Category: 2002

SLY IN UK’S HOTDOG MAGAZINE

Craig / / 2002, Celebs, Cop Land

Ernest “Jazzman” Resendes sent in the following:

I found this in the current issue of HOTDOG ( UK edition, volume3 number 2 ). It includes a piece that reads…

WHY MISS DIAZ… YOU’RE HIDEOUS
They’re Hollywood’s sexiest stars, but here they’re king of funny lookin.’ More than most passport pictures even…
STORY: Mark Wyatt

…It highlights actor’s who have transformed themselves for various roles. Among those featured are Sly Stallone, Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, Robert Deniro, ect…

Thanks to Ernest “Jazzman” Resendes for sending in the info!

– Craig Zablo (February 17, 2002)

EMPIRE PRAISES “D-TOX”

Craig / / 2002, D-Tox, Eye See You

The March 2002 issue of Empire magazine has the following review:

D-Tox

Some three years after filming began, D-Tox is finally here. That delay, coupled with the presence of former box office heavyweight, Stallone, means that it must be crap, right? Well, actually no, it is better than crap. In fact it is surprisingly watchable. Which for a film delayed longer than Toen & Country, is saying something.

It’s a hybrid of Seven, The Thing, and Scottish helmer Gilliespie’s I Know What You Did Last Summer [right down to the killer’s fur-lined parka and ability to be in two different places at the same time]. But thanks to an ominous mood and some surprises – an attempted suicide is all the more shocking for its sheer matter-of-factness – the blend works.

However when Stallone arrives at the detox center, Gilliespie surrenders to cliche, wasting [literally] a pantheon of good actors in distressingly similar fashion. Sly, though, is on impressive, if not career-resuscitating form – at least until convention dictates that he run around dark corridors waving a gun.
Chris Hewit

Any Good?
D-Tox is probably best enjoyed on video. But that a serviceable thriller like this struggles to get a release, when certain nameless dross gets rushed into cinemas is, frankly, bewildering.
***

“Sly, though, is on impressive, if not career-resuscitating form…” Music to my ears!
Thanks to Ernest “Jazzman” Resendes for sending in the info!

– Craig Zablo (February 17, 2002)

SLY SUES OVER STOCK LOSSES

Craig / / 2002, Celebs, Planet Hollywood

Stallone Sues Over Planet Hollywood Stock Losses
Fri Feb 15, 5:52 AM ET
HOLLYWOOD (Variety) – Actor Sylvester Stallone has filed a $17.3 million lawsuit against a business manager who urged him to hold onto Planet Hollywood stock as the share price spiraled downward and the theme-restaurant company plunged into bankruptcy.

Stallone, in a complaint filed in Los Angeles Superior Court, claimed that Kenneth Starr, a business manager with many celebrity clients, cost him more than $10 million by repeatedly advising Stallone to hang on to more than 3.9 million shares of Planet Hollywood International stock.

Stallone received the shares in exchange for promotional work for the movie-themed restaurant chain, which went public in 1996 with help from Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Bruce Willis. The shares peaked in September 1996 at $28.50, making Stallone’s stake worth more than $111 million.

Starr allegedly “had actual or constructive knowledge of the poor financial condition of Planet Hollywood” because he also represented Keith Barish, a member of the company’s board of directors and a large shareholder. Financial information about the company normally sent to Barish also went to Starr, the suit said.

When Stallone became a Starr client in 1997 at the suggestion of Barish, Planet Hollywood stock was trading at between $16 and $20, making Stallone’s investment worth $60 million to $80 million.

Starr, when asked by Stallone or his assistant about selling the stock, said he shouldn’t, that a sale would hurt the company by sending the wrong message to the stock market, and that the price of the stock could be expected to go much higher, the suit said.

Starr allegedly made similar statements over several years as the stock price continued to go down. The company filed for bankruptcy in October, 1999. Stallone eventually sold his shares in March, 2000 for less than ten cents apiece and netted $295,256.74, the suit said.

Starr allegedly told others that Planet Hollywood was heading for bankruptcy at a time when the stock was still trading at more than $5, the suit said.

Stallone also complained in the lawsuit that despite instructions to invest only in conservative, liquid investments, Starr lost some $7.3 million by putting the actor’s money in three high risk, illiquid mutual funds.

– Craig Zablo (February 17, 2002)

STALLONE VS GIBSON

Craig / / 2002, Celebs, Unmade Films

The February 25 – March 4, 2002 issue of US Weekly contains an article in the “The Hot Stuff” section titled “Sly Vs. Mel”

Sylvester Stallone and Mel Gibson are calling a cop – the same cop. Sources say the two Hollywood heavyweights are trying to woo former New York police commissioner Bernard Kerik with lunches and meetings in an attempt to get the rights to his best-selling autobiography, The Lost Son: A Life in the Pursuit of Justice. “They’re really fighting each other over it,” says one insider. Also interested in the book rights, according to another source, is Robert DeNiro. The tables have turned since Kerik took Stallone to Ground Zero two months ago in an attempt to ingratiate himself with the actor. Now a competition has sprung up, and, says one source, “Kerik’s in the driver’s seat.”

