Rush back to save old enemy in 'Pirates'

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- Geoffrey Rush lives the actor's life much the way his buccaneer character Barbossa lives the pirate's life.
Both Rush and Barbossa, who's back on board for "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End," strike a balance in their jobs between gravitas and goofiness, menace and madness, versatility and buffoonery.
Rush, 55, who won the best-actor Academy Award for his breakout role as dysfunctional piano master David Helfgott in 1996's "Shine," was seemingly out of the picture after Johnny Depp's Jack Sparrow killed him at the end of the first flick, "Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl." (Watch the pirates of "Pirates" discuss the film )
Yet Barbossa, Jack's mutinous first mate, popped up at the end of last summer's "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest," brought back from the dead to join a mission to rescue his old nemesis from Davy Jones' locker.
In "At World's End," Barbossa becomes an uneasy ally to Jack, a juicy role that allows Rush to strut the decks with a blend of the comic abandon the actor honed in his early stage career in Australia and the weightiness he has shown in such films as "Elizabeth," "Les Miserables" and "Lantana." (Read the review)
Rush sat down with The Associated Press to discuss his late-blooming cinema career, the lure of the high seas in the "Pirates" movies and his thoughts on whether the Black Pearl might sail again in future films.
Q: What did you think when you heard Disney was making a movie based on its "Pirates of the Caribbean" ride?
RUSH: On the first film, there was always lots of talk from the more cynical corners of the press. "Oh, we've reached that point of moviemaking where Hollywood is now basing movies on theme-park rides." And I would always go, the pirates of the Caribbean is a very specific point in colonial history that maybe lasted from the mid-1600s to the early 1700s. Two generations. This is when all the powers of Europe were starting to ransack the New World and colonize it. Piracy kind of emerged around that, because there were so many bountiful ships at sea. ...
When I looked at the creative team and I thought of the scale, that this film was going to require all the skills of (producer) Jerry Bruckheimer, with his track record, and the fact that he was throwing in Johnny Depp, the actor's actor, pretty much in his first full-blown, commercially driven role, I found that very exciting. It wasn't rounding up the usual A-list box-office stars. Jerry wanted fresh, he wanted new, he didn't want predictable. (Watch the stars arrive for the "Pirates" premiere )
Q: At what point did you suspect there would be "Pirates" sequels?
RUSH: We got an inkling of it as we were completing the last two weeks of shooting on the first one. The call sheets would start not just having "Pirates of the Caribbean," but "Pirates of the Caribbean" -- colon -- "The Curse of the Black Pearl." Once we saw that colon, we started smelling sequel.
Q: How surprising was it that you were brought back, given that Barbossa dies in the first movie?
RUSH: I more or less said to them, "Well, that's good, I hope you guys have a great time." They said, "No, no, we are going to create a new villain. We're going to move the story at one point to Asia. We're going to involve sea monsters and all that, but Barbossa is going to return."
They were saying, "Keep this under your hat, but Jack Sparrow's going to die in the second movie." I went, "You're kidding me. The fans are going to go berserk."
They said, "Yeah, but there's this great teaser moment at the end, just when the film reaches a kind of melancholy wake, suddenly Barbossa emerges, and he's the guy that's got the goods and the map to go to the other side to bring Jack back." My mind was boggling with the potential of that, the story lines that could come out of that.
Q: The third movie seems to set up a potential new rivalry between Jack and Barbossa. What are the chances for more films?
RUSH: The writers always wanted to have this huge, rolling conflict between Jack and Barbossa. Even in the pre-story of the first film, where we heard a lot about how Barbossa was Jack's first mate, then he mutinied and took over. There's never going to be a resolution to that conflict.
So, sure, there are potential story lines, not uninteresting ones. I joked and said, "Why don't we do a prequel? If they find the fountain of youth, wouldn't that be fantastic?" They could CGI us up, so I could be 25 and Jack could be 10. There's a lot of fun in it.
Q: More sequels make good business sense, but what would it take to get you and the other creative people back on board?
RUSH: I think the same rules would apply. No one would want to do more of the same. I'm sure the studio heads would go, "Come on, we could bang one more out." But I just know that's not how Jerry would think, and Johnny. There'd be creative input. People would say, "Wow, you come up with a good script and a good set of conflicts and swerve it in a new direction, then it would be legitimate." But Disney's not going to say, "That was aesthetically pleasing. Let's put it to bed now." I can't see that sentence coming out in the board room.
Q: Your early career was mostly stage work, but in the last decade, you've played Peter Sellers, Trotsky, the Marquis de Sade, a couple of great Elizabethan characters, a larger-than-life pirate on film. If someone told you pre-"Shine" that you would have all those film roles, would you have believed them?
RUSH: Not at all. I think it has reflected very pleasurably the sort of diversity, the kinds of roles I used to play in the theater. I've managed to find some kind of cinematic equivalent to that. I was never a leading man. I've always been in the outer concentric circles in the company, being a character actor, which is a good place to be. It gives you that diversity.
Q: What do you think about the pirate iconography that's become so omnipresent largely because of the movie franchise?
RUSH: [When] I was staying at the Chateau, West Hollywood was rancid with pirates last Halloween. I was very tempted, if it didn't involve a 2 1/2-hour makeup job, I was so tempted to go out and just walk down Sunset Boulevard and knock everyone in a bandanna with a sword in their belt out of the water by parading along as Barbossa. It would be kind of fun.
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Celebrating an 'indestructible' American legend

NEW YORK (AP) -- On the 100th anniversary of John Wayne's birth, the Duke still swaggers through the American psyche as not just an actor, but a patriot -- his centennial spawning fond remembrance, and perhaps a few small protests on the side.
Wayne's legacy is unique because of the dual perspectives that pervade his memory. Pulitzer Prize-winning author and historian Garry Wills, who wrote "John Wayne's America" in 1997, described Wayne as "the most popular movie star ever, but also the most polarizing."
It could be argued that no other film actor has ever come to symbolize so many things: rugged masculinity, the frontier, even America itself. The Duke has remained, in the truest sense, an icon.
For many, an entire way of life is epitomized in the tired, unblinking eyes that peered knowingly from his cocksure pose ("walks around like a big cat," said Howard Hawks). His voice, too, seems etched in the collective memory: With a simple "pilgrim," a whole lost world is summoned.
Wayne, born Marion Robert Morrison, would have turned 100 on Saturday. He died at 72 of stomach cancer in June 1979 after a career that spanned more than 170 films. He didn't win an Academy Award until 1970 for his performance in "True Grit." (He was nominated twice earlier -- for best actor in 1949's "Sands of Iwo Jima" and best picture for 1960's "The Alamo," which he directed and produced.)
To this day, he still ranks atop polls rating the most adored actors; a Harris Poll conducted just this year rated him as the third-most popular movie star behind Denzel Washington and Tom Hanks.
Nostalgia for strong, silent heroes like those Wayne portrayed can regularly be spotted in places like HBO's "The Sopranos." Of course, even Tony Soprano sees a shrink, and Wayne's rugged masculinity is now often viewed as the symbol of bygone era; feelings are now meant to be openly expressed and analyzed. Those who keep their emotions locked up have even been referred to as suffering from the "John Wayne syndrome."
He seldom deviated from heroic roles, often set in the West or on the battlefield. Among his most beloved and acclaimed films are "Stagecoach" (1939), "Sands of Iwo Jima" (1949), "The Searchers" (1956) and "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance" (1962). His range was limited, but he mined a narrow path of the reluctant but obligated hero -- a consistent approach that furthered his iconic stature.
He knew it, too.
"When I started, I knew I was no actor, and I went to work on this Wayne thing," he once said. "I figured I needed a gimmick, so I dreamed up the drawl, the squint and a way of moving meant to suggest that I wasn't looking for trouble but would just as soon throw a bottle at your head as not. I practiced in front of a mirror."
It's a notably different -- and perhaps dated -- tactic in a profession that values, above all, malleability. If you want to be an actor, study Brando. But if you want to be a movie star, study Wayne.
"He never tricked the audience with the characters he played," says Gretchen Wayne, who heads her late husband Michael Wayne's film company, Batjac Production, which was formed in 1954 by her legendary father-in-law. "His films started in the late '20s, early '30s, so there's three generations of people who have grown up with him."
She will host an evening presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in Los Angeles on Thursday, where a new restoration of "The High and the Mighty" (1954) will be shown. (Wayne was married three times and had seven children.)
Turner Classic Movies (like CNN, a unit of Time Warner) has been paying tribute throughout the week by airing a 35-film festival of his movies. His birthplace, Winterset, Iowa, will hold a groundbreaking ceremony Saturday for a new John Wayne museum. "Hondo" (1953), recently restored in digital 3-D, will screen at the Cannes Film Festival.
Hollywood studios are also rolling out a small army of DVD releases, including collector's sets from Lionsgate, Universal, Warner Home Video and Paramount.
Representing
This is all evidences an enduring love for Wayne that may surpass even his esteemed contemporaries: Humphrey Bogart, Clark Gable, Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn, whose centennial was earlier this month.
Unlike some of the stars of his day, Wayne never served in World War II, ironic since Gen. Douglas MacArthur said he "represented the American serviceman better than the American serviceman himself." He was awarded a Congressional Gold Medal in 1979 shortly before his death.
Jim Olson, a Sam Houston State University history professor who co-wrote the 1995 biography "John Wayne: American," believes Wayne's guilt over not serving in the war propelled him to compensate by being a fervent anti-communist and symbol of American ideals.
"Wayne was a confused young man," says Olson. "He sort of grew up searching for the meaning of life and I think he found it in the values he ended up portraying on screen. His screen image and his individual persona kind of kept ricocheting off each other over time until the image on screen became his alter ego."
Especially in his later years, Wayne came to symbolize political conservatism and a dedication to country. His stand against communism during the Cold War was so influential that Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin plotted to assassinate him, according to Michael Munn's 2005 biography "John Wayne: The Man Behind the Myth."
Wayne famously said, "I always thought I was a liberal. I came up terribly surprised one time when I found out that I was a right-wing conservative extremist."
He angered more people with his support of the Vietnam War, which he expressed openly in 1968's "The Green Berets," a film he co-directed and starred in.
"Wayne lived in a world of absolutes. He did not like ambiguity," says Olson. "He lived in a world where, in his mind, right was right and wrong was wrong. And evil was real and evil had to be crushed with violence if necessary.
"There's a generation of Americans that kind of grew up with Wayne, matured with Wayne and grew old with Wayne, through all the trials and traumas of modern American history -- and in doing so, found in him a voice they understood."
It's been not only 100 years since his birth, but nearly three decades since his death. Yet Wayne still remains one of the most recognizable faces in the world. He is, as New York Times film critic Vincent Camby once wrote, "marvelously indestructible."
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Legendary actress still a special voice

