The Decatur Daily Review from Decatur, Illinois • Page 8

PAGE EIGHT Decatur, Illinois, Tuesday, January 2, 1979 Trouble haunts Bond filming in Venice By Dick Kleiner Venice, Italy Newspaper Enterprise Association The city of Venice has been around for a thousand years, give or take a century, and ancient St. Mark's Square has seen everything from Marco Polo to tourists from Texas. But the place may never recover from the sight of James Bond in a motorized gondola fleeing across the Square, scattering the famed pigeons and the sidewalk cafe denizens, as he once again shows his elegant heels to the villains. This is a scene from the latest Bond movie, "Moonraker," which is being shot on location all over the world. Already, scenes have been filmed in London and Paris and, later, the company will go to Rio de Janeiro and south America's most thrilling spot, Iguacu Falls.

Now they are In Venice, for a 3Vfe-week shooting session that will cost more than $1 million and result in possibly 10 minutes on the screen. The Bond movies, like everything else, keep getting more and more expensive. This one, says producer Albert R. (Cubby) Broccoli, will be in the $25 million area. Roger and Luisa Moore sit at the edge of the Square.

Luisa, who is Italian; calls him "Rogerino." They are both suave, sophisticated people. They like Italy, but working in Venice is another matter. It is difficult. The thousands of tourists, roaming the relatively small expanse that is Venice, have nothing much to do. So when they see a movie company and, particularly, this movie company, they throng in.

Italy, today, is jittery about terrorism. The movie company has been exceptionally security There had been some trouble before. A group of students had suddenly appeared one day and stood firmly in front of the camera. They refused to budge. They said they should either be in the film or get paid to stay out.

"We were advised not to pay them," Broccoli said, "lest we started something that we couldn't stop." He said, vaguely, that they made "an arrangement" with the students, who left peacefully. Another day the producers and direc- tor held a discussion about where they should shoot next. The Italians, passing by carrying loaves of bread or pushing handcarts, stopped and entered into the discussion. Soon there were a dozen people, talking in English and Italian, gesticulating wildly, arguing about where to shoot next. This was such a typical scene that eventually the company established a technique of diversionary tactics.

They had one group of people with a high profile, ostensibly doing important filming. That attracted the crowds, while the real filming went on quietly in another location. The scene around the company is very international. Instructions and orders are given in Italian, French, English, Spanish. THE DECATUR DAILY REVIEW Jaws returns for second 4007' epic TV Mork from the planet Ork.

on-football film, "The Longest Yard." "That was really my first big break," he says. "Out of that, I got a part in the TV series, 'Barbary which wasn't a hit in the U.S., but was a big hit in England. "And someone in Cubby Broccoli's office saw it and recommended me to him for 'The Spy Who Loved And that was my second big break. Kiel is a Californian, from a lower middle class section of Los Angeles called Baldwin Park. His father, who owned an appliance store, died when Richard was 19, so the young man and his mother ran the store for a year.

"But then we both decided to go our separate directions," he says. An aunt, who had always been a movie buff, urged him to try acting. It appealed to him, so he did. It was a struggle at first, but since "The Spy Who Loved Me," he says he has become an international figure. Out of that, came a big part in "Force Ten From Navarone" and, of course, "Moonraker." He says now he is known all over the world.

Show has very little besides Williams Richard Kiel vards. He is a towering man, at 7-foot-2, and she is a tiny woman, at 5-foot-l. He says the difference in their height means nothing, and he loves to quote his wife, who always says that they "see eye to eye." The two met in Georgia, when he was there shooting the Burt Reynolds pris cut from classic imold Paris Newspaper Enterprise Association They remembered Richard Kiel at the Hotel Raphael, but that really isn't too surprising. After all, it is hard to forget a man who stands 7 feet 2 inches. Kiel made such a hit in the last James Bond film, "The Spy Who Loved Me," as the steel-toothed villain.

Jaws, that they have brought him back to reprise the same character in the new Bond epic, "Moonraker." And the company is using Paris as its base. The elegant old Hotel Raphael is the favorite haunt of Cubby Broccoli, who produces the Bond films, so when Kiel came in to the Raphael's quiet bar, they remembered him. He says he and his wife, Diane, are adjusting to Parisian life. They will have been here five months, altogether, by the time the shooting is over. And it should be a memorable five months for the Kiel clan, because Diane is expecting their third child soon.

