The Akron Beacon Journal from Akron, Ohio • Page 39

On the inside Your favorite comic strips, advice columns, puzzles, bridge problem and daily astrology are on Pages E6 and E7. The Beacon Journal Friday, April 28, 1995 3 "I asked myself, 'Who is and I still didn't know. I knew the stone man, but I didn't know the emotional man. Nick Nolte starring in Jefferson in Paris mm mmm iMy mm as mmm mm- 1. -Jf Michael Jackson's two-CD set will contain big hits and new material.

Jackson makes a career move on new release By Greg Kot Chicago Iribune Michael Jackson will respond to the "Can this career be saved?" question on June 20 when a two-CD set of his greatest hits and new music will be released. Details of the long-rumored disc were released by Jackson's label, Epic Records. Jackson, whose penchant for self-aggrandizement seems to be increasing as his career spirals downhill, has titled the release History, Past, Present Future Book I. The first disc by the self-proclaimed "King of Pop" is called History Begins, and collects 15 hits spanning Jackson's career. The second disc, History Continues, assembles 15 new songs, and holds the key to Jackson's future as a viable artist.

The dominant pop singer of the last decade his 1983 Thriller album remains the biggest-selling album of all time at more than 33 million copies Jackson lately has been fending off allegations about his private life, the most serious of which involved a charge of sexual molestation brought by the family of a 14-year-old boy befriended by the singer. Jackson's attorneys announced an out-of-court settlement in the case last year, but the we-are-the-world, save-the-children platitudes that dominated the singer's recent music took on a creepy twist to many fans. Artistically, Jackson has been fighting to regain his masterly commercial touch in the face of more contemporary-sounding records by younger hip-hop and new-jack-swing artists. The History Continues disc contains his latest response, including a duet between Jackson and his hit-making sister, Janet, on a song called Scream, and a collaboration with Chicago kingpin R. Kelly on You Are Not Alone.

Other new tracks include a version of the Beatles' Come Together and a tribute to Charlie Chaplin called Smile, using music Chaplin wrote in 1936, according to an Epic Records statement. Among the guest singers and musicians on the new Jackson material are Boyz II Men, rapper the Notorious B.I.G., and Guns N' Roses guitarist Slash. The set includes 150 minutes of music and a 52-page booklet. It will cost $32.98 for CD, $23.98 for cassette. Merchant Ivory Productions Thomas Jefferson, portrayed by Nick Nolte, forms a lifelong relationship with the beautiful young slave Sally Hemings (Thandie Newton).

,0 Nick Nolte Greta Scacchi portrays Maria Cosway, the Anglo-Italian painter and musician who befriends Thomas Jefferson during his years in Paris. high on low concept I- LfA 1 In latest film, actor seeks to demystify Jefferson Gywneth Paltrow plays Patsy Jefferson, the devoted daughter of American statesman Thomas Jefferson. She accompanies him to Paris. studio to studio trying to get this film financed, and nobody wanted to give him money," said Nick Nolte, who plays the title character. "The excuses he heard ranged from 'We don't think Jefferson is commercial' to 'We don't like costume pictures' to 'We don't think America's interested in stories on the founding "It's typical Hollywood head-in-the-sand thinking.

They think this town exists on $100 million blockbusters, but it doesn't. It exists on the majority of regular films, including costume fiims, that make back its money. "And most movies do make back their money. I'll bet even Heaven's Gate made back its money. I'll bet that Schwarzenegger film (hist Action Hero) See NOLTE, Page E2 By Barry Koltnow Orange County Register In the strange and often mystifying world of pitching movie ideas, there are high concepts, such as "Tim Allen accidentally lolls Santa Claus and has to take over his duties," and then there are low concepts, such as "Thomas Jefferson during his five years as ambassador to France." The first pitch generates intense interest and excitement, gets financed instantly and goes on to make $142 million.

The second, the two-hour, 20-minute Jefferson in Paris (which opened in the area last Friday), barely gets enough money to be made (a reported $15 million), only one studio cares enough to offer to distribute the film, and the box-office potential remains very much in doubt. "(Producer) Ismail Merchant went from Some talk radio ust too raucous tender ears One of the results of the Oklahoma City bombing has been a new debate about talk radio. The question has been whether hateful rhetoric by radio personalities and callers alike has become so excessive that it has created a climate for violence. While the rhetoric itself often is vile, the finger-pointing does little good. English actress on spring break in New York battery cables or steeplechase ponies, not a sweater, when a Brit asks to borrow a "jumper." Newton has made a half-dozen films, starting in 1990 with Flirting, a com- ing-of-age story set in R.D.

Heldenfels The hosts and organizations targeted often benefit from the attention such controversy generates, not to mention the aura of legitimacy that comes with being interviewed by mainstream organizations. Second, any group with a point of view is going to turn to available technologies to put across that viewpoint. That includes not only radio but Australia. Young Americans and Loaded followed. She was a succulent victim in Interview With a Vampire, and her next outing is The Journey of August King, to be released in "I didn't have any political baggage to carry to the movie so I didn't give my character any kind of bias either way Thandia Newton actress BY RlC LEYVA Associated Press New York The average American college student spends spring break carousing on some overcrowded beach.

For Thandie Newton Cambridge undergrad and budding movie star there is no time for such trite, colonial amusements. Newton, who captures the heart of a future president as slave girl Sally Hemings in Jefferson in Paris, is an anthropology major in her final term at the esteemed British university. Unable to play like the Yank kids, she passed her spring break far from the Florida seashore, fighting jet lag through endless interviews to help promote the latest film from the celebrated team of Ismail Merchant and James Ivory. It's not her first visit to the New World, but culture shock remains a concern, especially when it comes to American slang. "Cheesy," she says, making a sour face.

"I had a time of it getting the meaning for that one, I must admit." Though worldly at 22, Newton was shocked to learn Americans think of car print, video, music (MTV has reported on extremist rock bands) and, most recently, the computer Internet. Third, we all see certain points of view as acceptable and some as not. But individual judgments are different from a systematic banning of certain kinds of expression, since any system could well be used to ban legitimate forms of expression. Finally, the only way to get swill off the air is for listeners and advertisers to reject See RADIO, Page E4 Blinking sleepily on the sofa of a Manhattan hotel suite, she wears a vintage floral print summer dress dating back to the 1950s. A seam rip at the side is pinned closed rather poorfy.

Girlish, she slides off funky, purplish canvas sneakers as soon as she starts talking. She folds forward, hugging her knees. See NEWTON, Page E2 Associated Press Thandie Newton plays role of a slave girl in Jefferson In Paris..