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- Julie Andrews has been Hollywood royalty for decades. Lately, she's had the parts to prove it with queenly roles in "The Princess Diaries" and "Shrek" films.
Andrews -- who reprises her voice role in "Shrek the Third" as Queen Lillian, mother-in-law to Mike Myers' ogre and mom to Cameron Diaz's ogre princess -- is a pragmatic monarch.
Since throat surgery ruined the glorious singing voice of the star of "Mary Poppins," "The Sound of Music," "Victor/Victoria" and other films, Andrews finds other ways to express herself, continuing to moonlight as a children's author and director. (Watch the "Shrek" cast members talk about their characters )
Though she managed a subdued little musical number in 2004's "The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement," Andrews said she has not recovered her singing voice in the 10 years since the surgery.
"No, sadly," Andrews said in an interview to promote "Shrek the Third." "I'm not singing. My daughter, the one that I write with, said something so lovely. I was bemoaning the fact that I wasn't singing and how much I missed it. And she said, 'Mom, you've just found a different way of using your voice by writing.' It made me feel so much better. ...
"I do miss singing with an orchestra, the beauty of it all. I miss the music. But at least I am able to still contribute, which is lovely."
Andrews, 71, has referred to her talent as "my freak four-octave voice," which gave her an early start in show business in England. The daughter of music-hall performers, Andrews was singing on stage as a child and was still in her teens when she debuted on Broadway.
She quickly became a Broadway superstar as Eliza Doolittle in "My Fair Lady" and followed that musical as Guinevere in "Camelot," though success in Hollywood initially was elusive.
Andrews was passed over in favor of Audrey Hepburn for the big-screen version of "My Fair Lady." But Walt Disney cast her as the perky, singing nanny in 1964's "Mary Poppins," a screen debut that earned Andrews the best-actress Academy Award. That same year, Hepburn was not even nominated for "My Fair Lady."
A year later, Andrews was nominated for best actress in "The Sound of Music," and she earned a third nomination for 1982's "Victor/Victoria," one of seven films she made with her husband, director Blake Edwards.
Andrews' voice problems developed while she was performing in the Broadway production of "Victor/Victoria" in the mid-1990s. She underwent surgery to remove non-cancerous nodules, but the operation left her without her singing voice.
She sued two doctors and Mount Sinai hospital in New York and settled out of court in 2000, with no terms disclosed.
By then, Andrews had long since established herself as a children's author, a sidelight that became increasingly important with her singing career over. Her books include "Mandy," "Little Bo," "The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles" and her "Dumpy the Dump Truck" tales.
Daughter: 'Write me a story'
Andrews and daughter Emma Walton Hamilton write together and oversee a collection of children's stories under Andrews' name that includes their own works, tales by others and books that had gone out-of-print.
The writing career began about 30 years ago during a simple game with her children "that required the paying of a forfeit," Andrews said. "I was the first to lose, and I said, 'What shall my forfeit be?'
"My eldest daughter said, 'Write me a story,' and I thought, OK, because I used to make up little tales for them. I thought a couple of pages of an Aesop's fable would be fine, but she was my new stepdaughter, and I thought, well, maybe I can really make something of this and give her a gift."
The pages piled up, husband Edwards urged her on, and "when the book was finished, I felt empty and I wanted to do it again," Andrews said. "It's been going on like that since."
After another children's book, William Steig's "Shrek!", became the basis for the 2001 animated hit, Andrews was brought in for 2004's "Shrek 2" as the voice of Lillian, wife of the frog king Harold.
"We were thinking, OK, we need a queen who has really got it together but has got to have a sense of humor because of the world she lives in," said "Shrek the Third" producer Aron Warner. "Her husband's a frog, her daughter's an ogre. So we had to have someone we knew could laugh but could also carry that sort of regalness.
"Julie's an icon and a dream to work with. We were just talking about how sometimes during her recording sessions, we would sit there and go, 'That's Julie Andrews.' You need to be paying attention to the lines and not the fact that it's Julie Andrews, and I wasn't listening."
Though her singing career is behind her, Andrews does get to hum a tune in "Shrek the Third." In a dizzy moment for Queen Lillian, she trills through a few bars of "My Favorite Things," one of the songs Andrews belted out in "The Sound of Music."
"It felt like a charmingly wicked thing to do," Andrews said.
Andrews has directed for the stage and hopes to do it again amid her writing and acting work, which she hopes will include future "Shrek" films.
"I'm lucky, because I have this job, and I have my wonderful publishing job. I seem to have spread, which makes me feel great, and I'm getting to the age where I love to think about directing now," Andrews said. "I just love to keep myself active, because I've always been active. So as long as I do something that I love, I'm happy."
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

DA: No theft charges for Lindsay Lohan

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- Lindsay Lohan won't be charged with theft because prosecutors can't confirm she walked off with someone's clothes.
The district attorney's office declined to file felony grand theft charges on May 9 because of insufficient evidence, spokeswoman Jane Robison said Thursday.
An e-mail to a representative for Lohan seeking comment was not immediately returned.
A woman claimed that Lohan walked away with a shirt and other clothing after visiting her apartment while she was away for a few days.
The rejection notice said a housesitter had invited Lohan over and told authorities that she had given Lohan some clothing.
However, a plaid shirt that Lohan supposedly was wearing didn't match photos of a shirt that the alleged victim said was missing.
"The bottom line is that Lohan can't be shown to have been seen either taking or to have been later in possession of missing items and items she can be shown to have possessed were with (the housesitter's) permission," Deputy District Attorney Greg Somes wrote in the rejection notice.
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Review: 'Shrek' continues genial hit-or-miss ways

