Tampa Bay Times from St. Petersburg, Florida • 49

ST. PETERSBURG TIMES lliQaDCo0Co0l Ann Landers, 3-D Television, 7-D Movies, 5-D Comics, 9-D on oo MARCH 4. 198511 I 11 section headliners mrS a cast off HiDnoiiasaimdls Grammy-night quotes Ah, the Grammy Awards last Tuesday, traditionally one of television's highest-rated shows. Recording stars were there; the press was there; and the quotes flowed after the live telecast was over: I ZZ By KELLY SCOTT St. Pf rburg Tim StaH Writw iisiiu ni Yankovic, comedy award winner for far It, a parody of fieaf It "This is weird.

I want to thank Michael Jackson for writing the music for me. And I want to especially thank the little people I had to step on to get where I am today." Cyndi Lauper, the girls-just-want-to-have fun punker who won as best new artist: "When I go to McDonald's now, I can buy more than just a Weird Al Yankovic: Thanks, Michael. fishburger. I can get a malted and some french fries, anything I want." Lionel Richie, mellow-toned album of the year winner: "It's heart attack time now. If you knew how vTfl Jf jf I If 'atts I h.

A many times I've sat out in that audience hearing the names of those other winners, wondering why I don't have to wonder tonight." Tina Turner, the wild-haired, frantic belter and double winner for female pop and female rock vocals: "Hey, my hands are fulll I'm just going to keep doing what I'm doing, honey. I'm not going to change a thing." Elizabeth Cotten, the 91 -year-old winner in Summer Rental is the second movie in the past year to roll its cameras in Pinellas County, but the "extra" pool here is not yet jaded. The film's local casting officials were astounded by the thousands of people who turned out for an open casting call Sunday afternoon for the John Candy comedy. Shari Rhodes, a woman who helped cast all three Jaws pictures and Close Encounters of the Third Kind kept saying she was "thrilled to death," "delighted" and "overwhelmed" with the hordes. "This is much more successful than usual," she said.

Word went out last week that Carl Reiner's Summer Rental was looking for extras in a literal cast of thousands, speaking and nonspeaking, for big beach and watersport scenes. They specified they needed lifeguard-types and volleyball players. From the look of the crowd, they got what they needed about three times over. Many of the men came bare-chested. Many of the women exposed a lot of leg.

This was balanced somewhat by families who looked like they stopped by on their way home from church. BUT WAIT. Where would be the last place you would want an extra few thousand cars on a brilliantly sunny Sunday afternoon in March between the hours of noon and 5 p.m.? The Pinellas Bayway, gateway to the Gulf beaches, you say? Well, you got it the casting call took place at the Eckerd College gymnasium. Depending on what time you hit the crucial stretch of road, cars were either backed up onto the southbound interstate lanes or moving inches at a time along the stretch of Bayway right before the tollbooths. Cars were parked on the median, too.

Once inside the Eckerd gates, things moved fairly quickly. If you were looking for a little bit o' Hollywood, though, you were probably disappointed. No stars. No Carl Reiner, either; he leaves this part of the moviemaking to people like Rhodes. The experience did not just scream show biz.

In fact, waiting to sign up for extra duty wasn't a whole lot different than waiting for a new driver's license. No breakdancing exhibitions, warbling "From This Moment On" or impassioned scene reading. Not even interviews. Instead, hopefuls waited in a line that stretched about 150 yards out the gym door. The procedure: enter gym and get briefed.

Fill out application form, mostly the standard vital statistics plus acting experience, special talents and availability. Staple your photo to the bottom. Exit gym. Tina Turner: Plans to keep it up. St.

Patsriburg Timas BILL SERNE The sign expresses the feeling of many of those who stood in the long line waiting to sign up as potential extras for Carl Reiner's Summer Rental. ethnic or traditional folk category, asked how she acquired her unusual left-handed guitar technique: "Jesus showed me how. He taught me to play guitar in a dream." Joe Williams, jazz vocal winner: "I'm old enough to enjoy this and young enough to want some more." Thomas Dolby, who didn't win for his video: "You dress up, get a limo, drive all the way to downtown L.A., and then they don't give you an award. What kind of party is that?" Dee Snider of the rock group Twisted Sister, who didn't win either but was happy nonetheless: it A v.y i nv i 4 I And wait. Rhodes told the hopefuls "If you look right for one of the speaking parts, we'll call you in the next week.

