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week 31-01
ShowBiz Weekly: news from the UK & US...

TOM CRUISE and NICOLE KIDMAN are likely to make their first public appearance together since their break-up last year, at the Los Angeles premiere of The Others on Tuesday. Cruise produced the film in which Kidman stars. The former Hollywood golden couple are expected to finalise their divorce next week - but Cruise's spokeswoman Pat Kingsley has indicated they will both be at the screening and will attend the party afterwards. ``They'll walk the press line. There's no script,'' Kingsley said. She did not know if Cruise, who has been dating PENELOPE CRUZ, would bring a date with him. Cruise was planning to miss this week's New York premiere, which Kidman was also expected to attend. In the film, set in wartime Jersey, Kidman plays the troubled mother of two young children.

Director MICHAEL CRISTOFER had to use all his creative ingenuity to hide ANGELINA JOLIE'S tattoos during her explicit love scenes with ANTONIO BANDERAS in the romantic drama Original Sin. ``I couldn't shoot around them because there are too many of them,'' said Cristofer, who also wrote the script for the story, set in turn-of-the century Cuba. ``The make-up person did her best to cover them and sometimes we would put a strip of nightgown over one of them. For others that were still visible when we were editing, we used computer generated images to brush them away.'' In Original Sin Banderas plays a wealthy Cuban sugar planter who advertises for a bride and gets more than he bargained for when Julia, played by Angelina Jolie, arrives on the boat from New Orleans.

BRUCE WILLIS is giving all profits from the telecast of a play he directed and starred in to help research towards pancreatic cancer - the disease that killed his brother Robert. The play, SAM SHEPARD's True West, about two brothers, was put on by Willis at the Liberty Theatre in Hailey, Idaho, w here he has a home. It opened on June 26, three days after Robert died, and closed on Sunday. It is being shown in America later this year on cable's Showtime network.

Timeline, the film of the MICHAEL CRICHTON novel which has been in development for the past 18 months, will go before the cameras in March with British actor GERARD BUTLER in the starring role. Butler - who was recently rumoured to be a leading contender to succeed PIERCE BROSNAN as James Bond - will play the site manager on an archaeological dig in France who is recruited to lead a group of students back in time to rescue their professor. PAUL WALKER, who recently co-starred in The Fast and the Furious, will play Chris Hughes, an archaeology student who is also the stepson of thestranded professor.

BARBRA STREISAND is going into the studio to record her first Christmas album since 1967. Sources say she will not repeat any of the songs on the original album - which included Jingle Bells, White Christmas and Ave Maria - and is singing better than ever. She does not, however, plan any personal singing appearances or concerts to support the album, say the sources.

The British filmmaker DANNY BOYLE, who last directed LEONARDO DICAPRIO in The Beach, will be turning to comedy with his next project, Solomon Grundy. The story, based on British writer DAN GOOCH's novel, takes its roots from the nursery rhyme and follows the whirlwind experiences of a man who lives a complete life in one week. The project is expected to use state-of-the-art technology to depict thehero's life cycle.

SPY GAMES The New Zealand director LEE TAMOHARI is expected to direct the 20th James Bond film, which will begin shooting early next year with PIERCE BROSNAN returning as 007 for a fourth time. Tamohari has emerged at the top of at least half-a-dozen A-list directors vying for the as-yet-untitled projec t. Tamohari, who made his film debut with the urban drama Once Were Warriors, also directed the thriller Along Came a Spider. The new Bond adventure will be released in late 2002 to mark the 40th anniversary of the release of the first Bond film, Dr No, which starred Sean Connery.

KATE HUDSON, who was Oscar-nominated for Almost Famous, will be donning period clothes for her next film, The Girl With the Pearl Earrings, which is to be directed by Briton MIKE NEWELL. She will play a 17th century housemaid who becomes romantically involved her with master, the Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer. The film, based on the novel by Tracy Chevalier, takes its title from Vermeer's portrait of an anonymous woman wearing a pearl earring.

LUCY LAWLESS, whose hit television series Zena: Warrior Princess ended this summer, is moving into alien territory and joining the cast of The X-Files. She has signed to appear in the first two episodes of the series and is expected to extend her stay for longer although details of her character are being kept secret. ``We think we've found an interesting and unexpected way to have her join the family,'' executive producer FRANK SPOTNITZ tells Daily Variety. ``We're thrilled to have the opportunity to work with Lucy whose work we've admired for a long time.''

QUENTIN TARANTINO is facing a dilemma posed by the pregnancy of his friend and Pulp Fiction star UMA THURMAN. Thurman, who is married to ETHAN HAWKE, is expecting her second child which means she will be unable to meet the autumn start Tarantino wants for his latest film, Kill Bill which he wrote especially for Thurman. He will now have to either recast the leading role and rewrite the script or push the film back until after Thurman has delivered the baby and is ready to return to work. Thurman was to have been the centre-piece in the drama about a wronged woman who seeks revenge.

The British director STEPHEN NORRINGTON is Steven Spielberg's choice to direct the epic kung fu action adventure story Hammer Of God for DreamWorks Pictures. Norrington, who wrote and directed the upcoming British film The Last Minute, will begin work on Hammer Of God after first directing NICOLAS CAGE in the horror action film Ghost Rider. He told Daily Variety that, ``Hammer of God was one of the best epic kung fu ideas I've ever heard,'' continuing: ``Add to that DreamWorks and STEVEN SPIELBERG and my excitement has reached a transcendental plane.''