(CNN) -- The monstrously popular but desperately hit-and-miss "Shrek" series continues on its merry way in its inevitable third installment, even if the ogre himself is in danger of being sidetracked altogether.
Actually, that would probably be just fine with Shrek (voice of Mike Myers), a cantankerous and, by and large, humorless fixture in his own franchise. True to form, he spends most of this movie ducking his responsibilities and yearning for a quiet life back at the swamp with Fiona (Cameron Diaz) at his side.
Fate has other plans: when his ailing father-in-law, the frog king, finally croaks, Sir Shrek is next in line to the throne. That is, unless he can persuade Fiona's callow cousin Artie -- that is, Arthur -- to take the gig instead.
Princess Fiona doesn't get much say in all this, but her revelation that Shrek can expect to hear the pitter-patter of not-so-little feet doesn't improve his mood. A surreal nightmare sequence with Shrek babysitting vomiting infant ogres (ogrets?) is as close as this comedy is prepared to risk upsetting its family demographic.
Which isn't to say that it doesn't meander all over the place.
With seven official screenwriters and several more credited with additional dialogue, story ideas and such (including "Silence of the Lambs" scribe Ted Tally) it is hardly surprising that "Shrek the Third" feels like it's been assembled by committee.
Some promising ideas aren't as developed as they might be. Undeterred by the dismal example of "Happily N'ever After," the villainous Prince Charming enlists the aid of a rogue's gallery including Captain Hook, Rumplestiltskin and the Evil Queen, but it says something that they're all upstaged by a couple of enchanted trees. And there's terrific potential in the magical mix-up that sees those reliable scene-stealers Puss (Antonio Banderas) and Donkey (Eddie Murphy) switch hides, but they don't do much with it.
Other sketches fall flat and are allowed to keep right on plummeting: a frog chorus of Paul McCartney's "Live and Let Die" at King Harold's funeral is particularly terrible, though you know someone somewhere obviously loved the idea to death. "Worcestershire," a medieval academy populated with Valley Girls and stoners -- laughing yet? -- is another elongated fizzle that smacks of marketing strategy meetings.
Artie himself (Justin Timberlake) is a bland non-entity in the very worst Disney tradition. And Eric Idle's disenchanted New Age-y Merlin is a mildly amusing comic creation encouraged to overstay his welcome.
But it's not all bad, by any means. You've got to love Donkey's brood of braying dragon babes. There's a delicious moment when Gingerbread Man's life flashes before his eyes and he's so moved he breaks into song.
And a baby shower featuring Fiona, her mom (voiced by Julie Andrews), Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Snow White and Rapunzel gives birth to a spirited girl-power finale, with Snow White (Amy Poehler) storming the gates. (Heaven knows what Julie Andrews is capable of -- the woman did bare her breasts in "S.O.B.")
On top of it all, the animation is more impressive than ever. Facial expressions render nuances you would be hard-pressed to find from Mike Myers or Cameron Diaz in the flesh. It was a nice idea to stage the climax against a theatrical operetta of Prince Charming's devising, and this splendidly creaky, ear-piercing production is lovingly realized.
Verily, then, it's more of the same shtick, but likely a hit with the fans. "Shrek the Third" is beginning to smell a little ripe, but that's just how we like him.
"Shrek the Third" runs 93 minutes and is rated PG. For Entertainment Weekly's take, click here.

'Simpsons' still rolling in 'd'oh'

LOS ANGELES, California (Hollywood Reporter) -- Matt Groening remembers the moment he realized that "The Simpsons" -- the Fox show he created, executive produces and has nurtured as his favorite child for 18 seasons -- had grown to become a genuine colossus of popular culture.
It was a few years back, and he was stopped and searched while going through security at Los Angeles International Airport. "Suddenly, this kid walks by and shouts, 'Heah! Heah!' just like (schoolyard bully) Nelson Muntz would have," Groening recalls. "It was amazing because I'm pretty sure he didn't know who I was. At least, I like to believe he didn't."
Similar incidents, no doubt, occur all the time -- Homer Simpson's classic "D'oh!" long ago entered the American lexicon of catchphrases -- and it can safely be said that TV series don't come much more iconic than "Simpsons." It's the longest-running comedy, in terms of years, in TV history, reaching its 400th-episode milestone May 20 (the Federal Communications Commission-baiting installment "You Kent Always Say What You Want," which finds newsman Kent Brockman locking horns with Ned Flanders over alleged indecency).
Only one other TV comedy -- "The Adventures of Ozzie & Harriet," with 435 episodes -- has produced more segments. Already renewed for Season 19, "Simpsons" will tie all-time series champ "Gunsmoke" if it gets renewed for a 20th, which is thought to be likely but hardly a certainty. Nonetheless, considering that it continues to be broadcast in some 75 countries, in 18 different languages, averaging more than 40 million weekly viewers and a staggering 13 billion annual impressions globally, it's hard to argue against the notion that this is the most successful franchise to hit the small screen.
The series' characters, who first appeared as crudely produced shorts on Fox's "The Tracey Ullman Show," will celebrate their 20th anniversary on television with a feature film this summer, "The Simpsons Movie," which will have a global release July 27.
How has this longevity even happened in a medium known for inspiring fickleness and apathy in audiences? Executive producer James L. Brooks says it's a combination of great raw material and uncommon creative freedom.
"Matt's original creation of the characters was just absolutely inspiration, which really set the stage for everything that's followed," Brooks says. "And Fox has been so good about allowing us to be self-governing, to as much an extent as any show can be. We've really never gotten notes from the network, even if there was a ratings dip along the way. (And) we have benefited from mirroring the personality of our showrunners in not being any one rigorous style. They've varied the comedy in such a way that it's always stayed fresh."
Agrees Groening: "There's never been any one single kind of comedy we've tried to do over and over. We do everything from huge physical gags to cameo appearances by Gore Vidal. And I hear all of the stuff about the quality having slipped, but I think the show has never been smarter or better animated than it has in the last few seasons."
At the core of the never-waning "Simpsons" juggernaut is its collection of characters who, thanks to the cartoon format, neither age nor appreciably change in nature. For better or worse, they are what they were when the series premiered in December 1989 with the Christmas-themed "Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire." (Story: "Simpsons" voices say they have great jobs)
"When you're dealing with a live-action comedy, the writers and showrunners are obliged to have the characters learn lessons and grow emotionally," says Dana Walden, president of the show's producer, 20th Century Fox Television. "A lot of times when that happens, the show loses its comedic (point of view). That's one reason 'The Simpsons' has thrived for so long."
Producer 'still excited by every show we do'
Despite some ratings erosion over the course of Season 18, Fox Broadcasting Co. has no plans to drop the show from its schedule in the near future.
"In my world, it's almost unfathomable to have any conversation about the end of this show," says Peter Liguori, Fox's president of entertainment. "When I sit down to talk with Matt and Jim (Brooks), it's about what to do during the next 18 years. It's not a job for these guys -- it's a calling."
Al Jean, the show's longtime executive producer/showrunner -- and a "Simpsons" fixture from the beginning -- lately has been logging double duty on both the show and impending film. Despite an exhausting workload, Jean professes to still being "excited by every show we do. And I still feel like we're as good as ever, no matter what the nostalgia crowd might believe."
What's perhaps most remarkable about the series' franchise is its sheer ubiquity.
According to Fox executives, "Simpsons" shows somewhere in the world every hour of every day. And, of course, its tie-in merchandise remains an evergreen wonder of the retail universe. Elie Dekel, Fox executive vp licensing and merchandising, notes there are 600 "Simpsons" licensees, including a group of Kenyan tribesmen making hand-carved stone sculptures of the characters that are expected to be available later this year.
"We're also contemplating approaching the performers to lend their voices to GPS systems in cars," Dekel says. "We use meticulous care and (creative) integrity in developing products for the brand, and it continues to pay off."
The first nine "Simpsons" seasons have now been released on DVD and combined have sold in excess of 12 million units, making the series' home video sales a cottage industry unto itself. And in a TV landscape where comedy isn't supposed to translate from culture to culture, "Simpsons" has proved a massive exception, maintains Fox International Television president Mark Kaner.
"These story lines and characters are so relatable that they've crossed cultural boundaries," Kaner says. "In my 30 years working in TV, I've never seen a show as bulletproof as this one. Globally, it seems to recruit a new audience of young people every three years. It remains unbelievably popular in Spain, Italy, Germany, Australia and all throughout Latin America, and we see no signs of it slowing down."
On its home turf, too, "Simpsons" remains spectacularly consistent as easily the most popular syndicated comedy of the past quarter-century.
And to think it all started so modestly: as a series of interstitials on a series with perpetually low ratings ("Tracey Ullman"), on a network that had, at the time of its premiere, been around only about a year and was found in the upper reaches of the UHF dial in a number of markets.
Even if the odds were long, "I have to say that from Day 1, I thought we would be a hit if adults gave us a chance," Groening says. "And I guess they have. It was considered such a risky move at the time to schedule an animated series. But it's even more odd now to see that 20 years later, no other network has figured out how to do it."
But will Fox continue to do it for a 20th season -- and beyond?
"If I were to bet, I'd say yes," Groening adds. "But animation requires such a staggering amount of attention to detail and time that we can't drag our heels for too long. You see, ultimately, my goal isn't just to tie 'Gunsmoke' but for everybody connected with 'The Simpsons' to be as rich and bitter as anyone in Hollywood. And, you know, so far, so good."
Copyright 2007 Reuters. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