Extras for the big beach scenes will be called anytime over the next seven weeks." Auditions for what she called the 20 to 25 speaking parts will be this week. Filming begins March 18. AS SHE spoke privately, Rhodes scanned the room for faces with the right look. "Look at those three," she mused of 15-year-old Julie Jameson, and 13-year-old twins Dawn and Debbie Nozicka. They looked like triplets: matching blond hair, tanned skin and eager expressions.

Told of Rhodes' comment about them, they convulsed in giggles. "I'm going to die, Julie," said Debbie. E. J. Mann, chief of security at Eckerd, said he was called at home with the news that there were 500 people waiting on campus by 9:30 a.m.

There were approximately 2,500 would-be extras waiting when the movie people began letting them into the gym and handing out applications, well before the announced noon start. By 12:15, the 3,000 application forms on hand were nearly gone. "We were just interested to see how a picture is made!" bubbled Helene Zeager, 62, of Clearwater. That's all she wanted out of the experience, but her husband Chuck Zeager, 70, is a little more ambitious. "I want to try for a speaking part," he said quietly, as Mrs.

Zeager scurried about looking for someone to take their picture; they forgot theirs. "I had two parts in high school plays," Zeager continued. This was back at Rocky River High School in Rocky River, Ohio, on the west side of Cleveland. "One was a minstrel, and in the other one, I was a sponsor for a radio program. I had to ad-lib some of the lines, and I brought the house down." This is a man who has waited for his big break for a long time.

In addition to Zeager, other seasoned veterans of show business were on hand. Eric Peterson, 22, was hoping to parlay his perfect blond, tanned and big-shouldered lifeguard-like appearance and the fact that the casting people asked him to hold the carton in which people dropped their completed applications into a role. It wouldn't be his first. Eric and his twin brother Chris were the stars of a 1963 Northern paper towels commercial. He was also featured in an Oscar Meyer commercial.

Today, he is a student at St. Petersburg Junior College. And a real Please see THOUSANDS, 4-D Dee Snider: the first Grammy "dirtbag. "This is the first time a dirtbag has been on the Grammys. They've never recognized heavy metal before." 1 Taft Broadcasting at a glance Molly Ringwald meets fan Taft Broadcasting will own 20 radio stations if the purchases from Gulf Broadcast ara Taft Broadcasting's entertainment holdings go beyond TV and radio stations.

The fan letter to Molly Ringwald, star of The Breakfast Club and Sixteen Candles, amused her. i'Why don't we do lunch sometime," the young fan vvrote, "or maybe dinner, or maybe breakfast, or 'maybe we could do, like, a toothpick, or maybe we f-icouldjustdoit?" 'lt was soooooo funny," Molly told Rolling Stone. "I back to him, and I just met him. He's 16." jHe's also not as bold in person as the letter -suggested. Molly decided to surprise the letter writer -by showing up at his place of employment, a candy J-jStore near Los Angeles.

The young man was so flabbergasted at seeing her that he ran from the store, I WW I III i I 1JU A E- 'l approved. Both of Taft's radio stations on theSuncoast WYNF-FM in Tampa and WSUN-AM in St. Petersburg will have to be sold if the purchase of WTSP-TVis approved. )' SilTI VHU-OPhiladelphiaP lxivl ki vIy 1 -Columbus, Ohio J77C7V XKX 1 5 C5 WDAF-TV I la SK) ffi A Kn City ffl WKRC-TV-'Yf jf VX A A I -ll WGHPTv" S2 KTSP-TV 19 I 7 Greensboro. H.C.

7 Phoenix. Ariz. 1)0 I I jA -v- ml. KTXA-TVfiKy1 WBRC-TV mm j- Dallas Birmin0njm' Ala KJeaving her there. They include: Hanna-Barbera Productions, creators of cartoon series.

Production companies for movies such as Reuben, Reuben and Cujo. Canada's Wonderland, an amusement park near Toronto. Minority ownership (47. of the Philadelphia Phillies. Management of the College Football Hall of Fame north of Cincinnati.