TONY KAYE, the British director who clashed with actor EDWARD NORTON and New Line Cinema over the editing of his debut feature film, American History X, is now financing his own projects. ``I realised that if I wanted control over my movies I'd have to finance them myself,'' said Kaye, who is currently filming Lobby Lobster in downtown Los Angeles. ``When I run out of money I stop and make a commercial.'' Kaye says he is not sure what Lobby Lobster is about. ``We're writing it as we go along,'' he tells Entertainment Weekly. ``It's honest film-making. I'm being honest about not knowing what the movie is about, whereas most directors pretend they know when they really don't.''

TOM CRUISE has been involved in every aspect of production of his estranged wife NICOLE KIDMAN'S latest film The Others, according to Dimension Films chief Bob Weinstein. Cruise is the producer of the suspense film, in which Kidman plays a stressed-out, Bible-quoting mother of two in an old, fog-shroude d house in the Channel Islands. He was on the set during filming in Spain, was involved in post-production and went to a test screening, Weinstein tells USA Today. ``Both of them worked diligently and professionally,'' he said of Cruise andKidman. Kidman has vowed to attend the film's premiere in New York on Thursday but Cruise is not expected to be there.

The legal campaigner who became famous after being portrayed by JULIA ROBERTS in Erin Brockovich is to host an as-yet-untitled television show based on the British series Challenge Anneka. America's ABC network is currently in negotiations with British producer Mentorn International for the rights to televise a one hour special in which Brockovich will face a tough challenge to perform a good deed in a short time.

BRITNEY SPEARS has finished work on her first feature film, an as-yet-untitled coming-of-age story that co-stars KIM CATTRALL of the Sex and the City television series. In her acting debut, Spears plays a virtuous student who teams up with two others to travel across the country. On the way they meet a young musician who persuades them to go to Los Angels to compete in a music contest. The film also features DAN AYKROYD as one of the people the travellers meet up with.

JENNIFER LOPEZ is to portray a modern-day Cinderella who falls for a British nobleman in The Chambermaid, an updated re-telling of the fairy story. The singer-actress will play a young dreamer who takes a job as an hotel chambe rmaid and meets the British guest but loses him when she leaves herjob.

After producers announced that NICOLE KIDMAN had been dumped from Danish director LARS VON TRIER'S forthcoming film Dogville for refusing to sign her contract, the Australian actress has reportedly signed on the dotted line. ``Our lawyers in New York just told me that Nicole Kidman has signed the contract,'' producer Vibeke Vindelv told Daily Variety. ``I just talked to Lars and obviously we are both very happy.'' Dogville, which is set in a small, US mountain village, will begin filming in Sweden in January.

MEL GIBSON's next venture is likely to involve heading out to sea for a starring role in The Captain and the Shark. Based on the book In Harm's Way, the film will tell the true story of theUSS Indianapolis which was sunk in the shark-infested South Pacific after transporting components of the atomic bombs dropped on Japan. Gibson is to play Capt Charles McVay, the skipper who was made a scapegoat and charged with failing to evade torpedo fire despite evidence from survivors that his actions helped save some of the men. The shark carnage was the subject of a chilling speech by Robert Shaw's character in Jaws. McVay, who received bitter notes from the families of the sailors who died, committed suicide in 1968 at the age of 70.

PAUL WALKER, who stars in the surprise summer hit The Fast and the Furious, is in negotiations to star in a big screen version of the 1970s television series SWAT. The series, based on the Los Angeles police department's Special Weapons And Tactics Squad, starred Steve Forrest and Robert Urich and the film project has been in various forms of development for years. It was initially intended as a starring vehicle for ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER but the script has now been changed to make the project more youth-oriented.

Members of the British rock band THE WHO are working with producer Bill Gerber on a film about the life of the band's drummer KEITH MOON. By working with The Who - Who Films will share the producing credit - Gerber has been able to avoid the legal tangles that often come with rock star biographies. ``Dealing with publishing rights and record labels can get extremely complicated but that has not been a problem for us because The Who controls their own publishing and they are working with us,'' says Gerber, who produced the 1997 JENNIFER LOPEZ film Selena. ``Keith was a troubled man but the story of how he became that way is truly fascinating.''

British director STEPHEN FREARS, whose last film was High Fidelity, is to direct RICHARD GERE in Emperor Zehnder, a film based on the life of the late adventure photographer Bruno P Zehnder. Described as The English Patient meets Out of Africa, the script is an epic love story set in Antarctica. It chronicles Zehnder's rise to fame as a world-renowned photographer and environmentalist known for his penguin photography. Zehnder, whose love of penguins was so strong that he legally changed his middle name to Penguin, died in an Antarctic storm in July 1997, aged 52.

The British actor ALFRED MOLINA has signed a new deal with CBS TV which calls for him to develop and star in a television series for the network. Molina, recently seen in Chocolat, starred for two seasons in the weekly CBS comedy Ladies Man which ended earlier this year. He has just finished filming his role as the painter Diego Rivera in Frida, opposite SALMA HAYEK as Frida Kahlo. winner HILARY SWANK, who backed out.

ANTONIO BANDERAS and Charlie's Angel co-star LUCY LIU are teaming up again for the action film Ecks vs. Sever. The duo, who starred together in 1999's Play it to the Bone, will play two Terminator-like undercover agents who think they are competitors but find they have a common enemy.