'Rock 'n' roll photographer' comes of age

ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) -- Annie Leibovitz lopes through the blond-floored galleries at the High Museum of Art, eyed by film stars, comedians, writers, dancers and those who have known and loved her best.
"You know, my mother," she stops near a small image, a group of four. A bathing-suited Marilyn Leibovitz is pictured, solidly balanced on the sands of a Long Island beach. She's executing a side arabesque, a ballet movement she loved as a teacher of modern dance. "It's hard to find a picture of my mother not doing that." ( Watch Leibovitz describe her work and what it means to her )
Once surrounded, as Leibovitz is, by some 175 of her often celebrated images, it's tempting to feel she knows each subject just as well as she knows her mom-on-one-leg. ( Watch an audio slide show in which Leibovitz discusses several key works. )
"A Photographer's Life, 1990-2005" opens Saturday at Atlanta's High Museum of Art, and represents a somewhat controversial departure for Leibovitz. There's much more than the "assignment" images, some as famous as the nude profile of a pregnant Demi Moore commissioned for the cover of Vanity Fair.
In addition, Leibovitz has chosen to include some highly personal images, including shots from the births of her three daughters, the death of her father and many from her long relationship with author-essayist Susan Sontag, who died in 2004.
"After she died," Leibovitz says, "I went looking for a picture for a memorial book that we were going to give out at the memorial service." What was chosen was a dramatic image of the dark rocks of the ancient city of Petra in Jordan. Tiny, at the break in the stone at ground level, stands Sontag, taking in the towering frieze carved into the forward rock face.
"I found this picture," Leibovitz says, taking it in, "... sort of a beckoning picture into life."
The experience of choosing that shot of Sontag and remembering the travels and times the two enjoyed together prompted her to merge commercial and private artwork into a huge book from Random House -- which serves as a catalog to the show -- and then into this touring exhibition organized last fall at the Brooklyn Museum of Art.
This is the second such major retrospective of her work, the first covering two decades, 1970 to 1990, put together under the auspices of the National Portrait Gallery in Washington.
Now 57, she likes to talk of how much easier it is to know when a shoot is finished. She also has developed a keen sense for where she wants a portrait to go.
In the case of Jim Carrey, for example, she started with British artist Francis Bacon's studies after Velasquez's Pope Innocent X. Carrey's trademark rubber-faced, wide-mouthed comedy thus ends up related to a boxed-in, agonized visage of Bacon's papal imagery.
Comedians, she points out, can be among the trickiest subjects: "The worst thing that happens with comedians is people always want them to be funny in pictures. What does that mean, 'to be funny?'"

Behind the lens
Born in Westport, Connecticut, in 1949, the daughter of an Air Force officer, Leibovitz became interested in photography in the late 1960s. While Rolling Stone was still a young magazine, editor Jann Wenner hired her, making her chief photographer in 1973 -- and giving her the label "rock 'n' roll photographer" along the way, as she followed Mick Jagger, John Lennon and others.
Advertisement work and cover layouts for Vanity Fair, Vogue, Conde Nast Traveler and other publications followed, cementing her in the collective consciousness as a creator of image-defining artwork.
The current show includes portraits of the Bush Cabinet -- before several members left -- and of Colin Powell, Chris Rock, Robert DeNiro, Al Pacino, Brad Pitt and one of Leibovitz's inspirations, the late Richard Avedon.
There also are very large photographs of landscapes, vistas in which the human subject is replaced by natural character on a vast scale.
Ultimately, the combination of the personal and commercial work, with some images as small as a standard snapshot and others measured by feet rather than inches, is a kind of darkroom disappearing act.
That's not to say Leibovitz isn't recognizable. Awards showered on her have included the Commandeur in France's Ordre des Arts et des Lettres and a Living Legend commendation from the Library of Congress.
It's more a question of what happens when her approach doesn't follow the symbolic personality tack she takes to so many celebrities.
Tony Kushner, writer of the "Angels in America" plays, wears AIDS-activist buttons. Pitt lolls on an orange bedspread in Las Vegas in faux-leopard-spotted pants, also orange. Dancer-choreographer Bill T. Jones vaults right out of Leibovitz's childhood -- her mother, Marilyn, taught modern dance. ( Read about Jones' choreography this season for Broadway's 'Spring Awakening' )
But the discovery awaiting fans of her work in this exhibition may be what Leibovitz does when looking the other way, if you will, not toward fame and fashion but toward her family, friends, singular moments, cherished locales, scenes developed in a solution of fond attachments, aching allegiances and focused hindsight.
"It's this idea of letting things unfold in front of you," she says. "You're not doing journalism, you really do have a point of view. And it's done with a 35-millimeter camera, black and white. ... I just aim the camera and take the pictures."

Review: '28 Weeks Later' thrillingly effective

(CNN) -- "28 Days Later," a zombie movie on speed, pictured the United Kingdom as a desolate wasteland just a month after a homicidal virus ("Rage") entered the general population.
Although the low-budget hit from "Trainspotting" director Danny Boyle ended on a note of muted hope, none of the original characters have survived for "28 Weeks Later," which picks up this localized doomsday scenario several months later.
Too efficient for its own good, the epidemic has long since extinguished itself. With no more human flesh to cannibalize, the infected have starved to death. So the quarantine has been lifted and refugees are being sent to the Isle of Dogs, a safe zone in the heart of London's financial district secured by the U.S. military, to begin anew.
Here Dan (Robert Carlyle) is reunited with his two kids. Tammy (the splendidly named Imogen Poots) is a teenager with pale, wary eyes. At 12, her brother Andy (the even more splendidly named Mackintosh Muggleton) is Britain's youngest resident.
It's quiet in England now. But not for long.
With Boyle and screenwriter Alex Garland otherwise engaged on the forthcoming sci-fi epic "Sunshine," sequel duties have been entrusted to Spanish filmmaker Juan Carlo Fresnadillo, whose only previous feature was the eye-catching thriller "Intacto."
Fresnadillo proves a shrewd choice. "28 Weeks Later" combines traditional B-movie virtues -- economy, invention, sinewy narrative spine -- with the eerily resonant spectacle of a 21st-century metropolis stripped of its citizenry. The movie provides an apocalyptic chill with images such as poison gas drifting past Westminster at dawn, or the Docklands being firebombed.
Admittedly, the film has its share of traditional B-movie detriments too: sketchy performances, implausible narrative short cuts, and only nominal emotional investment.
Even with the family fissures running through this story, Fresnadillo fails to flesh out the humanity in his characters in the way that Boyle managed. The action flows thick and fast, culminating in a genuinely scary descent into the pitch-black Underground (frightening enough at the best of times), but at close quarters the director's reliance on a murky palette and blurrily frenetic handheld camera slips from intentionally disorienting to downright confusing.
All these problems collide in a far-fetched scene where a sentimental GI (Jeremy Renner) starts shooting his own guys to protect the children. Much more credible, unfortunately, is the way reconstruction efforts abruptly collapse as military containment degenerates into chaos.
In the movie's most powerful sequence, the security forces decide to give up the hopeless task of distinguishing between the rampaging infected and their terrified prey to shoot down everything that moves.
The parallels with Iraq are so bald, they don't require spelling out -- though it's interesting that London should play this world's-end role again, so soon after "Children of Men." Given the deeply cynical ending, you could twist this political allegory more ways than one, but fear would seem to be an appropriate response.
They don't call them horror movies for nothing.

'Terminator' back for a new trilogy

LOS ANGELES, California (Hollywood Reporter) -- The Terminator is coming back.
A nascent film company has acquired the franchise rights to the popular movie series from producers Mario Kassar and Andrew Vajna, intending to make a new trilogy. The deal is said to be in the tens of millions of dollars.
The Halcyon Co. -- a privately financed firm -- plans to begin immediate preproduction on "Terminator 4," with hopes that it will be ready for release in the first half of 2009.
The script, by John Brancato and Michael Ferris, was part of the transaction. No distributor is on board, or any talent.
Halcyon -- headed by advertising veteran Derek Anderson and "Cook-Off!" producer Victor Kubicek -- pursued the "Terminator" rights aggressively for several months, knowing that the series is one of the few recognizable properties out there not in the hands of a major studio. Halcyon also is concentrating on a merchandising and licensing push for the property.
The rights to "Terminator" have changed hands several times.
Kassar acted as an executive producer for 1991's "Terminator 2: Judgment Day," and he and Vajna acquired interests from Gale Anne Hurd -- who produced the first one in 1984 and executive produced the second -- when the duo made 2003's "Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines."
Copyright 2007 Reuters. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Where have all the viewers gone?

