Posted on 07/08/2002 9:41:13 PM PDT by weegee
NEW YORK (Variety) - Director Ron Howard will not lead the charge on "The Alamo," because Disney is taking too long to get the prestige project into production.
Howard, off his Oscar win for "A Beautiful Mind," has begun concentrating on other film projects for his followup. However he and his Imagine Entertainment partner Brian Grazer may well continue as producers of the period Western.
The studio has already begun seeking a new director in hopes of keeping a late-year start date in place, as well as a cast that was to include Russell Crowe and Ethan Hawke.
Howard never formally signed a deal to direct the film, but such an accord was considered a fait accompli when word got out that he was scouting locations in Texas.
After winning all that Oscar hardware for "A Beautiful Mind," Howard and Grazer wanted to capitalize on the momentum and get a film started quickly; "The Alamo" just went back to the shop for a rewrite by "Traffic" scribe Stephen Gaghan.
Apparently, the cast will remain in place to see who Disney hires to replace Howard. That includes Crowe, who rearranged a very busy dance card to carve out a few weeks for "The Alamo," mainly because he wanted to reteam with its director.
Howard laid aside several high profile scripts to concentrate on "The Alamo," and there are numerous candidates for his next picture. One possibility is that he and Crowe will work together again on "Cinderella Man," a Universal/Imagine film about Depression-era boxer and folk hero Jim Braddock.
Howard has also shown interest in the fact-based Warner Bros. legal drama "The Burial." The studio was said to have once had Denzel Washington in its docket to play Mississippi personal injury lawyer Willie Gary, who represented a funeral parlor owner wronged by a conglomerate and helped win the plaintiff a $260 million verdict. The tale originated as a New Yorker article by Jonathan Harr, who wrote "A Civil Action."
as if it's important...........FRegards
In the "strange but true" department, the set for Duke's Alamo still exists, and is in wonderful condition! If I remember correctly, it's just a few miles north of Bracketville, Texas. They used that set for the filming of "Lonesome Dove," though some extra buildings were added. And that same set was also used for the "IMAX" version of the Alamo, which was extremely well done and surprisingly accurate. Wouldn't be surprised if Disney were to use that set as well.
Ron Howard directing Russel Crowe --no thank you. Ridley Scott directing Russel Crowe --now that might be an "Alamo" film worth seeing.
Please elaborate...I am interested.
A study of the correlation between Nun buoy wave response and Ted Kennedy's cogent-icity?
And as copyrights are allowed to be renewed again and again, more works will disappear completely because their copyright owners have abandoned them (there were even films that were retroactively brought out of public domain and returned to "copyright holders").
Also:
No matter where the diary ends up, a debate over its authenticity is likely to continue. Crockett's diehard fans have denounced it as a 20th century forgery, an elaborate hoax that disputes their belief that the coonskin-capped frontiersman went down fighting at the Alamo in March 1836.But many academics accept it as a circa 1840 narrative penned or dictated in Mexico City's Inquisition Prison by Lt. Col. Jose Enrique de la Pena, who was jailed for backing the wrong general-politician after the Texas War of Independence.
Only a page of the diary is devoted to Crockett's demise; the rest of the 200 pages detail de la Pena's complaints about his superiors' incompetence and cruelty.
But it is that one page that most interests many Texans.
According to de la Pena, Crockett and six others were captured after the Alamo "skirmish" and brought before Gen. Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, who ordered them executed. When a unit of engineers didn't budge, officers aiming to please the general moved in.
"They thrust themselves forward, in order to flatter their commander, and with swords in hand, fell upon these unfortunate, defenseless men just as a tiger leaps upon his prey," the account says.
Gee, I hope they built they are building that set on HIGH ground...
So they are building the set outside of Austin, by far the most liberal city in Texas? At least we can take solace in the fact that the 1960 Alamo set in Bracketville will not be descrated by leftwing PC zealots. It's surprisingly conservative down there in Val Verde County, despite the voter support for the Democrap party.
The Alamo itself does not appear in that film.
From IMDB, here is a list of films shot there:
Happy Shahan's Alamo Village, Brackettville, Texas, USA"Centennial" (1978) (mini) TV Series 8.2/10 (145 votes)
"Lonesome Dove" (1989) (mini) TV Series 9.1/10 (730 votes)
"Streets of Laredo" (1995) (mini) TV Series 7.8/10 (57 vvotes)
...aka "Larry McMurtry's Streets of Laredo" (1995) (mini)
"West, The" (1996) (mini) TV Series 8.7/10 (27 votes)
Alamo, The (1960) 6.6/10 (1004 votes)
Alamo: The Price of Freedom (1988) 6.2/10 (36 votes)
Alamo: Thirteen Days to Glory, The (1987) (TV) 6.6/10 (58 votes)
Bad Girls (1994) 4.8/10 (1232 votes)
Bandolero! (1968) 6.4/10 (297 votes)
Battle of the Alamo, The (1996) (TV)
Buffalo Soldiers, The (1992) (TV)
Bullfighter (2001)
Gambler V: Playing for Keeps (1994) (TV) 6.1/10 (19 votes)
Good Old Boys, The (1995) (TV) 6.5/10 (104 votes)
Jericho (2001) 8.8/10 (10 votes)
Rio Diablo (1993) (TV) 6.2/10 (24 votes)
Sam (1967)
...aka Hottest Fourth of July in the History of Brewster County, The (1967) (USA)
Texas (1994) (V) 4.3/10 (56 votes)
...aka James A. Michener's Texas (1994) (V)
Travis (1991)
...aka Cost of Freedom, The (1991) (USA)
Two Rode Together (1961) 6.8/10 (196 votes)
Wong Fei-hung chi saiwik hung si (1997) 6.4/10 (189 votes)
...aka Huang Fei-hong zhi xi yu xiong shi (1997) (Hong Kong: Mandarin title)
...aka Once Upon a Time in China VI (1997)
...aka Once Upon a Time in China and America (1997)
"Any similarities between real people or events is purely coincidental."
Oh, I can just imagine they will. Worst of all, these were white males. I'm afraid the only way we'll be able to rehabilitate their reputation is for somebody to tell Eisner that the whole lot of them were gay and that the Alamo was a bathhouse...
I agree. Quite a turnaround from the wholesome Disney of a couple of decades ago. Now we also have the HIV positive Sesame Street character coming soon to America. They're not related to Disney, but it just shows you the liberal flakes are taking over the kids entertainment industry.
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