, the Dave Clark made a record 13 appearances on the Ed Sullivan Show before breaking up in the early 1970s.
The J. Geils Band came together in Boston in 1967 and scored hits such as "Must of Got Lost" and "Give It to Me" in the '70s before rising to the top of the charts in 1981 with the catchy teen-obsession anthem "Centerfold." Other hits include "Freeze Frame" and "Love Stinks."
Heartland singer Mellencamp, known for his numerous Top 10 singles such as "Jack and Diane," "Hurts So Good" and "Pink Houses," released his first album in 1976 and cofounded Farm Aid with Willie Nelson.
The Sir Douglas Quintet was formed in San Antonio in the 1960s and scored a 1965 hit single, "She's About a Mover." Frontman Doug Sahm died in 1999 of heart failure.
The Patti Smith Group was signed to Arista by Clive Davis and released its first album, Horses, in 1975. The group's no-frills approach to rock paved the way for the punk movement that followed.
Tex was a soul singer, who scored his biggest hit with 1972's "I Gotcha." He converted to Islam that same year and changed his name to Joseph Hazziez . He died in 1982.
Nominees are picked by a 70-member committee of rock 'n' roll historians, journalists and label execs, with ballots then mailed to an international voting body of 700 music industry types for the final decision. The five to seven nominees that receive the most votes will be inducted into the Rock Hall next year.
Tori Spelling Splitting With Husband
LOS ANGELES - Actress Tori Spelling and her husband are reportedly splitting after a year of marriage.
Spelling, 32, and actor-writer Charlie Shanian, 36, married in July 2004 and have been living apart since the beginning of August, People magazine reported.
Spelling, the daughter of television producer Aaron Spelling, spent 10 years on his hit series "Beverly Hills 90210." She also has appeared in the films "Scary Movie 2," "Scream 2," and "Troop Beverly Hills."
The couple met on stage in 2002 during the Los Angeles production of the romantic comedy, "Maybe, Baby It's You," co-written by Shanian. The two actors were in 11 vignettes about couples in search of love.
'Heaven' Beats the Devil at Box Office
LOS ANGELES - Heaven beat the devil at the box office this weekend.
The Reese Witherspoon, Mark Ruffalo romantic comedy "Just Like Heaven" debuted at No. 1 with an estimated $16.5 million in ticket sales, bumping the courtroom horror film "The Exorcism of Emily Rose" into second place.
Overall, box office revenue jumped an estimated 13 percent compared with the same weekend last year, continuing the upward trend in movie grosses after a dismal summer, said Paul Dergarabedian, president of box-office tracker Exhibitor Relations.
"The fall season is starting in a terrific fashion," Dergarabedian said. "I'm cautiously saying that we're back on track. Audiences are just finding that the studios have a lot to offer right now."
In its second weekend, "The Exorcism of Emily Rose," about a Catholic priest on trial for negligent homicide following the death of a satanically possessed 19-year-old, earned $15.3 million in ticket sales from Friday to Sunday, bringing its total domestic gross to $52 million, according to studio estimates.
"Lord of War," starring Nicolas Cage as an arms dealer pursued by Interpol agent Ethan Hawke, debuted in third place with $9.2 million.
Dreamworks' "Just Like Heaven," which follows a man who encounters romance from beyond when a ghost keeps appearing in his apartment, touched on the audiences' desire for something light and romantic, Dergarabedian said.
"It was sort of one of these traditional romantic comedies. Even the reviewers said it seemed like such a pat formula, but they kind of liked it," Dergarabedian said, "And Reese Witherspoon is always a draw."
The film owed its successful debut to the female over-25 crowd, who made up more than two-thirds of its audience, according to Jim Tharp, head of distribution for Dreamworks. Tharp said positive exit reviews suggest the film will continue to grow by word of mouth.
"When you have strong exits, eventually it gets out to everyone," he said.
The comedy "The 40 Year-Old Virgin" continued its successful run, moving to fourth place with $5.8 million, bringing its total to $90.6 million. Opening in fifth place with $4.6 million was "Cry Wolf," about a group of teens who spread online rumors about a serial killer only to find the story coming true.
Also opening in limited release at five theaters, Tim Burton's stop-motion animated film, "Corpse Bride," voiced by Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter, earned an impressive $411,000.
Meanwhile "March of the Penguins," now in its 13th week, moved up a spot to ninth place, boosting its total to $70.4 million as it inched toward "Fahrenheit 9/11," which earned $119 million, as the top grossing documentary of all time.
"It's an amazing run," Dergarabedian said. "Nobody ever thought this would have a chance of challenging 'Fahrenheit.'"
Despite the upswing, box office revenue for the year remained down about 6 percent, with attendance down 9 percent.
So, here are the estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Exhibitor Relations Co. Inc. Final figures will be released Monday.
1. "Just Like Heaven," $16.5 million.
2. "The Exorcism of Emily Rose," $15.3 million.
3. "Lord of War," $9.2 million.
4. "The 40 Year-Old Virgin," $5.8 million.
5. "Cry Wolf," $4.6 million.
6. "The Transporter 2," $4.0 million.
7. "The Constant Gardener," $3.7 million.
8. "Red Eye," $2.9 million.
9. "March of the Penguins," $2.6.
10. "Wedding Crashers," $2.5 million.
11. "An Unfinished Life," $2.1 million.
12. "The Brothers Grimm," $2.0 million.
'Lost,' 'Raymond' Named Top Shows at Emmys
LOS ANGELES - Everybody loved "Raymond" one more time at the Emmys, honoring the show Sunday as best comedy series for its final season and denying the prize to newcomer "Desperate Housewives." But another first-year hit, "Lost," won best drama honors.