NEW YORK (AP) -- Maybe they're outside in the garden. They could be playing softball. Or perhaps they're just plain bored.
In TV's worst spring in recent memory, a startling number of Americans drifted away from television the past two months: More than 2.5 million fewer people were watching ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox than at the same time last year, statistics show.
Everyone has a theory to explain the plummeting ratings: early Daylight Savings Time, more reruns, bad shows, more shows being recorded or downloaded or streamed. (Blog: What -- and when -- are you watching?)
Scariest of all for the networks, however, is the idea that many people are now making their own television schedules. The industry isn't fully equipped to keep track of them, and as a result the networks are scrambling to hold on to the nearly $8.8 billion they collected during last spring's ad-buying season.
"This may be the spring where we see a radical shift in the way the culture thinks of watching TV," said Sarah Bunting, co-founder of the Web site Television Without Pity.
The viewer plunge couldn't have come at a worse time for the networks -- next week they will showcase their fall schedules to advertisers in the annual "up front" presentations.
The networks argue that viewership is changing, not necessarily declining. Some advertisers respond that they are no longer willing to pay full price up front to reach viewers that may not tune in later.
This fall, both sides will be watching what happens with families like Tony Cort's. During prime-time, Cort, his wife and four kids tend to scatter to computers or other activities in different parts of their New Jersey home. (Not during "American Idol" or "Lost," though.) They're definitely watching less TV, said Cort, who runs a Web site for martial arts aficionados.
"I remember when '24' was on, that was something there was a lot of interest and excitement about," he said.
News flash: "24" is still on. Its ratings are down, too, amid a critically savaged season.
More bad news abounds. NBC set a record last month for its least-watched week during the past 20 years, and maybe ever -- then broke it a week later. This is the least popular season ever for CBS' "Survivor." ABC's "Lost" has lost nearly half its live audience -- more than 10 million people -- from the days it was a sensation. "The Sopranos" (a show that has earned broadcast-network-like ratings in the past) is ending on HBO, and the response is a collective yawn.
Events like "American Idol" on Fox (which is owned by News Corp.) and "Dancing With the Stars" on ABC (owned by The Walt Disney Co.) are doing the most to prop up the industry. But still, in the six weeks after Daylight Savings Time started in early March, prime-time viewership for the four biggest broadcast networks was down to 37.6 million people, from 40.3 million during the same period in 2006, according to Nielsen Media Research.
Missing money
Millions of missing viewers could translate into millions of missing dollars for the networks heading into the up-front sales season.
Advertisers don't believe that the drop in viewership is as dramatic as the numbers suggest, but they're no longer willing to spend what they once did in the spring market, said Brad Adgate of Horizon Media, an ad buying firm. Johnson & Johnson and Coca-Cola sat out the spring market last year -- betting they could get lower prices later -- and it's likely other companies will do the same this year, he said.
The early start to Daylight Savings Time has hurt ratings. Prime-time viewership traditionally dips then as people do more things outside, and this year folks had a three-week head start to get into the habit of doing something else. More network reruns during March and April dampened interest, too.
"We let them get out of the habit of watching television a little bit, and it's going to take some time to get these people back in front of their television sets," said David Poltrack, chief researcher for CBS (owned by CBS Corp.).
Strategic decisions to send some popular serial dramas on long hiatuses appeared to backfire. NBC's "Heroes," CBS' "Jericho" and "Lost" lost significant momentum when they returned. Besides HBO's "The Sopranos," there are no lengthy countdowns toward the end of very popular series, unless you count "The King of Queens."
There also are technical reasons that this apparent diminished interest in television may be overstated.
This year, for the first time, Nielsen is measuring viewership in the estimated 17 percent of homes with digital video recorders _ but it only counts them in the ratings of a specific show if they watch it within 24 hours of the original air time.
If you recorded "Desperate Housewives" this spring and watched it two days later, you're not counted in the show's ratings. And you're not counted by Nielsen under any circumstances if you downloaded a show on iTunes and watched it on your iPod or cell phone, or streamed an episode from a network Web site.
Since last year's Nielsen sample contained no DVR homes and this year's sample does, logic dictates that fewer Nielsen families are watching TV live this year, deflating ratings.
"People are not consuming less television, they're watching it in different ways, and the measurements haven't caught up," said Alan Wurtzel, chief research executive at NBC (owned by General Electric Co.).
The numbers can be significant. When "The Office" aired on NBC on April 5, Nielsen said there were 5.8 million people watching. Add in the people who recorded the episode and watched it within the next week, and viewership swelled to 7.6 million, a 32 percent increase, Nielsen said.
"The Sopranos" is another interesting case study. For its first four episodes this season, the show averaged 7.4 million viewers for its weekly Sunday night premiere, down from 8.9 million at the same point its last season.
But HBO shows each new episode eight times a week. Between the multiple plays and DVR viewing, each episode this spring gets 11.1 million viewers, down from 13 million last year. And these figures don't count people who watch on demand.
Numbers for "The Sopranos" may be down because people can watch whenever they want. They may not be as interested in the show as they used to be -- or it could be a combination of both.
Television has made billions based on how many people watch a show at its regular time. That idea may already be obsolete. So should the industry use DVR viewing when setting ad rates? If so, how quickly must people watch the shows -- within two days? A week? What about people who watch shows on their cell phones or on network Web sites, which Nielsen doesn't measure yet? Later this month Nielsen will begin measuring how many people watch commercials. Should those be used to compute advertising costs?
Right now, none of those questions have answers.
However, "if we continue to do business assuming people will watch television as they always have," said NBC's Wurtzel, "it's a dead-end game."
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

'Axis of Evil' inspires laughs

FORT LAUDERDALE, Florida (CNN) -- Standing onstage, comedian Aron Kader describes how his cousin in the Middle East likes to curse the United States -- in English.
"Arabs love to cuss in English," Kader belts out. "They cuss their heads off in English, but they won't do it in Arabic because then God can hear them."
The audience, two-thirds of Mideast descent, explodes in laughter. (Watch the comics "scare people into laughing"
Kader is a member of the "Axis of Evil" comedy group, a collection of comics with Mideast roots who have formed a niche by taking on Mideast stereotypes and making subjects such as war, terrorism and suicide bombers funny.
It's a delicate balance, but one that seems to be catching on with a larger audience. The comics' videos on YouTube have been viewed more than 200,000 times, they recently had a one-hour special on Comedy Central and they currently are on a 15-city tour with packed crowds.
How do they make such serious topics funny?
The key, Kader says, is getting the audience on board. "Let them know that 'Hey, I get it, you guys have a stereotype of us, and I know what you see.' " (Watch the Axis dig into their roots )
Ethnic humor has a long history in the United States, but Kader says being Middle Eastern is different. He says people too often think of militants, terrorists and suicide bombers. "You just say you're Palestinian, and it's like you made a political statement."
And so the group has worked to try to change those stereotypes, one laugh at a time.
In November 2005, the comics took up the name Axis of Evil, playing off the term President Bush used in his 2002 State of the Union address to describe Iraq, Iran and North Korea.
There are four members of the Axis comedy group. Kader is a Palestinian-American, and Maz Jobrani is an Iranian-American with a degree in political science from the University of California, Berkeley. (Jobrani was one of the stars of the ABC series "The Knights of Prosperity.")
Rounding out the Axis are Ahmed Ahmed, an Egyptian-American, and Dean Obeidallah, a Palestinian-American who once was a practicing attorney.
Their biting humor is something to which many in their audience can relate. Jobrani says when he tells one joke begging for the news media to show Middle Easterners doing something positive -- like "baking a cookie or something" -- the crowd loves it for more than just its humor.
"That gets a laugh, but it also gets a clap from regular audiences, and I think that's because a lot of people are sick of seeing Middle Easterners depicted the way we're always depicted," he says.
Obeidallah says he never felt like a Middle Easterner until after the September 11, 2001, attacks. Now, he says, he does his comedy "not just for me."
"It's for my cousins, it's for my friends, it's for other Arabs and other people who get dirty looks or looked at funny because they have an accent or are viewed as suspicious simply because of their heritage," he says.
"We don't want to be defined any longer by the worst examples in our community, and it's a very small amount of people. There are a few terrorists and they define all of us."
Ahmed says he gets problems at the airport -- because his name matches the alias of a terrorist on the FBI's "Most Wanted" list.
But he takes it in stride. Like his fellow Axis comedians, he says, you can "scare people into laughing."
He quotes a comedy colleague who is a rabbi.
"He always says you can't hate anybody when you're laughing with them. So it's nice, when we're doing our comedy show, to see the diversity in the crowd and people actually laughing together," Ahmed says.
"You see Arabs and Jews and Mexicans and whites, and they're all sitting together and they're sharing the same laugh. Comedy's like food or music. It's universal. Laughter's universal."

