Tom Selleck, Dec. 4, 1987

A publicity shot from "Three Men and a Baby"

By DONALD PORTER
Standard-Examiner staff

PALM DESERT, Calif. -- As, Tom Selleck walked toward the next group of reporters waiting to interview him, he got sidetracked. There were these babies, you see -- the twins who co-starred with Selleck in "Three Men and a Baby" – and the 6-foot-4-inch actor was absolutely bonkers f0r the tykes.

"Hi. How ya doin’, huh?" Selleck said in an embarrassingly high-pitched voice as he tiptoed up to the babies, who were resting in their parents' arms. "Hi. Remember me?" he asked, tickling them under their little chins and cooing at them. They smiled back and laughed. Yes, they remembered.

Maybe it was the mustache.  Or the dimples big enough to park a Buick in. Whatever, the babies seemed to like Tom Selleck -- and he clearly wasn't showing this affection to win friends or influence the media.

Royal Dano, Aug. 21, 1987

Royal Dano

By DONALD PORTER
Standard-Examiner

OGDEN -- There sat Royal Dano, character actor extraordinaire, on the edge of his bed – in his boxer shorts, an ice bag on his knee.

"Sorry I can't get up," he said in that deep, rich voice that's become so familiar to moviegoers over the past four decades. "Got a bum knee."

Dano -- whose credits include "The Red Badge of Courage," "The Trouble with Harry," "Moby Dick," "Something Wicked This Way Comes" and "The Right Stuff" – had recently undergone arthroscopic knee surgery, stemming from an injury sustained during the filming of "The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid" in 1971.

"I finally decided to take advantage of this directors' strike and have it done now," he explained, exposing the scar and explaining the procedure. "An actor's greatest fear is that the best role of his career will come along while he's unable to work. So elective surgery can be a dangerous thing."

Dano, one of the most recognizable character actors in the history of film, was in Ogden recently to attend the National Western Film Festival. Although he's known most for the vast number of westerns he's appeared in, Dano is a versatile actor who's at home in almost any role.

Lou Diamond Phillips, July 24, 1987

By DONALD PORTER
Standard-Examiner staff

SALT LAKE CITY -- Lou Diamond Phillips sat in a chair against the wall of his Little America Hotel suite, in the shadow of a lamp that wasn't turned on.

The 25-year-old actor was dressed smartly -- tan sports coat, shirt with two buttons open at the neck, blue jeans and cowboy boots. Longish black hair fell over his collar. Without a trace of cockiness, Phillips acknowledged that he's on the verge of something that may be very big -- big with a capital B.

Test audiences have been indicating that his new film is "hot." That's a good word to have connected with a movie. Almost as good as "big," as in box office. Those two words spell success in Hollywood. They're the ticket to the big time. Yes, if indications are correct, big things could be happening to Phillips soon. Then he would be -- that's right -- hot.

Billy Drago, July 24, 1987

By DONALD PORTER
Standard-Examiner staff
 
There's a chilling scene in "The Untouchables" in which Al Capone's hit man, Frank Nitti, sits in a car outside G-man Eliot Ness' home, smoking cigarettes. Ness isn't home, but when he does arrive, after dark, Nitti expounds on the virtues of family life.

It's Nitti's way of letting Ness know that if Capone continues to be harassed, Ness' wife and child will be murdered. It would be easy, Nitti intimates by his presence outside the home, for him to have walked in and snuffed out their lives.

In the movie, Nitti is a dastardly, evil character. But in reality, the actor who played him -- Billy Drago -- is soft-spoken and unassuming. And Drago says he's loving the attention the movie has given him.

"I have literally not been able to go on the street one day since the picture opened without somebody coming up, or being in a restaurant and having someone say something to me," Drago said last week during a telephone interview from his Los Angeles home. "It happens everywhere I go."

"Full Metal Jacket," July 10, 1987

By DONALD PORTER
Standard-Examiner staff
 
There are bound to be comparisons between Stanley Kubrick's new film, "Full Metal Jacket," and Oliver Stone's Oscar-winning "Platoon." But such comparisons are invalid, since the two films take completely different approaches to the same subject: Vietnam.

"Full Metal Jacket" is a film that deserves equal attention, not out-of-hand dismissal as simply another Vietnam War drama. It is an astonishingly powerful movie -- a film that strikes terror in the gut and sadness in the heart.

There is brilliance on display in "Full Metal Jacket," which possesses both the technical mastery and flair for the ironic that are Kubrick's trademarks. His view of Vietnam and the decision-makers who "ran" the war are every bit as biting and sarcastic as was his treatment of similar characters and institutions in "Dr. Strangelove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb." War is the ultimate madness, and Kubrick is very adept at showing us how we come to participate in such mass lunacy.

Sun not setting on drive-ins (July 3, 1987)

"Outtakes" movie column

Last summer I packed up my wife and daughter, dragged them to the Davis Drive-In and left them sitting in the car while I walked around the parking lot asking people why they see movies on outdoor screens. I realize that makes me sound like a neglectful husband and father, but I was there to get a firsthand look at the decline of an American entertainment
tradition, and my family came along for the ride.

I had gone with the preconceived notion that there would be only a handful of people to speak with, as national publications have been trumpeting the death of drive-ins for years. But 'I was wrong. By the time the sun went down the drive-in was packed, I had plenty of good quotes for my story and my mind had been changed.

Jim Varney, May 22, 1987

By DONALD PORTER
Standard· Examiner staff 

SALT LAKE CITY -- As the door to the hotel suite opened, Jim Varney could be seen sitting in a chair across the room, barefoot with one leg pitched over the armrest, and the other sprawled out on the coffee table. He was relaxed and laughing, enjoying a cigarette between interviews.

Such a sight is comforting to an interviewer, because it sends a strong signal that a pleasurable experience is about to follow, instead of an agonizing 30-minute slug-fest with an uptight and defensive celebrity.

As Varney rose from the chair to greet his guest, two gold chains swung out of his sport shirt; open half-way to his navel. But as the talk progressed it became apparent that this show-biz fashion" statement probably owed a lot more to comfort than ego.

Varney, a 37-year-old actor who has become famous playing obnoxious next-door neighbor Ernest P. Worrell in some 6,000 TV commercials over the past several years, was in Utah recently to promote his new film, "Ernest Goes to Camp." Ernest, for the uninitiated, is the lovable bumpkin who's always shouting "Hey, Vern!" and "KnowhutImean?" during TV, commercials designed to sell milk and other consumer goods.