STAR WARS TEAM HITS LUCKY NUMBER
For Star Wars guru George Lucas and producer Rick McCallum, 2-1/2 seems to be their lucky number. McCallum told a filmmaker gathering in Sydney, after an “incredibly painful” 2-1/2 years of writing, Lucas only nailed the script for the second prequel just 2-1/2 days before shooting commenced in Sydney, nearly 2-1/2 months ago. But, the producer said, shooting in Sydney, which was about 30 per cent cheaper than the London-based shoot for its predecessor The Phantom Menace, progressed at the rapid rate of about — you guessed it — 2-1/2 pages of dialogue a day. The production will soon move to Italy and Tunisia.

BIG FISH MAY HOOK SPIELBERG
Close to landing a very big fish indeed, the two producers of American Beauty are in serious discussions with Steven Spielberg to direct Big Fish at Columbia Pictures. ...Fish would reunite Spielberg with producers Dan Jinks and Bruce Cohen, whose Gothic drama American Beauty brought home DreamWorks’ first Best Picture Oscar earlier this year. Based on the eponymous novel by Daniel Wallace, ...Fish has been adapted for the screen by John August (Go). It’s likely to be Spielberg’s next project after Minority Report next year at 20th Century Fox.

Big Fish is the story of braggart and exaggerator Edward Bloom and his son William, who after a long estrangement, returns home only to learn his father is dying of cancer. Desperate to know the complicated man before it’s too late, William sets about trying to unravel fact from fiction, with much of the story told in humorous or poignant flashback. It’s unclear at this point whether the film will be wholly financed by Columbia parent Sony, or whether Spielberg’s DreamWorks will be involved.

CULKIN EYES LONDON STAGE DEBUT
Macaulay Culkin is in negotiations to make his London stage debut in Madame Melville, a new play about a 15-year-old American living in Paris, who has an affair with his French instructor. A spokesperson said the 19-year-old actor was “seriously considering the project but has made no decision.”

Culkin’s 1990 turn in Home Alone made him the most sought-after child star of the early ’90s. He last appeared on screen four years ago, opposite Ted Danson in Getting Even With Dad, and has kept a low profile ever since.
Madame Melville, which will also star French actress Irene Jacob (Red), is expected to open in October at London’s Vaudeville Theater. It marks a rare commercial debut for playwright Richard Nelson, who won a Tony Award in June for his book James Joyce’s The Dead. He is also set to direct.

Gregory Mosher, who produced The Dead on Broadway with Arielle Tepper, will be joined by a British team of producers to bring Madame Melville to the London stage.

LOCAL CRITICS BLAST AFRICA FILM
It was shot in South Africa, used a South African crew and an array of South African actors, but American director Hugh Hudson’s I Dreamed Of Africa has left many South Africans cringing in embarrassment. Released in the country two weeks back, the movie, starring Kim Basinger, serves up, per one critic, “every tired colonial cliche you can imagine.” The critic and newspaper personality Barry Ronge lambasted Hudson for casting Africans either in servile roles or as poachers and hijackers. “They’re not people, they’re local colour, and form the backdrop against which Kuki Gallmann can do good deeds, and show them the right Western way to do things,” Ronge wrote.

The movie centres around the life of Gallmann, a woman who left her privileged life in Europe to settle on a broken-down farm in Kenya. Other critics were equally scathing of the movie. “The movie’s best forgotten,” said newspaper critic William Pretorius, “Perhaps it’s lucky that (South Africa’s) standing in for Kenya so we don’t have to feel too embarrassed.” Said yet another critic, “The best solution is to get our own movie industry so we can show what local talent can do.”

GUINESS AND POPULARITY
Though Alec Guiness was recognised as an accomplished actor, the veteran kept such a low-profile, that he was rarely recognised in public. But he never took it to heart and even wrote about it in his memoirs. In one of the stories he told about himself, Guinness checks his hat and coat at a restaurant and asks for a claim ticket. “It will not be necessary,” the attendant smiles. Pleased at being recognised, Guinness later retrieves his garments, puts his hand in the coat pocket and finds a slip of paper on which is written, “Bald with glasses.”