'Spider-Man's' other woman: 'Such a big movie'

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- No wonder Bryce Dallas Howard is smiling.
The eldest daughter of Ron Howard, the Oscar-winning director of "A Beautiful Mind," is a newlywed, a new mom, and now a classic comic-book babe as Gwen Stacy, Peter Parker's new crush in "Spider-Man 3."
("Spider-Man 3" got off to a fast start: the film set box-office records last weekend.)
Howard first gained fame in M. Night Shyamalan's 2004 film, "The Village," and went on to become the ethereal star of his "Lady in the Water" two years later.
But "Spider-Man 3" is her first big summer blockbuster, and judging by her grin, she's ready for more.
Despite having a baby boy just 10 weeks ago (with husband Seth Gabel) Howard, 26, is out promoting the film and already looking forward to her next project, a leading role in "The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond," due in 2008.
Folded into an overstuffed chair at Beverly Hills' Four Seasons Hotel and peeking out from beneath her long red bangs, Howard beamed as she talked with The Associated Press about motherhood, movies and what she's learned from her famous father.
Q: How does "Spider-Man 3" compare to other films you've done?
BRYCE DALLAS HOWARD: It is supersized. Literally I would walk around the Sony lot ... and they took over the entire lot practically. I was really surprised because when I was on set with (Director) Sam (Raimi) and all the other actors, it felt so intimate and fun and playful. Then when I finally saw the movie I remembered again, "God, this is such a big movie." I can't believe it, because it didn't seem like a high-pressure situation. It seemed really relaxed and cool and like we were just making this movie.
Q: Are you a fan of superhero films?
HOWARD: I was really into this franchise in particular because although it is obviously this big film and there are these huge action sequences that are absolutely terrifying, it really is, at the end of the day, just a great character piece. Sam creates these really complex characters and there's a lot of humor in it as well. It's very, very funny, so it's an incredibly balanced film. It's terrifying, it's hilarious, it's emotional, it's beautiful.
Q: Are you at the point yet where you're giving your dad advice?
HOWARD: Oh God, no. Are you crazy? All the time I come up with these weird ideas or theories. I have all these theories about the industry or the future of storytelling, that kind of thing, so I'll talk to him about that, but no, that man needs no advice from me, trust me.
Q: Does he give you a lot of advice?
HOWARD: No, he's really great in that way. I mean, I ask him for advice sometimes, but he never gives unsolicited advice. He's always kind of letting us -- myself and my siblings -- find our own way, make our own mistakes and come to our own conclusions. He's pretty much the ideal parent.
Q: Are there any downsides to having such a famous father?
HOWARD: No. Sure, there have been times where there has been a bit of criticism and people say I'm only in this industry because he's in this industry and all that kind of stuff, but that's OK. I'm really grateful to have the father that I have and if I'm going to get that kind of criticism, I have to take it with a grain of salt. ... I feel so lucky to have parents who are so supportive. I know a lot of my friends who are actors, their parents don't quite understand ... whereas my parents ... know it's possible. That itself is such an advantage just knowing your parents believe in you.
Q: Is there a genre that appeals to you more than others?
HOWARD: No, I like doing it all because I have a lot to learn. I want to immerse myself in as many genres as possible and as many different industries as possible. I love the European film community, I love the independent film community. I love now, with "Spider-Man," being part of the more conventional Hollywood film community. So I just want to continue doing that and gathering as much information as possible and experiences as possible.
Q: How about a director you dream of working with?
HOWARD: I would love to work with my dad. I'm dying to work with my dad. We talk about it and I harass him about it. But I think eventually, if there is a role that's totally appropriate and perfect, I hope it would become a reality. I have a bit further to go, though.
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

'Spider-Man 3' breaks 1-day record

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) -- "Spider-Man 3" sold a record $59 million worth of tickets during its first day of release across North America, and is on track to break the industry mark for an opening weekend, according to estimates issued Saturday by the film's distributor.
The highly anticipated superhero saga opened in the United States and Canada Friday, having already begun its international campaign May 1.
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Showbiz Tonight's Sibila Vargas sits down with Tobey Maguire to discuss his role in 'Spider-Man 3'. (May 2)
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The North American one-day and opening-weekend records were held by Walt Disney Co.'s July 2006 smash "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest," with respective sums of $55.8 million and $135.6 million.
"Based on the first day's performance, the studio believes the film will deliver in the range of $135 million to $145 million in North America for its first three days of release," Columbia Pictures said in a statement.
The Sony Corp. (Charts) -owned studio will issue three-day estimates early Sunday.
Summer of sequels!
The first "Spider-Man," released in 2002, earned $39.4 million on its first day, $114.8 million on its first weekend, and $403 million by the end of its North American run. Two years later, "Spider-Man 2" finished with $373 million. It opened on a Wednesday -- rather than the traditional Friday -- with $40.4 million, and earned $88.2 million during the subsequent weekend.
Overseas business is similarly brisk, with Friday sales estimated at $45 million. A Columbia spokesman did not have information on the foreign earnings to date.
All three films star Tobey Maguire as the web-slinging crime fighter, and Kirsten Dunst as his girlfriend. Sam Raimi directed the trilogy.

Paris Hilton sentenced to 45 days in jail

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- A judge sentenced Paris Hilton to 45 days in county jail Friday for violating her probation, putting the brakes on the hotel heiress's famous high life.
Hilton, who parlayed her name and relentless partying into worldwide notoriety, must go to jail by June 5.
She will not be allowed any work release, furloughs, use of an alternative jail or electronic monitoring in lieu of jail, Superior Court Judge Michael T. Sauer ruled after a hearing.
The judge, saying "there's no doubt she knew her license had been suspended," ruled that she was in violation of the terms of her probation in an alcohol-related reckless driving case.
"I'm very sorry, and from now on I'm going to pay complete attention to everything. I'm sorry, and I did not do it on purpose at all," she told the judge before he announced the sentence.
She was then ordered to report to a women's jail in suburban Lynwood by the set date or face 90 days behind bars. The judge's ruling excluded her from paying to serve time in a jail of her choice, as some violators are allowed to do.
As a city prosecutor said during closing arguments that Hilton deserved jail time, Hilton's mother, Kathy, laughed. When the judge ruled, Kathy Hilton then blurted out: "May I have your autograph?"
Paris Hilton was among a series of witnesses who took the stand during the hearing. She testified she believed her license was initially suspended for 30 days and that she was allowed to drive for work purposes during the next 90 days. (Watch why Hilton thought it was OK to be driving )
She said that when an officer who stopped her in January made her sign a document stating her license was suspended, she thought he was mistaken and did not actually look at the document.
Also called to the stand was Hilton's spokesman, Elliot Mintz. Hilton and her attorneys characterized Mintz as a liaison between Hilton and her lawyers.
Mintz testified that to his knowledge Hilton did not drive during the 30-day period. He said he then advised her that he believed her license was no longer suspended.
The judge called Mintz's testimony worthless and expressed disbelief at Hilton's excuse.
"I can't believe that either attorney did not tell her that the suspension had been upheld," the judge said. "She wanted to disregard everything that was said and continue to drive no matter what."
Hilton looked forward and didn't speak to news media as she left court with her mother.
When a reporter asked what she thought of the judge's decision, a visibly angry Kathy Hilton responded: "What do you think? This is pathetic and disgusting, a waste of taxpayer money with all this nonsense. This is a joke."
Defense attorney Howard Weitzman said he would appeal.
"I'm shocked, I'm surprised and really disheartened in the system that I've worked in for close to 40 years," Weitzman said.
He said the sentence was "uncalled for, inappropriate and bordered on the ludicrous."
"I think she's singled out because of who she is," Weitzman said.
Hilton had arrived at the Metropolitan Courthouse 10 minutes late and ignored screams of photographers as she swept in with her attorneys, mother and father, Rick Hilton.
The celebrity case brought an unusual scene to the austere courthouse south of downtown in a commercial area. As if at a red carpet event, dozens of photographers and reporters lined up at the rear entrance. Yellow police tape substituted for velvet ropes.
String of traffic violations
Hilton, 26, pleaded no contest in January to reckless driving stemming from a Sept. 7 arrest in Hollywood. Police said she appeared intoxicated and failed a field sobriety test. She had a blood-alcohol level of 0.08 percent, the level at which an adult driver is in violation of the law.
She was sentenced to 36 months' probation, alcohol education and $1,500 in fines.
Two other traffic stops and failure to enroll in a mandated alcohol education program are what landed the socialite back in court.
On January 15, Hilton was pulled over by the California Highway Patrol. Officers informed her that she was driving on a suspended license and she signed a document acknowledging that she was not to drive, according to papers filed in Superior Court.
Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies stopped Hilton on February 27 and charged her with violating her probation. Police said she was pulled over about 11 p.m. after authorities saw the car speeding with its headlights off.
Mintz said at the time Hilton wasn't aware her license was suspended. A copy of the document Hilton signed on January 15 was found in the car's glove compartment, court papers say.
Hilton was also required to enroll in an alcohol education program by February 12. As of April 17, she had not enrolled, prosecutors said.
Hilton, heiress to the Hilton Hotel fortune, first gained notoriety for her hard partying as a teen. She attracted worldwide attention when a sex tape she made with a boyfriend was released on the Internet.
She stars in the reality-TV series "The Simple Life," now in its fifth season, with Nicole Richie. She appeared in the 2005 film "House of Wax" and recently finished filming "The Hottie and the Nottie." She also is a handbag designer and has a namesake perfume.
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

