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| Jeffrey Boam |
By DONALD PORTER
Standard-Examiner staff
BURBANK. Calif. -- Mel Gibson and Danny Glover are standing in the corner, alongside Dennis Quaid. A set of still photos chronicling the demolition of a house in the movie "Lethal Weapon 2" is framed on the wall next to the actors, and bears the handwritten inscription: "Jeff, we did it. Next time, go easy. Love ya, Donner."
Jeffrey Boam sits in the opposite corner of the room, which happens to be his office, ignoring Mel, Danny and Dennis because they are made out of cardboard; the life-size figures are theater lobby advertisements for two of the movies he's written. And the set of framed stills is a gift from "Lethal Weapon 2" director Richard Donner.
You wouldn't be alone if you admjtted Jeffrey Boam's name doesn't ring a bell. But if you go to movies. you've probably seen it on the screen. Boam's job is done behind the camera, off the set, in an office at his home. It's where the 41-year-old screenwriter has penned such familiar movies as "The Dead Zone," "lnnerspace," "Funny Farm," "The Lost Boys," "Lethal Weapon 2" and "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade."
This is not a complete transcript of the interview. My vague recollection was that I was facing a pretty tight deadline, and so I skimmed through the recording and only transcribed the notes I thought I might use in the interview story. That said, the nuggets here are pretty interesting, given the way things played out:
* On “Lethal Weapon IV”: Jeffrey got no credit whatsoever. It turned out to be another bad “Lethal Weapon” experience with Warner Bros. and Richard Donner. Before the interview, he sent me a copy of the screenplay. At the time, I suspected he was eager to talk about it because he felt like it might be slipping away and going to another writer, and so he was trying to salvage it. His script, if I’m remembering correctly, involved the Los Angeles Lakers on a jet and a terrorist attack.
* He also mentions “The Phantom,” which he alluded to in our earlier interview. That movie bombed.
* On the fourth “Indiana Jones” movie, he didn’t get a credit, either. But what little he says about it sounds like George Lucas had the story pretty well set even back in the mid-1990s.
Don Porter: THE RIGHT-WING TERRORISM THING SEEMS PRETTY DEAD-ON.
Jeffrey Boam: “It seemed kind of far-fetched when I wrote it. [The Oklahoma City bombing] kind of spooked me a little bit, actually.”
