|
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
July 17, 2005
More film actors move from the big screen to television
By Steve Murray, Cox News Service
ATLANTA -- Next season, the networks are seeing stars -- the kind more often seen at the multiplex.
ABC has Oscar winner Geena Davis and Donald Sutherland in "Commander- in-Chief." Batman's former Robin, Chris O'Donnell, starts his own law firm in Fox's "Head Cases." Oscar-nominee Melanie Griffith shrinks her big-screen ditziness for the WB's "Twins."
Also on the WB, "X-Men" and "Femme Fatale" star Rebecca Romijn becomes TV reporter "Pepper Dennis." Dennis Hopper (in theaters in George A. Romero's "Land of the Dead") goes to the Pentagon in "CSI" mastermind Jerry Bruckheimer's NBC drama "E-Ring." And Kyra Sedgwick is already on the air in TNT's "The Closer."
What's going on here?
David Kohan, co-creator of "Will & Grace" and the coming "Twins," quips, "Movie actors are coming to their senses and doing the right thing."
The big news of this big-screen-to-small trend is that it isn't such big news any more -- though for most of television's history, moving from feature films to TV series was viewed as a career taboo for movie actors.
As the great director Billy Wilder once said of television: "It used to be that we in films were the lowest form of art. Now we have something to look down on."
But things change.
"Over the last 10 years it's gotten to be less and less of a barrier," says actor Michael Vartan of "Alias," who has worked alongside Oscar winners Joel Grey and Faye Dunaway, Lena Olin and Isabella Rossellini on the show.
Rehearsing for his series' season finale this spring, he watched Olin and Rossellini discussing an upcoming scene and was struck by the accomplished duo. "I thought, "These actors are on our show!' It's insane sometimes."
Actually, it's standard operating procedure now, according to Rod Lurie, executive-producer of "Commander-in-Chief" and writer-director of the 2000 feature film "The Contender," starring Joan Allen.
"In the past, people saw actors coming to TV as a surrender, rather than a coup for television," he says. "That is what has changed. The writing on TV has become exceptional because the standards have risen to such a high value. That's due to HBO and Showtime having reinvented the wheel on hourlong television. People have lifted up their game."
Glenn Close, who finished a season as the new alpha-female captain in the macho sweatshop of FX's "The Shield," won't argue with that.
Though she'd appeared in several television films over the years, no one had asked her to join a series until "The Shield's" creator Shawn Ryan gave her a call.
"I refused to be a snob about it," she told TV critics this year. "I think, as an actor, I go where the great writing is. And I think that should be the bottom line."
From the early '60s into the '80s, though, TV was still seen as taboo by movie actors -- or at least their agents. Then came cable, especially programming innovators like HBO.
"Even when someone who had already been big on TV, like James Garner, went to do movies then came back to TV, it was viewed as a sign of a failed film career," says Christine Becker, assistant professor in Notre Dame's department of film, television and theater. "This strikes me as a big difference with today; in the past, an aura of failure or deficiency almost always surrounded a film star who did TV. That's not usually the case anymore."
"Commander-in-Chief's" Lurie says the biggest obstacle for film actors choosing to do series TV isn't ego. It's scheduling and contractual demands that come with a regular role on the tube.
"What's daunting (for actors) isn't the idea of going to TV," he says. "What's daunting is, they're looking at a six-year commitment.
That's generally when the deal comes off the table."
Getting Sutherland -- who has spent virtually his entire career on the film screen -- made for a particularly tough challenge. It wasn't simply committing to a schedule. In the new series he plays the speaker of the House, and antagonist to Davis' female president.
"His problem was unusual," Lurie says. "He didn't want to play a Republican for six years. He didn't think he had the internal fortitude to play somebody who goes against everything he personally stands for."
In the end, Sutherland and ABC negotiated a commitment deal, which Lurie can't reveal, that made everyone happy.
While more actors like Sutherland and Close are committing to hourlong dramas, sitcoms were the format that first lured notable stars for guest spots.
"I remember "Friends' was one of the first shows to have huge movie stars as guest stars, and then it became cool," says "Alias' " Vartan. "Television is so good now, and there's so much money in it, those actors are willing to do it."
Possibly even more than "Friends," "Will & Grace" has featured a revolving door of starry guests, often playing themselves (as Vartan's "Monster-in-Law" colleague Jennifer Lopez did).
"Will & Grace's" Kohan says many actors who are guest stars on the show like shooting what amounts to a mini-play in a single week, enjoy the ego-gratifying response of a live audience's laughter, and, in some cases, use the show to flex muscles they normally don't get to use.
Take Michael Douglas, who played a gay detective in 2002. "He's a terrific comic actor who doesn't find himself in comic roles very often," Kohan says.
Television also can be a good career step. Sally Field, for instance, won a 2001 Emmy for her guest role on "ER."
There's another appeal for actors who have burned out on spending months away from home in far locations. "If you're an actor and have a family and have your roots here (in Los Angeles), this is a 9-to-5 job, and really more like a 9-to-1. It's a great life."
Finally, there's an increasing reality for actors who have been film staples for years. The clock ticks loudly in Hollywood. These days, more and more movies are skewed to teenage audiences, meaning fewer (and less interesting) roles for older actors.
You can call it a career slump, if you want to sound negative, but it's also just the brutal truth about the Hollywood demographics game.
Ultimately, moving to TV is becoming a no-brainer. "You know, there are bad movies and bad television," Kohan says. "But I think, percentage-wise, there are more bad movies."
Steve Murray writes for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
© The Atlanta Journal-Constitution 2005
 Back To Exclusively Michael 2005
|
|