'Spider-Man 3' opens; box office records next?

LOS ANGELES, California (Hollywood Reporter) -- The summer movie season is upon us. Let the hyperbole begin!
Sony Pictures unleashes "Spider-Man 3" in a record 4,252 theaters across North America Friday, and by Sunday morning, if not before, it will become clear whether Spidey has overtaken Captain Jack Sparrow for the honor of biggest opening weekend of all time, a formidable challenge since the bar set last summer by "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest" stands at $135.6 million.
In the meantime, everyone -- Hollywood executives, moviegoers and certainly the media -- is likely to lose all sense of perspective, a phenomenon that happens every summer as the would-be blockbusters roll out. (Review: 'Spider-Man 3' mixes highs and lows)
The media are often eager to proclaim such high-profile movies an instant hit or miss. Each summer, there are a few big-budget movies whose failure to launch is immediately apparent. (Remember the ill-fated "Poseidon" last summer?) But for most big-budget gambles, the evidence is more ambiguous and won't start coming into focus until the second or third weekend of a film's release.
Consumers, meannwhile, are all too willing to turn into lemmings, eager to participate en masse in the next big thing. As digital media proliferate, much has been written about the growth of niche micromarkets with audiences splintering into thousands of discrete interest groups. But when it comes to summer entertainment, a herd mentality still prevails. (It's not restricted to movies, either -- the eventual "American Idol" finale on TV this month and the publication of the final "Harry Potter" novel in July also are guaranteed to post huge numbers.)
Of course, the studios are looking to corral that mass audience with the help of enormous blockbusters that demand attention. Given the huge budgets involved as well as the massive marketing expenditures, the costs factors are so high that it would take a court-ordered audit to figure out the ultimate profitability of such projects.
"Spider-Man 3," for example, is officially pegged at $258 million, though skeptics insist the final budget could well be higher. For that money, Sony could have arguably turned out a half-dozen $40 million-$60 million movies. Would a broader slate of more modestly budgeted movies ultimately prove more profitable? The studios, increasingly putting more of their eggs in fewer baskets, don't think so.
When the dust from the blockbusters settles by summer's end, the surviving ones, if successful, continue to be the gifts that keep on giving. They become profit centers driving other endeavors.
The Walt Disney Co., for example, used the success of its "Pirates" franchise to retool its venerable Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland, and in the summer it will borrow characters from "Finding Nemo" to revive its old submarine ride in Tomorrowland.
To woo DVD viewers to its new Blu-ray Disc format, Sony packaged a Blu-ray DVD of last summer's hit "Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby" with its PlayStation 3. The eventual Blu-ray version of "Spidey 3" could prove another weapon in the ongoing standards battle between Blu-ray and Toshiba's HD DVD.
In the end, the box office figures, no matter how high they go in what promises to be a record-breaking summer, will only tell a part of the story.
Copyright 2007 Reuters. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

'Spider-Man 3' has huge international first day

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- "Spider-Man 3" cast a worldwide web with a blockbuster first day, hauling in $29.15 million in 16 overseas markets and beating the debuts of the previous two "Spider-Man" flicks in each locale.
The film had the best opening day ever Tuesday in some countries, including France, Italy, South Korea and Hong Kong, distributor Sony Pictures said.
"Spider-Man 3" opens over the next couple of days in dozens of other countries, including the United States on Friday. (Watch Tobey Maguire talk about his love of the film )
" 'Spider-Man' is a worldwide franchise, and the thing we're most excited about is that in two pretty completely separate parts of the world we've gotten off to a great start," Jeff Blake, Sony vice chairman, said Wednesday. "We certainly hope for the same in North America."
Domestically, 2002's "Spider-Man" opened with $114.8 million in its first weekend, a record debut that stood until "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest" shattered it last year with a $135.6 million weekend.
"Spider-Man 2" opened on a Wednesday before the Fourth of July weekend in 2004, pulling in a record $180.1 million in its first six days.
The two previous films combined for a total of $1.6 billion worldwide, about half of that coming in the United States.
In France, "Spider-Man 3" took in $6.8 million on opening day, more than the first-day grosses there for "Spider-Man" and "Spider-Man 2" combined.
It grossed $4.6 million in Germany, $4 million in Italy, $3.7 million in Japan, $3.4 million in South Korea, $1.1 million in the Philippines and $1 million each in Hong Kong and Thailand.
The third installment in director Sam Raimi's superhero series, "Spider-Man 3" reunites Tobey Maguire as the web-slinger, Kirsten Dunst as the love of his life and James Franco as his old pal turned enemy.
Adapted from the Marvel comic books, the film also introduces two new villains, Thomas Haden Church as the Sandman and Topher Grace as Venom. (Story: The villains dish)
Along with bad guys, Spidey ends up battling his own dark side as he fights the temptation to use his powers for evil after an alien entity infects his superhero outfit.
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Tobey Maguire: 'Everything's in transition'