– Craig Zablo (February 17, 2002)

SLY’S BEEN IN THE ENDZONE BEFORE…

Craig / / 2002, Celebs

In the February / March 2002 issue of Movieline, an article entitled, “You Can Leave Your Shirt On,” by Joe Queenan appears. The article discusses (with a humorous slant) several “older male” actors who regularly take off their shirts in movies. Pierce Brosnan, Harrison Ford, Robert Redford, Tommy Lee Jones, Arnold Swarzenegger and others are mentioned. The general consensus of the article is that the shirts should stay on… but here’s what Mr. Queenan says about Sly:

“No story about middle-aged vanity would be complete without mentioning Sylvester Stallone. Tellingly, the customarily vain Stallone does not take off his shirt in last year’s, “Driven,” generously forgoing a golden opportunity to upstage his costar Kip Pardue. However, Stallone does briefly appear in a sweaty athletic shirt in “Get Carter,” a woeful remake of Mike Hodge’s 1970 film noir classic. Having scrutinized 35 movies in which Sly’s contemporaries part with their shirts, I found it great to see a movie in which a guy showing off his shoulders finally had some shoulders worth showing off. Rippling, taut, enormous, those granite-like Rambo-era pecs and biceps still say it all. Built like the proverbial brick shithouse, Stallone doesn’t need to primp and preen in front of a mirror to get his message across. All he has to do is stand there and let the camera do its work. As a famous man once said, when you get into the end zone, act like you’ve been there before.”

– Craig Zablo (February 9, 2002)

SLY & JEN: LARRY KING LIVE!

Craig / / 2002, Celebs, Jennifer Flavin-Stallone, TV

Jennifer Flavin, right, wife of actor Sylvester Stallone, left, makes a point as she discusses heart disease during taping of CNN’s ”Larry King Live,” Thursday, Feb. 7, 2002, in Los Angeles. The program is scheduled to be telecast on CNN, Sunday, Feb 10, 2002. Flavin and Stallone’s daughter had open-heart surgery. (AP Photo/CNN, Rose M. Prouser) – Craig Zablo (02/07/02)

MGM LOOKING AT ROCKY MUSICAL

Craig / / 2002, Celebs, Rocky Musical

Wednesday January 30 3:49 PM ET

Yo Adrian! Rocky, Other Films May Be MGM Musicals
By Bob Tourtellotte
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Move over Mel Brooks.

If film studio MGM has its way, “Rocky: the Musical” may just be Broadway’s next big hit, rivaling Brooks‘ current smash ”The Producers” as the hottest ticket in town.

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. said on Wednesday it has launched a new initiative under long-time business and legal executive Darcie Denkert to develop new products, starting with Broadway shows, from its huge library of old films.

Already in development, the studio said, are stage plays based on comedies like “The Pink Panther” films from the 1960s and 1970s, which will be produced by Blake Edwards. Actor John Lithgow is set to star in a version of 1957’s “Sweet Smell of Success,” and stage versions of romances “Marty” and ”Moonstruck” are being worked on, an MGM spokeswoman said.

On the horizon could be any one of the roughly 4,100 titles MGM holds in its library of films billed as the world’s largest catalog of modern movies. Off the list, are the MGM musicals of the 1930’s and 1940’s, whose rights were sold years ago.

Still, rags-to-riches boxer Rocky, portrayed in the movies by action hero Sylvester Stallone and owned by MGM, could be tromping the boards on The Great White Way sometime soon.

No doubt, key lyrics to any song in “Rocky: the Musical” would be, “Yo!” and the wailing “Adrian.”

“(Denkert’s) ties to the Hollywood and Broadway creative and business communities provide us with the ideal blend of resources to help energize our renowned library properties,” MGM Vice Chairman Chris McGurk said in a statement.

Denkert takes the job of President, MGM Entertainment Business Group, which will focus on creating new products from old library titles across all of MGM’s businesses, including film, television, home video and music.

But her first effort will be spearheading the efforts of the new MGM on Stage business unit, which MGM has created to develop stage plays from its old films.

MGM is not the first studio to look to Broadway for new business. The Walt Disney Co. has turned hit animated movies such as “The Lion King” and “Beauty and the Beast’‘ into stage plays both on Broadway and in touring companies.

Brooks wrote and directed “The Producers,” the 1968 film about a washed-up theater producer and his accountant who set out to bilk money from investors by making a Broadway flop.

The director of such classic film comedies as “Blazing Saddles” put the story on stage, and it became one of Broadway’s biggest recent hits, starring Matthew Broderick and Nathan Lane.

Denkert began her career as a theatrical lawyer involved in Broadway and off-Broadway productions, and subsequently has worked for MGM and its United Artists film unit for a total of 25 years, joining UA’s legal department in 1977.

In addition to naming Denkert as head of the new entertainment business group, MGM is decentralizing its entire business affairs operations, shifting reporting to its various divisions in film, television, home video and music.

MGM is 81 percent owned by billionaire investor Kirk Kerkorian, and is currently looking for merger partners in order to expand its distribution platforms.

– Craig Zablo (February 3, 2002)