The 100 Smartest Things Hollywood's Done Lately

51. Brendan Fraser worked out for six months to do George of the jungle.

52. Robert Downey Jr. landed a starring role in the big-budget studio picture U.S. Marshals after making himself insurable by convincing a judge to rule that he would still be able to finish the picture he was working on, even if he were found to be on drugs.

53. Tom Cruise managed to elude serial killer Andrew Cunanan.

54. Terrence Malick talked Sean Penn, John Travolta, George Clooney, Woody Harrelson, John Cusack and Bill Pullman into doing his comeback picture,_ The Thin Red Line_, in Australia for less money than they'd be paid for doing just about anything else.

55. The script Curtis Hanson and Brian Helgeland wrote for L.A. Confidential.

56. David Fincher's direction of and the marketing campaign for The Game.

57. Anne Heche signed for the romantic lead opposite Harrison Ford in Six Days, Seven Nights before announcing she was dating Ellen DeGeneres.

58. The casting of Rupert Everett in My Best Friend's Wedding.

59. Dodi Fayed allegedly bounced the kiss-off check he wrote to model/ girlfriend Kelly Fisher.

60. MCA Records released the Danish quartet Aqua's single "Barbie Girl," which has the voice of Barbie's boyfriend, Ken, saying, "Kiss me here, touch me there, hanky-panky."

61. When Mattel sued MCA Records to stop distributing Aqua's "Barbie Girl," MCA Records issued the statement, "In our view 'Barbie Girl' is just a fun, funny pop song."

62. Ted Turner attempted to prevent the release of Crash.

63. Ted Turner donated $1 billion to the United Nations.

64. David Bowie issued bonds backed by the anticipated value of future royalties from his songs and raised $55 million.

65. When Arthur Hiller took his name off the film titled "An Alan Smithee Film," leaving the film direction to be credited to Alan Smithee, screenwriter Joe Eszterhas commented, "I know some people will think this is a guerrilla-style publicity stunt in a guerrilla production."

66. Jennifer Lopez scheduled her extravagant press-attended wedding to take place three weeks before the premiere of Selena.

67. Brad Pitt and Gwyneth Paltrow called the whole thing off.

68. Despite rumors to the contrary, Demi Moore and Bruce Willis, partners in a marriage with three kids and a collective dollar value of kazillions, didn't split up.

69. Having decided not to thank either The X-Files creator/executive producer/writer Chris Carter or costar David Duchovny in her Emmy acceptance speech, Gillian Anderson took out full-page ads in the Hollywood trade papers to express her gratitude.

70. Anne Rice halted the stream of personal notes of advice and congratulations to President Clinton that she had been publishing on the pages of Hollywood's trade papers.

71. Fox Searchlight acquired The Full Monty for $3.5 million and made over $10 million in the first few weeks at the box office.

72. New Line let Mike Myers have his own way on Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery.

73. DreamWorks served enough champagne at the premiere of The Peacemaker to get guests drunk for the screening.

74. Twentieth Century Fox arranged to have the members of the press covering Anastasia, the studio's first entry into the animated musical sweepstakes, flown to Paris and put up at a luxurious hotel for the screening and media interviews.

75. After writing a draft of the new Superman Lives!, indie filmmaker Kevin Smith called the studio executives an "anxious bunch of motherfuckers."

76. Kevin Smith asked Emma Thompson to play God in his movie Dogma.

77. In & Out screenwriter Paul Rudnick had Joan Cusack's character say, "Fuck Barbra Streisand."

78. Phoenix Pictures chairman Mike Medavoy urged entertainment executives to "dare to spend less money."

79. Harrison Ford was cast as president of the United States.

80. Leonardo DiCaprio was cast as Romeo.

81. Al Pacino was cast as the Devil.

82. The Ain't It Cool News Web site.

83. Beta blockers.

84. DVDs.

85. El Nino.

86. After Miss Evers' Boys was presented on HBO, President Clinton made a formal apology on behalf of the nation to the African-American men who had been deliberately untreated for syphilis as part of a scientific experiment.

87. Robert Redford announced plans to team up with the Loews Theatres unit of Sony Corp. in a venture to build theaters that will specialize in independent film exhibition.

88. The soundtracks to William Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet, L.A. Confidential, Grosse Pointe Blank and Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery.

89. Will Smith followed up Independence Day with Men in Black.

90. Nic Cage moved into action films and more than doubled his asking price.

91. Matt Damon and Ben Affleck wrote Good Will Hunting.

92. Sean Penn and Robin Wright Penn moved to the San Francisco area after Wright Penn got carjacked in L.A.

93. Alicia Silverstone lost weight.

94. Shannen Doherty is undergoing anger control therapy.

95. Elle Macpherson has played models in four of her seven movies.

96. Juliette Lewis has been cast as a retarded girl in the film The Other Sister.

97. Fran Drescher did not make a movie this year during her hiatus from The Nanny.

98. Sony Pictures reserved theaters for the 1998 Memorial Day weekend opening of Godzilla a year in advance.

99. Universal followed up its profitable restoration and rerelease of Hitchcock's Vertigo with the restoration and planned rerelease of Hitchcock's Rear Window.

100. Roman Polanski is finally worming his way back into Hollywood.

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Comments

  • Marlon Brando is truly the greatest ever actor. He had the power to make even the best of his contemporaries look ordinary. And he did it all with very little effort. Brando saw acting as simply necessary to the maintenance of his life and it was this irreverance that enabled him to produce such thrilling performances. Watch him in any film and you’ll see it is all so effortless for him, yet undoubtedly brilliant.

  • Okay...got my coffee and the Star Ledger.... Let's see if there's anything positive in the paper this am...