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- Tobey Maguire says he and his big-screen alter-ego, Spider-Man, "have very different lives."
Still, both are caught in the same web of uncertainty: What next?
The upcoming release of "Spider-Man 3" raises as many questions as it answers for the web-slinging hero and the actor behind him. (Watch Maguire and co-star Topher Grace try to answer some of those questions .)
Is the Spidey franchise finished? Will Maguire sign on for a fourth installment? Will Peter Parker propose to Mary Jane? How will fatherhood and marriage affect Maguire's future? What roles lie ahead after superhero success?
"Everything's in transition for me," says the actor, sitting in a plush suite at Beverly Hills' Four Seasons Hotel. "My friendships, where I want to live."
And his work. After playing "Spider-Man" for six years, and fitting in "Seabiscuit" and "The Good German" in between, the 31-year-old star is looking at a wide-open calendar. His top priority is spending time with his fiancee, Jennifer Meyer, and their 5-month-old daughter, Ruby Sweetheart. But workwise?
"I don't have any specific ideas," he says, looking sharp in a gray suit, white shirt and Hollywood stubble. "I want to work in all types of movies. I don't care the size of the movie. I want to work in different genres and different types of films. It just all depends on scripts and directors."
He's not ruling out another adventure with Spider-Man and the film series' three-time director, Sam Raimi. But he's not ruling it in, either.
"If there's a script I love, if the character goes in directions that I think would be great, and if Sam's involved and the right cast is there, then I would consider it at that point," Maguire says, adding that it could take years to develop a script for "Spider-Man 4."
"I think they would love for Sam to do it, so we'll just see." (Story: "Spider-Man 3" from the villains' perspective)
Raimi: Maguire was perfect
As far as Raimi is concerned, there is no other Peter Parker besides Maguire. He cast the actor after seeing him in "The Cider House Rules."
"What I saw within his performance was a sensitivity and a vulnerability that I felt the character had to have," Raimi recalls. "There was an outcry at the time that he was wrong, that he was never going to be Peter Parker. But I was never bothered by that. Because although I'm a very insecure person, I was very confident I knew the character, knew who he was, and that these people were thinking of some hero called Spider-Man. And that the real heart of Spider-Man was this kid behind the mask. That's what I was going to make this movie about."
Laura Ziskin, one of the film's producers, says she had some initial reservations about Maguire's superhero qualities -- until she saw his screen test.
"We cast him immediately," she says. "When we finished the movie, you know you cast something right when you can't imagine anybody else doing the part."
Maguire manages to capture Peter Parker's low-profile nature as well as Spider-Man's over-the-top heroics, says co-star Bryce Dallas Howard, who plays affection-object Gwen Stacy in "Spider-Man 3."
"I understand why he got cast as this character and why he's so beloved as this character: because he's not so different," she says. "He's a good, good man ... and he goes to great lengths to help people around him."
Still, Maguire says he doesn't feel he owns the role.
"I don't go to bed at night thinking, 'Ah, I'm Spider-Man,' " he says. "These are properties for these studios and ... I won't be doing them forever whether I do another one or not."
Meanwhile, he's enjoying the accomplishment of finishing a six-year project. He celebrated with some time off before jumping into the movie's marketing madness, which included a trip to Tokyo and a jaunt to New York City. He likes "being part of the event" of "Spider-Man 3," he says, but his measured speech gives the impression that he might prefer privacy.
Maguire says he's "proud" of his work on the three Spider-Man films: "I feel like this version of it is ours." Now he's looking forward to free time and figuring out fatherhood.
"It kind of changes everything when you're a dad," he says. "You don't have the same time to hang out with your friends. You don't have the same time to do other stuff that, for me, I used to do. But you're trading it up for something that's better, which is getting to hang out with my daughter, and that's amazing."
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Would-be sleepers take on summer blockbusters

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- Sequels to "Shrek," "Spider-Man" and "Pirates of the Caribbean" aren't the only movies coming out this summer. It only seems that way. Beneath the Hollywood's behemoth franchise flicks, a few less-heralded gems sneak in to become niche hits and sometimes $100 million smashes.
The question is whether this season's exceptionally strong lineup of blockbuster sequels will leave breathing room for many -- or any -- summer sleepers.
"There's not a single movie I don't know about this summer, and I'm terrified of them all," said director Matthew Vaughn, who worries his intriguing fantasy "Stardust" could get lost amid the rush that begins in May with "Spider-Man 3," "Shrek the Third" and "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End." "I call them juggernauts. They are coming, and nothing's going to stop them."
A fairy tale for adults, "Stardust" (from Viacom Inc.'s Paramount Pictures) features Claire Danes as the human incarnation of a fallen star, who lands on Earth, falls for a young adventurer (Charlie Cox), is befriended by an effeminate ship captain (Robert De Niro) and pursued by an evil witch (Michelle Pfeiffer).
"Stardust" opens in August on the same day as the buddy-cop sequel "Rush Hour 3" and just weeks after such big flicks as "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix," "The Simpsons Movie" and "The Bourne Ultimatum."
Along with those big hitters, summer's lineup features such heavily marketed studio flicks as the animated tales "Ratatouille" and "Surf's Up," the sci-fi saga "Transformers," and sequels including the heist caper "Ocean's Thirteen," the superhero adventure "Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer" and the comedy "Evan Almighty."
How are worthy smaller movies supposed to stand out in a crowd like that?
"That's none of my business. I'm a filmmaker, not a marketer," said Frank Oz, who has made such studio films as "The Stepford Wives" remake and "The Score" but this time directs the small ensemble comedy "Death at a Funeral," which opens right before the busy Fourth of July weekend, when "Ratatouille" and "Transformers" are expected to dominate at theaters.
"My job is to make a film, not to look at grosses and marketing. I've been told what films are up against mine, and I've forgotten them all," said Oz, whose film features a relatively unknown cast in the tale of a British funeral beset by outrageous revelations, schemes and mishaps.
The strategy for such smaller films is to screen them for critics and preview audiences well in advance, so word-of-mouth can help make up for their generally minimal marketing budgets.
The film-festival circuit is a major pipeline to build buzz for sleeper films, including such past summer hits as "Little Miss Sunshine," "Garden State" and "Napoleon Dynamite."
Favorites from last fall's Toronto and this winter's Sundance festivals are hitting theaters this summer, among them the teen tale "Rocket Science," about a stuttering youth who tries out for a debate team; "Away From Her," a melancholy drama directed by actress Sarah Polley about a woman (Julie Christie) succumbing to Alzheimer's; "Waitress," with Keri Russell as a diner worker trying to break away from her dreary life; "Once," following an Irish street musician (Glen Hansard of the Frames) who forms a musical partnership with a Czech woman; and "Eagle vs. Shark," a quirky New Zealand romance between a wallflower and a geek.
Some summer films vying for attention among the franchise flicks benefit from big-name performers, such as last year's breakout hits "The Devil Wears Prada" with Meryl Streep and "The Break-Up" with Jennifer Aniston.
Those two films also filled the chick-flick void typical of summer, which tends toward action spectacles, teen comedies and family movies.
Among this season's films with female star power are the comedy "Knocked Up," featuring Katherine Heigl of "Grey's Anatomy" as a career-minded woman who gets pregnant from a drunken one-night stand with a slacker (Seth Rogen), and the romantic drama "No Reservations," starring Catherine Zeta-Jones as a work-obsessed chef whose poor interpersonal skills are tested by her young niece (Abigail Breslin) and an easygoing sous chef (Aaron Eckhart).
"It's certainly not a 'Spider-Man' or a 'Batman,"' Zeta-Jones said of "No Reservations," a remake of the 2002 German charmer "Mostly Martha." "I really love the movie, but it's out of my control, the way it's programmed and marketed. ... I just thought that it's a story that could be brought to a broader audience."
"No Reservations" director Scott Hicks said he was happy distributor Warner Bros. had enough confidence in the film to put it out in the busy summer rather than waiting for fall, when most films aimed at older adults hit theaters.
"We hope to sort of weave our way through the behemoths as they come thundering down the tracks," Hicks said. "It will provide some counterprogramming for the big summer fare. Beyond that, it's in the hands of the audience gods now."
Along with Heigl's appeal, "Knocked Up" benefits from the track record of writer-director Judd Apatow, who scored a big-screen smash with "The 40-Year-Old Virgin," which co-starred Rogen, now elevated to leading man.
"We talked about making a movie where I was the lead, but no one was going to let us, which is not surprising," said Rogen, who also co-starred in Apatow's beloved TV shows "Freaks and Geeks" and "Undeclared." "If you look at me, there's nothing that screams, 'I want to stare at this for two hours."'
Apatow managed to convince Universal Pictures, whose posters for "Knocked Up" take advantage of Rogen's average looks, presenting a tight shot of his face as he stares goofily, with a scruffy stubble of beard. The slogan: "What if he got you pregnant?"
It's reminiscent of the marketing campaign for "The 40-Year-Old Virgin," which had a similarly straightforward title that spells out the story. The poster used a close-up image of star Steve Carell looking innocent and hopeful.
The success of sleeper hits such as "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" or "Napoleon Dynamite" hangs on offering something unique or unexpected that movie lovers would not get from studio films aimed at the broadest possible mainstream audience.
The Broadway adaptation "Hairspray" presents something wildly different: John Travolta in drag as an overweight Baltimore housewife, a role originated by Divine in the 1980s cult film that inspired the stage version.
"Hairspray" also is unique as this summer's one big musical, a genre reborn in recent years with hits such as "Chicago" and "Dreamgirls."
"It's like the Western or science fiction. You just have to do them well and people will want to see them," Travolta said. "People just have more tolerance for comedy and drama not done well, but musicals you have to do full-blast, everyone on their best game, their A-plus game. Then you can pull it off."
As she does in "Stardust," Pfeiffer plays the villain of "Hairspray," the story of a plump teen who leads a fight to integrate a TV dance show in the 1960s.
"Stardust" director Vaughn figures his thoughtful fantasy will offer something fresh after audiences have gorged themselves on blockbuster after blockbuster.
"The movie's sort of unique, so I'm thinking, people love chocolate cake, it tastes fantastic, but once you've had six slices, you've had enough," Vaughn said. "Hopefully, we'll be the sorbet to cleanse the palate."
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.