They have a son, 4, and a 2'-year-old daughter. The Kiels always make an interesting sight, when they stroll the Paris boule- New 'heavy' Hollywood Newspaper Enterprise Association Down through the years, Hollywood has given us dozens of people we have loved to hate. The roster of Hollywood's heavies Peter Lorre, Sydney Green-street and their colleagues is long and impressive and lovable. Maybe we have a new one, because Paul Lawrence Smith seems to be cut from the classic mold. He has a unique form and a unique face and he can act and you just love hating his guts.

In fact, the public seems to love hating him so much that they have shown signs of wanting to do it personally. Smith is the number one villain in "Midnight Express," the huge mountain of a man who plays the head Turkish jailer, a professional sadist. "I think I may have played the part too well," Smith says. For one thing, he spoke only Turkish in the film. He learned each line phonetically, of course, because he is an American, born and bred in Boston.

But he did it so smoothly and so convincingly that Hollywood's producers think the film company hired a Turk to play that part. He is having to go around telling everyone that he did it, not some Turkish actor. And, for another thing, the people who see the film come away with such a hatred of him that they stop him on the street and want to get physical about it. "Recently," Smith says, "I had to talk my way out of a street brawl with a half-dozen toughs who took it personally what I did to the Billy Hayes By David Handler Newspaper Enterprise Association Mork is a space-age Charlie McCarthy. Part innocent, part naughty, he careens about the stage like a liberated ventriloquist's dummy, delivering a pattern of odd noises and catchy, second-hand slogans.

In the hands of Robin Williams, our traveler from the planet Ork is a nut. Unfortunately for me, he is also Henry Schreibman, a guy who lived across the hall from me in college, who would drop by my room every night at 11, do a monologue with my deodorant stick, romance a sneaker, watch my TV and not get the hint to go home until forcibly ejected. Mork, like Henry, is only a laugh in small doses. The show has little to offer us besides Williams. Mork is assigned to experience life on earth and report back to his head man, Orson.

He appears in Boulder, and apparently moves in with Mindy McConnell, who is wholesome, cute, has a nice smile, is cute and wholesome. Why she takes him in baffles me, but we must accept it because the show does not exist outside her apartment. Nor do the other characters. Mindy has some sort of marginal coed life, but it is off-camera. Then there is her pop, a bow-tied prig who owns a music store, and her caustic, foul-mouthed granny.

But basically the show is Mork. In place of situations (a.k.a. plots) Likables difficult to find on churning 'Dallas' 'Taxi' takes viewer for ride By David Handler Newspaper Enterprise Association "Taxi" is as bumpy as a New York cab ride. Its jokes are either very funny or awful, its characters colorful or cardboard cut-outs. There is no sense of balance or pacing, no workable operating base.

But this ABC entry from the creators of "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" is the only situation comedy I have watched so far this fall that makes me laugh out loud. When it works it is very funny. And that is, indeed, what it is all about. The show is built around a hack garage and its gang of zanies. All of the drivers except Alex (Judd Hirsch) are part-time helpers trying to bust out.

One wants to be an actor, one a boxer, another an art dealer. Because Alex is the only person in the place who is relatively sane Hirsch is the hub of the show, rather than its star. His presence is as a straight man, a listener; he does not get many funny lines. The laughs are thanks to two of the characters and the actors who play them. Danny DeVito as Louie, the runty dispatcher, one-ups the old Lou Grant for sheer brutality.

Louie is incredibly foul and nasty. "You want a great tip?" he says to a novice driver. "Never pick up a cripple. In the time it takes to get 'em in and out of the cab you can pick up 10 fares." Stand-up comic Andy Kaufman achieves a tour-de-force as Latka, an over-sexed immigrant of non-descript origin who speaks an unknown tongue in a rapid, high-pitched voice. Kaufman deadpans the alien mechanic so beautifully (his only English phrase is "Thank you very that he occasionally makes his fellow actors break up.

But the caliber of "Taxi's" ensemble drops sharply after that point. Unlike the successful gang comedies like "Barney Miller," "Taxi" exhausts its supply of funny people in the first 10 minutes. Tony the boxer (Tony Danza) is yet another in the Vinnie Barbarino string of cute, slow-witted toughs who talk out of the sides of their mouths. The rest are throw-ins. Jeff Conaway as the actor and Randall Carver as the neophyte driver have nothing funny to do and too-closely resemble Danza and each other.

