Gerald Nachman
Thinking Small, Should we be
celebrating . . . Independents' Day?
After so many small, sensitive, independent films dominated last year's Academy Awards, several Hollywood moguls were forced to rethink some of their current blockbuster projects.
Max Gross, founder of Gross Worldwide Pictures, immediately ordered "Exterminator XXIV: The Sequel Continues" into turn-around and asked his head of production, Guy Manley, to green-light Jane Austen's next novel.
"Jane's dead, chief," said Manley. "`Mansfield Park'" went in the toilet.
"That's a damn shame," remarked
Gross. I didn't see her obit in the trades.
What a loss to the industry -- such a talented gal, and cut down
in the prime of life, too, just when her career was starting
to build. So what else do we have on the front burner?"
"I've commissioned a rewrite of Henry James's `The Golden Bowl,'" said Manley, "and I just got off the horn with Stallone. He's very excited about the project and would very much like to be involved. Sly wants to move in a new direction and believes that an Edwardian novel about the subtle breakdown of a marriage among the British aristocracy might be the way to go."
"OK, but what do we have lined up for Schwarzenegger? Arnold's restless to get in on the switch to non-action movies in order to attract female moviegoers. He wants Gena Rowlands to co-star."
"Well, I've got Joe Esterhasz working on a remake of `Tea and Sympathy,' with Arnold as a middleaged man confused about his sexuality. It's a stretch, sure, but I think it will pull in a whole new demographic for him. It's likely to be a tough sell overseas, so for the foreign version I've asked Joe to add a scene where Arnie blows away a tea room when a waitress drops a scone on his foot, which he interprets as a threat to his manhood."
"I like it, Guy, but I'm a little worried about some of the films we already have in production. Is there any way to slip some sensitive feminist stuff into the new Tom Clancy picture about the Pentagon being destroyed by a fleet of nuclear-powered Bejing-backed Cuban subs? I'd like to attract that Jane Campion crowd."
"No problem, Max. I've just signed Kristin Scott Thomas to play the Chief of Naval Operations, who breaks down in the last scene when her boyfriend, who's commanding a nuclear substation off the coast, defects to China."
"Fine, but where's the big explosive ending?"
"That's it, Max. She erupts in tears, flooding the screen. Her lover, played by Chuck Norris, also sobs uncontrollably and, in the last scene, tells her he feels as bad about leaving her as he does about leveling the Pentagon. As the picture ends, he reads her a Browning sonnet. It's a real arm-grabber, all right. The ad line reads: `See it with someone you're not all that crazy about.' Trust me, Max, it's a whimper a minute."
"If you say so, but I gotta go. George Lucas is on the other line, pestering me about six new `Star Wars' prequels. I don't know how to tell him we're not interested in that stuff anymore."
"Have him try Merchant-Ivory. They're
desperately looking for something that nobody else is doing...."
© 2000 by Gerald Nachman
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