VT Houston CA0J4 I Stations owned by Taft WTSP-TV St. Ptrburg Timet FRANK PETERS Stations Taft is seeking FCC permission to purchase WCIX-TV Miami Harris' project tmmylou Harris is trying something different on her record album. The Ballad of Sally Rose. 'Think of it as a novel told in song. has taken her pet project on the road for a 22-city tour during which she will sing the entire album at -each performance.

Sally Rose is being called a "concept album" by the trade, although Harris refers to it as "country opera." The themes of its songs are tied together, to create a of musical biography of a character Harris says is 5 fictional (although others have said the story is -autobiographical). "There is a little bit of me in everything I write, but iially Rose is purely fictional, a way for me to say some i I've needed to say," Harris said, j' The songs tell of love lost, love found, heartbreak and 'all the emotions in between. Harris wrote the songs along with Paul Kennerley. ViTThink of it as a soundtrack without the movie," Harris told one reporter. "Most of the songs can stand on their own but they could augment a particular story.

I was worried whether the songs could stand together." To complete the project, which began in 1 978, Harris moved from California to Nashville, where she said she finds the writing environment to be better. Taft Broadcasting puts Tampa Bay on its map ON TELEVISION A mm jM Gulf Broadcast Company, of which WTSP has been a part. Taft will pay $755-million for five of Gulfs TV stations and all seven of its radio stations. In doing so, Taft will boost its coverage of U.S. television homes from 9 to 15 percent as it becomes the first broadcaster to reach the ceiling of 12 TV stations the Federal Communications Commission has voted to permit.

Even the networks are still at the old limit of seven. But to Taft, a company with total 1984 assets of $785-million, the $755-million purchase is all but overwhelming. The firm is going deep into debt financing its acquisitions and has announced it will sell off unspeci-ficed assets to reduce what it owes. Likely on the block are Taft's two Suncoast radio stations country WSUN-AM, which Taft purchased last year for and hard rock WYNF-FM, which it has owned since 1978. FCC rules designed to guarantee diversity of media ownership prohibit a company from owning both a TV and a radio station in the same service area (or a newspaper, either, for that matter).

And analysts do not expect Taft to sell WTSP. It is spending at least $200-million for the St Petersburg ABC affiliate, and some published estimates say $225-million. (By comparison, Capital Cities paid SSI-million for Channel 28.) At any rate, WTSP is the second-largest unit in the $755-million deal. Only Gulfs Phoenix, station commanded more. Please see TAFT.

4-D i With the announced sale of to Taft Broadcasting the bay area becomes a dot on the map of yet another communications conglomerate. Like Capital Cities Communications, which purchased independent last year, Taft is one of the nation's largest broadcast groups. It's not the darling of Wall Street that Capital Cities has become, but that doesn't bode ill for area viewers. Independent Channel 28 has gotten a shiny new look from its wealthy new owners, but a network affiliate such as Channel 10 comes with extra responsibilities. Those who know Taft say the company is known for its sense of priorities.

Mind, no one is confusing the firm with Amnesty International. But the point is television tends to be an icy business. "They're not as fanatically devoted to the cult of progressive quarterly earnings as many broadcast companies," said Alan Gottesman, who follows Taft for the investment firm L. F. Rothschild.

"They're good citizens right across the board," asserted Ed Atorino of Smith, Barney. As an example, he cited Taft's construction of expensive new headquarters in a Cincinnati neighborhood best described as marginal. It wasn't a place most businesses would think to locate, but Taft's move is helping turn the neighborhood around. Atorino said it was not atypical of this company, founded by the family that gave America its fattest president. "You can almost say they've sacrificed maximum profitability in order to keep news high and have good public relations." YOU CAN certainly say Taft has sacrificed maximum profitability in order to buy most of Dallas-based Correction, Floridian Tickets to Silk Stockings by the St.

Petersburg Little "Theatre are $7.50 for adults, and $6 for ages 1 2 and under. Incorrect ticket prices were listed in Friday's Calendar. Silk Stockings is scheduled March 22-24, 28-31 and April 4-6..