Sylvester Stallone's "Rocky Balboa" has its gala premiere at Grauman's Chinese Theatre tomorrow (12/13), amid buzz that the ol' fighter has done it again -- stunned the industry by bringing forth a winning boxing film. But this time, putting himself back in the ring at the age of 60, for crying out loud!
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| Sylvester Stallone's "Rocky Balboa" |
No wonder studios scoffed at the idea. Then again, it seemed impossible that Stallone could have made the trip down glory road with his first "Rocky" 30 years ago, when he turned down chances to sell the boxing script he'd written -- as an out-of-work actor living in a cramped Hollywood apartment with his then-wife and baby -- to studios that didn't want him to star in it. We'll never forget seeing him nervously pacing back and forth in the lobby at an early screening of that Oscar-winning film.
The story of "Rocky Balboa" certainly has parallels.
Frank Stallone admits that during shooting of fight scenes for the Dec. 22-opening "Rocky Balboa" in Las Vegas, he started to fear for his brother. "He's going to be 60 years old, and he's in the ring with a real champion [former light heavyweight champ Antonio Tarver]. One day, I just pulled the plug and I said, 'That's it. You're going to have a heart attack.' And he said, 'I don't care. I've been dissed for the last 10 years. I went from being a No. 1 box-office star for 15 years to the point I can't get anything going. I'm going for it now.'"
That, says Frank, was in front of "900 people who came from all over the world to be in the audience, who were not getting paid -- there was no budget -- but came because they love Rocky."
Audiences love Rocky all right -- perhaps too much. The public resisted accepting Stallone in different roles save for his other trademark persona, Rambo -- for which the star has "Rambo IV: Pearl of The Cobra" in the works for production next year.
MEANWHILE:
"Rocky Balboa" also represented coming full circle for Frank, whose "Take You Back" tune from the 1976 Oscar winner is prominently used in the new one -- and is getting good airplay as a newly released single -- along with a couple other Frank Stallone songs. Having racked up soundtrack credits and performed all over the world through the years, Frank says that, inspired by Sly, he's pulling out the stops in a fresh push in his own career, with his "Stallone On Stallone: By Request" album. "I've released it on my own label. I paid for it myself."
BEAUTY ON THE BAYOU:
Denzel and Pauletta Washington, Berry Gordy, Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta Jones are among the celebs expected to turn out at UCLA's Kaufman Hall for the gala night presentation of "Bayou Legend" Thursday (12/14). Debbie Allen reports that she and James Ingram, along with writer Jeff Stetson, have been working on this labor of love project off and on for 10 years. "It's a musical with poetry, song, dance, Cirque du Soleil techniques and a fantasy world with alligators, trolls and fireflies to tickle your mind," she says. They're expecting a "some very strong producers" to make the trek 'cross country to see it as well, aiming for the show to live on beyond the production that opens tomorrow (12/13).
"I knew as soon as I heard about this that it could be a really amazing Broadway show or musical film. That was decades ago," says Debbie, whose Howard University teacher Owen Dodson conceived the idea of a re-imagining of Ibsen's "Peer Gynt" in the North American bayou country. That's home turf to Debbie. "I grew up in Texas and Louisiana, and my sister, Phylicia Rashad, and I had an Aunt Fanny who would tell us stories to scare us and keep us from going down in the bayou."
The cast includes "real Dreamgirl Loretta Devine" and Tisha Campbell-Martin. "The world doesn't even know the genius of this woman," claims Debbie. And then there's her and husband Norm Nixon's daughter, Vivian, who was discovered on Broadway last year in "Hot Feet."
HUNGRY LIKE ONE:
Casting is underway for the indie feature "Audie and the Wolf," about a beautiful rocker gal named Audie and a guy used to be a wolf but turned into a man. She finds out about who he really is and falls for him. Yep, we've had that happen to girlfriends, too.
And then there's "Still Waters," a feature planned for an April production start in Florida, about a different kind of terror cell -- an evidently intelligent amoeba that preys on a pair of teenage boys at a lake resort. The awful thing will eventually be fought by a group of bikers and scientists joining forces.
THE VIDEOLAND VIEW:
What happens in Vegas stays on Cinemax. Well, some of it. Casting is underway for a planned half-hour erotic series to take place in that gaming town, "Sin City Diaries," which starts production right after New Year's. It has actress-supermodel Amber Smith as a sort of lusty Vegas counterpart to Mr. Roarke of the old "Fantasy Island" -- helping people make their wildest fantasies come true.
(With reports by Stephanie DuBois and Emily Feimster)
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