Expect Bruce Dern's forthcoming biography to be smarter than a lot of show biz memoirs. The veteran actor admits that when writers Robert Crane and Chris Fryer came to get his story, he said, "Who the hell cares about my life?' They said, 'Not just your life, but the life nobody knows about -- your family and family history."
That includes his uncle, the illustrious author and poet Archibald MacLeish, who wrote speeches for Franklin Roosevelt. Dern's own career story takes off at the twilight of the old Hollywood.
"My generation of guys and girls was really the last generation who had a chance to work with the legends," he points out. "The generations now -- we are not legends. We're not bigger than life like John Wayne and the others with the studio system behind them. Actually, as much as actors and actresses bitch about it, it's almost a little safer now than it was for those people. They lived and died by the success of their films." And when Hollywood's reception got cold, things were harsh even for the greats.
"I remember doing a guest role on 'Gunsmoke' and they said, 'Just wait 'til you see who's playing your mother.' Well, it turned out to be Bette Davis. I got tears in my eyes on the set." And when he asked the legendary actress what she was doing with a part on a TV Western, he recounts, sounding very Davis-like, "She said, 'Darling, I have to pay for my cigarettes!'"
Dern, who has several features in the pipeline, is also on HBO's March 12-debuting "Big Love" -- which centers on renegade Mormons who practice polygamy (the church banned the practice in 1890). Tom Hanks is among the executive producers on the cable series that stars Bill Paxton, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Chloe Sevigny and Ginnifer Goodwin.
EVIL TIMES:
Julian Sands, who debuts tonight (2/20) as Russian terror mastermind Vladimir Bierko on "24," may also be showing up on local TV soon -- if he decides to go ahead and run in the Los Angeles Marathon next month, as he's thinking of doing. "Look for me in the back," he jokes. But seriously, "It's a good test of one's general fitness if you do a marathon at least once a year," says inveterate athlete Sands, who splits his time between homes in L.A. and his native England. Sunny Southern California definitely appeals to his outdoors-loving lifestyle. "I love the confluence of the mountain, desert and marine energies here. It's fantastic for hiking and climbing. The show "24" hasn't put his athleticism to the test -- at least not yet. As the Western-educated billionaire bad guy, he's made "a lot of sinister phone calls."
VIDEOLAND VIEW:
The nightmare of self-destructive, hostile, substance-abusing adolescents is all too prevalent nationwide, notes Sharon Lawrence. She plays the mother of such an out-of-control teenage daughter in the searing real-life drama "Augusta, Gone" on Lifetime March 13.
"I don't have expertise in this area, so I was reading from different sources and asking people who've made it their life's work to understand," says the former "NYPD Blue" actress. "We had a wonderful psychologist who worked with this movie all the time. The problem may be indicative of a generation of parents who have perhaps indulged their children in ways that past generations' parents didn't. Also, there's an emotional mentality we have now, a narcissism, where the individual's needs and desires for self-fulfillment supersede the needs of others. I know my parents didn't spend a lot of time ruminating about whether they were happy."
On top of that, "There's an anger and resentment that goes along with this behavior. My generation -- we were happy at the core. When we rebelled, it was about growing. This is a different beast, fueled by self-loathing."
With Mika Boorem as the daughter and Tim Matheson playing the father and serving as director, "Augusta, Gone" also had the on-set expertise of best-selling author Martha Tod Dudman and her daughter, Georgia -- "a lovely young woman" -- the pair who actually lived the story.
TO HIS TASTE:
Wolfgang Puck may be a celebrity chef to the stars, but not everything about his job is fun and games, he tells us. "There are so many jobs in human resources that are hard, and talking to the accountants and the lawyers is hard. All the jobs which are not visible to the customers are the ones I don't like to do as much," he admits. "I like the cooking, I like to go to market to buy fish and vegetables, and saying hello to the customers, but the rest is not my favorite. It's part of my job, too, though. You cannot have everything exactly the way you want it." In the meantime, Puck and his crew are gearing up to feed around 1,600 folks at the Governor's Ball immediately following the March 5 Oscars. "It's always fun to do, and by now we have it down."
(With reports by Stephanie DuBois and Emily Feimster)
FEEDS: News | Pop Culture | Ledger Pop | Ledger DC