"All year long they've been asking us, `Do you think, now that your show is going, that this means the end of the sitcom?'" "Raymond" executive producer Phil Rosenthal said dryly. "I want to say, yes. I also think, beyond that, it's the end of laughing and soon the end of smiling."
Felicity Huffman and Patricia Arquette became first-time Emmy winners as they received lead actress honors while Tony Shalhoub and James Spader once again proved favorites in the best actor category.
"I've turned into one of those actresses and I'm sorry," Huffman, who plays an overwhelmed homemaker on ABC's "Desperate Housewives," said as she teared up at the start of her acceptance speech.
She thanked "the women of Wisteria Lane," her co-stars Marcia Cross and Teri Hatcher — also nominees in the category — and Eva Longoria.
Arquette, who plays a crime-solving psychic in NBC's "Medium," won the best drama series actress award.
"I want to thank you for this honor, for putting me in this incredible company," she said. She offered her "respect and gratitude" to volunteers helping Hurricane Katrina victims and issued a prayer that soldiers in Iraq "come home safe and sound."
Shalhoub was named best actor in a comedy series for "Monk."
"To my fellow nominees, whoever they are — I'm not that familiar with their work, I just want to say, there's always next year. Except, you know, for Ray Romano," he said, jokingly.
Spader was named best dramatic actor for "Boston Legal" for his portrayal of a lawyer with an ethics problem — his second consecutive win.
"I'd like to thank the academy and I'd like to thank my mother and I'd like to thank my mother again, because I forgot to thank her last year," he said.
Other past Emmy favorites grabbed trophies at Sunday's ceremony, with Brad Garrett and Doris Roberts of "Everybody Loves Raymond" and William Shatner of "Boston Legal" receiving best supporting actor honors.
Garrett received his third Emmy for the CBS sitcom and Shatner received his second Emmy for the character of egotistical lawyer Denny Crane, which also had first been featured on "The Practice."
"Oh, my gosh. ... Thank you so much," said Garrett, adding facetiously: "I have to dedicate this to Britney (Spears) and our baby. This is amazing."
Roberts appeared on stage with two grandsons at her side.
"This is the icing on the cake," she said, accepting her fourth trophy for her role as a meddling mother-in-law. "Nine wonderful years on `Everybody Loves Raymond' and to finish it off with this is wonderful."
Blythe Danner was named best supporting actress in a drama for Showtime's "Huff."
"I think my husband Bruce Paltrow is up there, stirring this up for me," Danner said, making a sentimental reference to her late husband, a director, then turned to two pressing national issues.
Danner said Paltrow (their children include actress Gwyneth Paltrow) would want her to pay tribute to hurricane-ravaged New Orleans and she issued a plea for the return of troops from Iraq.
Host Ellen DeGeneres paid brief tribute to the victims of Hurricane Katrina. The magnolia on her lapel was for them; presenters also were asked to wear the state flower of Louisiana and Mississippi. And Jon Stewart, a winner and a presenter, did a comedic bit that blasted the federal response to Katrina. But for the most part, the tragedy that had drawn Americans to their TV sets received scant attention as the ceremony's focus remained mainly on the awards.
The ceremony did include a tribute to late-night king Johnny Carson, the "Tonight" show host who died this year, with David Letterman remembering the man who entertained America and was mentor to so many comedians.
The ceremony also honored network TV's veteran news anchors, the retired Dan Rather of CBS and Tom Brokaw of NBC and the late Peter Jennings of ABC. Rather and Brokaw drew a prolonged standing ovation when they took the stage.
For their supporting acting work in a miniseries or a movie, Paul Newman was honored for "Empire Falls" and Jane Alexander for "Warm Springs," both on HBO.
Hugh Jackman was honored as best individual performance in a variety or music program for his work as host of the 58th annual Tony Awards.
"The Daily Show With Jon Stewart" repeated as best variety, music or comedy series and again won for writing.
"The Amazing Race" was named outstanding reality-competition program for the third time.
The directing and writing awards for a drama series were split between two new hit shows. "Lost" won the former and "House" took the latter.
Geoffrey Rush was honored as best actor in a miniseries or movie for "The Life and Death of Peter Sellers," HBO's dramatic take on the comic actor which also claimed writing and directing awards.
S. Epatha Merkerson was named best actress in a miniseries or movie for "Lackawanna Blues," on HBO, and proceeded to charm the audience by announcing her acceptance speech, which she'd tucked into her bosom, had slipped down and couldn't be retrieved.
"Desperate Housewives" won the comedy series directing award while the writing trophy went to Fox's "Arrested Development."
HBO's "Warm Springs," which dramatized Franklin D. Roosevelt's battle against polio before becoming president, was named best TV movie. The best miniseries trophy went to PBS' "The Lost Prince."
Earth, Wind & Fire kicked off the show at the Shrine Auditorium with a revamped version of its song "September," paying tribute to the TV season past. The Black Eyes Peas jumped in with a few rap verses, including a Martha Stewart lyric: "Went to jail, got a show, that's the way entertainment goes."
Emmy voters were in an eclectic mood, scattering the awards to a variety of winners and keeping even top winners to modest hauls. "The Life and Death of Peter Sellers" and "Everybody Loves Raymond" each won three awards Sunday, while "Lost" and "Desperate Housewives" claimed two.
Premium channel HBO emerged as the most-honored with a total of 27 awards, including seven honors Sunday and 20 trophies given at last week's Creative Arts Emmys recognizing technical and other achievements.
ABC received a total of 16 awards, followed by CBS with 11, NBC and PBS with 10 each and Fox with six.