Marilu Henner as Elaine, the would-be art dealer, swings from token feminism to bawdy innuendo without batting an eye. The result is that Louie and Latka sure-fire laughs must be employed again and again. They will quickly wear thin. The show also has a real problem with its stories. The situations just are not amusing and they have no organic base in the setting.

"Taxi's" plots could have been flown in from another show. The writers are running away from the group rapport "Taxi" must achieve. "Taxi" is a sound idea with potential. It is still juggling its talents but at least it has some to juggle. Given time and good strategy, it could blossom into a rewarding, durable favorite.

Dustin Hoffman hopes to return to New York stage Newspaper Enterprise Association Ratzo Rizzo would never be allowed in New York's posh Russian Tea Room, but Dustin Hoffman managed to shatter the decorum pretty well when he ran into his "Midnight Cowboy" co-star Jon Voight. The two thoroughly whooped it up amid the borscht and stares from other patrons, according to Cue magazine. "He comes from a very old said Hoffman of Voight, the son of a Yonkers, N.Y., golf pro. "Their money goes back so far it's Confederate," kidded Hoffman. Hoffman is all over the Big Apple now filming "Kramer vs.

Kramer." He says he'd also like to return to the New York stage. "I'd like to get back, and I wouldn't mind if Jon joined me." Diane Keaton will star in 'Captain Grown Up' Hollywood (AP) Academy Award winner Diane Keaton stars in the contemporary comedy "Captain Grown Up." The movie will be adapted from Kit Reed's novel by Susan Miller. "Mork and Mindy" relies on direction-als. Each week Mork learns one new thing about earth. Needless to say, his lessons generally involve you-know-what.

That is where Mindy comes in. she is his teacher: "If you want to be an earthling," she says, "You'll just have to experience love." "Does it lead to mating?" asks the hot-blooded Mork. "Sometimes." "Then when do we start?" It is the same tune as "Three's Company" kiddie porn wherein the dialogue and action are drenched with sexuality but the characters can't consummate even though they want to because of the show's structural limitations. In "Three's Company," Jack is only supposed to be a roomy, and a gay one at that. Here, Mork just is not a fella.

Williams is a talented comic. Reliable female sources inform me he is also ir-resistably cute. His physical humor is imaginative and sometimes amusing, but his routines just go on and on. There is incredible repetition, and really nothing else for the show to do. But for now, Mork is this year's on the cover of TV Guide and People the same week.

And "Mork and Mindy" is this season's first and only runaway hit, even though its only contribution to American culture is that we are now besieged by 13-year-olds flapping their ears and exclaiming "Na-no. Na-no." Geddes) to whom he is faithful and affectionate. She, in turn, apparently lives only to shower him with proud, caring looks. I think we are supposed to like the old folks, but we cannot. Jock and Ellie are depicted as out of step with the times and they have allowed their offspring to deteriorate around them.

The real stars of "Dallas" are the New Ewings, a decadent and thoroughly tasteless bunch of brats. J.R. (Larry Hagman) Jock and El-lie's oldest son, the stereotypical sleazy lobbyist. A drunkard and an adulterer. Sue Ellen (Linda Gray) J.R.'s wife.

Usually found lounging around the pool guzzling highballs. Has plenty of affairs. Got pregnant in a recent episode (after seven barren years with J.R.) and snapped "I've been as faithful to our marital vows as you've been." Bobby (Patrick Duffy) J.R.'s kid brother. At first I thought he would prove to be likable he is low-key, friendly and is about the only one who is not constantly drunk. But he revealed his true Ewing spirit when niece Lucy ran off in search of her mother.

She gets picked up by a crazed bandit and is tagged by police as his accomplice. Bobby follows in their tracks and tries to cover up the whole thing by whipping out a giant wad of hundred dollar bills and bribing people. Pam (Victoria Principal) Mrs. Bobby, painfully portrayed by a former Playboy playmate. The show captures her strongest acting attributes by dressing her in wet bathing suits or outfits that look like they were designed by Fredericks of Lucy (Charlene Tilton) A pint-sized blonde bombshell who is actually supposed to be a high school girl.

She stamps her foot frequently and demands her own car and junk like that. Her father is the brother of J.R. and Bobby, evidently a black sheep who ran off years ago. Do not ask about her mother it is a long, boring story. Just like "The Waltons," "Dallas" is built around the family ritual of breakfast and dinner.

Only here, no one talks. They just glare at each other. And have another drink. I'm just glad John Boy is not around to see this. 'Kaz' characters carry it to ies.

