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Film
Altman, the off-screen storyteller
By STEVE PERSALL
Published April 14, 2006
The closing weekend of the eighth annual Sarasota Film Festival was filled with memorable images, on screen and off. What I'll remember most vividly is the old man and the sea. Inside suite 1307 at the Longboat Key Club and Resort, a frail figure in an oversized chair sat with his back to open sliding glass doors overlooking the Gulf of Mexico. The crash of waves on the shore competed with the words of acclaimed film director Robert Altman, spoken barely above a whisper while sipping iced tea. Dressed in black down to his stocking feet, the 81-year-old filmmaker spoke about his new film, the festival's closing night hit A Prairie Home Companion, his illustrious career and the prospect of dying. This is what's known in the movie business as a teaser; the full interview with Altman will be published in June when his homespun, hilarious adaptation of Garrison Keillor's folksy radio show hits Tampa Bay theaters. Part of the conversation concerned Altman's production of HealtH at the Don CeSar resort in St. Pete Beach in 1980. The pink hotel was the setting for a political satire in the allegorical context of a healthy lifestyle convention. The cast almost upstaged by the architecture included James Garner, Carol Burnett, Lauren Bacall and Glenda Jackson. The movie was a box office flop, withheld nearly two years by skittish studio executives during an era when Reaganism took hold. Altman's blue eyes twinkled when I introduced myself as a reporter from St. Petersburg, as if memory took him back to HealtH before the question could be posed. "I remember everything,'' he said. "I recall the Teamsters came in and tried to put a whole bunch of people on the payroll who lived in Tampa and had to cross that Gandy bridge. They called it a distant location so it would cost us extra every time they left (home). Well, we never left that hotel, shot the whole thing there. We only needed three cars and maybe two drivers. They really stuck it to us real badly. I just said no. "They literally threatened me. They said: 'You'd better not get in a car while you're here.' And I didn't. I walked. We were living right next door to the Don CeSar, in a condo or something. And I never did get into a car.'' I mentioned one enduring tale that Altman and his production team allegedly spent evenings partaking of certain, um, herbal substances while refining the next day's script. "No, no,'' he said, dismissing the idea with a wave of an age-spotted hand. "That's part of the myth. There are all kinds of behaviors that were assigned to everybody during the late 1960s and the 1970s. I got involved in all of them. But I was never late and never missed a day's shooting. What else is there?'' n n n A few buildings away at the resort, director Mary Harron and screenwriter Guinevere Turner don't have Altman's resume, but they're carrying on his passion for offbeat storytelling. The Notorious Bettie Page is their first collaboration since 2000's American Psycho, but they spent a decade working on the biography of the 1950s queen of kinky poses. Gretchen Mol plays Page, a rural Tennessean who became a sex symbol almost by accident, redefining the underground world of sexually charged photography. The film was shown once at the festival to a capacity crowd that laughed in all the right places, according to Harron, plus a few times more, suggesting the topic is still unsettling today. "I was surprised, in a way, how uncomfortable people still are about sex,'' Harron said on a balcony overlooking the beach. "A lot of the film is quite light-hearted, but people figure if she was posing for those kinds of photographs that it was a tremendously sensual or sinister experience. I don't think she did them in a very sexual or dark way. "We focus very much behind the scenes, more interested in her than about what the world thought of her; a pinup's story from the pinup's point of view. In a way a lot of stuff that goes into making those images is very banal.'' Turner chimed in: "As much as we re-create the iconic images of her, we want to see her as more than a photograph, bringing to life the actual person, kind of demystifying a lot of what people project on her - that she was a dominatrix or a (purposeful) pioneer; all those things she really wasn't.'' The final irony of Page's life shown in the film is her return to conservative religious roots, reading the Bible in public and passing out dollars as Christian charity. The image of a church's lighted crucifix and Page's tearful submission to her faith are as striking as her sadomasochistic and bondage poses. I suggested that with a bit of editing for nudity and language, The Notorious Bettie Page might be appreciated by conservative Christians who otherwise wouldn't see it. "I'll be very interested to see how the film does when it reaches that audience,'' Harron said. "You can see it as a redemptive tale if you want to, as a right-minded Christian.'' The rest of Harron and Turner's interview will be published when The Notorious Bettie Page debuts here, sometime after mid April. * * * Meanwhile, as far away from the topics of sex, drugs and politics as one can imagine, sat Tampa resident Merl Reagle. He's featured in the documentary Wordplay, about the national championship tournament of crossword puzzles. Reagle constructs such brain teasers for numerous publications including the New York Times and also syndicates sudoku puzzles in others, including the St. Petersburg Times. Unlike Altman, Harron and Turner, the festival circuit is new to Reagle. He's making up for lost time. Before Sarasota, he accompanied Wordplay to the Sundance Film Festival - where being recognized by a crossword enthusiast in the midst of transplanted Hollywood was a thrill - then on to Orlando for the Florida Film Festival. "It's tough selling a movie,'' he said. "You're not used to it. They fly you around or drive you around and it's a lot of talking. And you have to make sure you don't get sick or else you're (sunk) when the next one comes up in three days. But it needs to be done. (Director) Patrick Creadon happened to pick the year when we have one of the most dramatic finishes we've ever had at a crossword tournament, and we've been doing them for 28 years. We've had exciting finishes but nothing like this one, which people need to see to understand.'' Wordplay also boasts appearances by crossword fans such as comedian Jon Stewart, New York Yankees pitcher Mike Mussina and filmmaker Ken Burns, in addition to politicians such as former U.S. Sen. Bob Dole and former President Bill Clinton, whose agreement to participate got the celebrity ball rolling by a serendipitous stroke. One of the tournament competitors is Vic Fleming, an Arkansas judge taking his first stab at the national crossword title. Creadon had been trying without luck to persuade Clinton to discuss his hobby for the film. It turns out that Fleming and his wife used to babysit Chelsea Clinton, so he called his close friend and convinced the former president that Creadon's endeavor was respectable. Clinton signed on, Stewart closely followed and the rest of the famous puzzlers fell into line. More about Wordplay and Reagle's involvement will be published when the film opens here, on a date to be determined. Steve Persall can be reached at (727) 893-8365 or persall@sptimes.com.
[Last modified April 13, 2006, 12:38:37]
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