From Boston, he comes from a family of doctors and dentists a grandfather was chief physician to the czar. He went to Brandeis where, in addition to football honors, he majored in philosophy and psychology. He went on to Harvard, where he got a master's degree in motivational psychology. He had become fascinated in acting in college, and moved to New York after college and studied acting. He appeared in several plays, both on and off Broadway.

He says he took some time off from acting to go to Cuba when Castro was struggling to gain power. Smith fought with Castro against Batista, and he has! a scar on his head as a memento of that experience. In 1966, he took more time off. He went to Israel to help out, but he spoke no Hebrew so they would not let him in the Army. But they did let him drive a truck.

Truck driving is only one of his accomplishments. He has been supporting himself since he was 13, and he has done dozens of things. Mostly, because of his size, they have been physical. He stayed in Israel six years, became a major force in Israeli films and TV (and acquiring a "lady" Eve who "keeps me and then moved to Italy where he starred in several Italian movies. Now he is here, but he is not sure for how long.

It all depends on whether Hollywood accepts him as an actor, and does not think that great part in night Express" was played by a Turk. success fresh out of the house of numbers by Bennett (Patrick O'Neal), stylish head of a slick, powerful law firm. Kaz don't know from tact or escargot, but he works hard and he cares. Along the way his frank, earthy charm melts the coolest of sophisticated hearts. And his street-honed wit wins over the crusty judges.

The idea is not particularly fresh but "Kaz" carries it off with interesting stories and likable characters. This 60-minute entry from CBS is a solid one. There is nice friction between Kaz and Bennett, who serves as both mentor and emery board. Bennett throws Kaz difficult and sensitive cases. They underscore his lack of polish but give him elbow room for his cheery honesty.

His clients are disappointed that they have been stuck with him, but he quickly bowls them over. An added bit of spice is Kaz's girlfriend Katie (Linda Carlson), a newspaper columnist with whom he shares a moderately adult TV relationship. They do not always get along. "Can't we be civilized about this?" he asks, when she becomes involved in one of his cases on the wrong side. "What would you know about being civilized?" she responds.

Courtroom work is fairly minimal. Kaz is no Perry Mason. The emphasis is placed instead on character and leg-work. Often he settles out of court, a touch of realism that suits this When he does go to court there is a good rivalry with a rather anemic but dedicated assistant DA. It is becoming harder and harder for the TV viewer to find a show which takes a simple premise and executes it with the proper blend of character, story and wit Some call it entertainment.

"Kaz" is precisely that. Paul Lawrence Smith He did talk his way out of the fight which was probably a good thing for those toughs. Paul Lawrence Smith is not the ordinary actor, physically. First, his dimensions are impressive he is 6 feet 4 and 300 pounds. But even more than sheer bulk.

Smith is a powerful man and a trained one. He has a black belt in karate. He was a Little All-America as a defensive (and he also played offensive) tackle. And he is one of the strongest men around. His life has been eventful enough to provide subject matter for a few mov Tony Baretta.

He is also an attorney. "Kaz" is a familiar duck-out-of-water story. You remember it. It usually goes: naive country boy ends up teaching them city slickers a thing or two about life. Here, Kaz (Ron Liebman) is hired favorite haunt.

'Msg Newspaper Enterprise Association Here is a thigh-slapper for you Lorimar has flipped "The Waltons" over onto its backside and turned it into an hour of soft porn. In truth, "Dallas" should warrant a chortle or two. Imagine: three generations of hot-blooded Southwestern Rockefellers living under one roof, united not by poverty and love but by greed and loathing. Fancy: heavy doses of boozing, bed-hopping and influence peddling. Face it, "Dallas" has all the stuff that good, fun trash is made of.

But it is no fun at all. Part of the problem is the pacing "Dallas" does not move, it churns. The crushing blow, however, is that there is no one in the Ewing clan who you like, or, as Roone Arledge says of Howard Cosell, who you like to hate. Heading the family is Jock Ewing (Jiip Davis), a crusty oldtimer who is the only one still in touch with the mammoth Ewing spread. Jock has a wife, Ellie (Barbara Del ivtt Jim Davis Newspaper Enterprise Association Martin Kazinsky is an ex-con with all the rough edges.

He misplaces his modifiers, plays drums in a seedy nightclub and wears outfits that look like they glow in the dark. Personality-wise, he is a cross between John-Boy Walton and Kaz relaxes at his Mwfi 4rr.