People & Places

NEWS/FEATURESARAB TIMES, FRIDAY, JUNE 3, 2016

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Mexican-US actress Salma Hayek poses upon arrival to attend the UK premiere of the fi lm ‘Tale of Tales’ in central London on June 1. (AFP)

Actor Daniel Wu (left), actress Paula Patton (center), and director Duncan Jones pose for media during a press event for the movie ‘Warcraft’ in Be-jing, China, on June 1. The fi lm will

open in China on June 8. (AP)

Polanski Malone

WARSAW/KRAKOW, Poland: Poland intends to extradite fi lmmaker Roman Polanski to the United States over a 1977 child sex conviction if the supreme court approves the move, the justice minister said on Wednesday, in a new twist to a decades-long legal battle.

Zbigniew Ziobro, who also serves as Poland’s prosecutor general, said on Tuesday he would appeal to the supreme court against an earlier court decision not to extradite the Polish-born Oscar-winning fi lmmaker.

“If the (supreme court) appeal is upheld, I will give an approving decision,” Ziobro told a news conference, adding that he would await the ruling “respectfully”.

As justice minister, Ziobro would have the fi nal say on extradition. Polanski, 82, often visits Poland and has an apartment in the southern Polish city of Krakow but he lives mostly in France, so it is unclear how Warsaw would be able to extradite him unless he returned voluntarily.

The United States requested Polanski’s extradition from Poland after he made a high-profi le appearance in Warsaw in 2014. A Polish court rejected the request last October and the prosecutor’s offi ce initially said it would not appeal that deci-sion. (RTRS)

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LOS ANGELES: Jena Malone has an-nounced the birth of her son.

Malone has posted a picture of her and boyfriend Ethan DeLorenzo with baby Ode Mountain DeLorenzo Malone on Instagram. In the caption she writes, “What an incredible blessing to be chosen by this amazing, kind, gentle and beautiful soul to be his parents.”

She doesn’t say when the baby was born, but mentions “The best weekend of our lives!!!”

Malone is best known for her role as Johanna Mason in “The Hunger Games” series. She starred in “Lovesong” earlier

Variety

Indian Bollywood actors John Abraham (second right), and Varun Dhawan (left), and Sri Lankan Bollywood actress Jacqueline Fernandez pose for a pho-tograph during a promotional event for the forthcoming Hindi fi lm ‘Dishoom’

directed by Rohit Dhawan in Mumbai on June 1. (AFP)

this year. (AP)❑ ❑ ❑

NEW ORLEANS: Lawyers for a man charged with second-degree murder in the shooting death of retired New Orleans Saints star Will Smith asked a judge

Wednesday to give them a police report that doesn’t omit the names of witnesses.

Lawyers for Cardell Hayes say they are entitled to the witness identities and that the report has been redacted to the point that it’s diffi cult to understand. Prosecutors say

they are worried about the safety of wit-nesses whose names are made public.

State District Judge Camille Buras said she wanted to read the police report before deciding whether to release it. It wasn’t clear when she would make her decision.

Police have said the shooting April 9 occurred after Hayes’s Hummer hit Smith’s Mercedes SUV from behind and they got into an argument. (AP)

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LOS ANGELES: “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows” should unseat “X-Men: Apocalypse” from the top spot on the box offi ce charts this weekend when it debuts to roughly $37 million.

However, the fi lm is the latest sequel to struggle to match the performance of its predecessor. The return of the pizza-munching, martial arts-wielding reptiles is on pace to open to just half of what 2014’s “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” made during its fi rst weekend in theaters.

Hollywood is fond of the franchise business, believing that sequels are easier to market and carry less risk than original productions. But go back to the trough too many times, and a studio can risk audience fatigue. This summer has been particularly brutal for follow-ups. “Alice Through the Looking Glass” fl opped, “Neighbors 2: So-rority Rising” stumbled, and even the latest “X-Men” fell about 30% short of “Days of Future Past’s” monster opening. (RTRS)

Heroes in half shell back

More halfhearted fun in ‘Turtles’LOS ANGELES, June 2, (RTRS): The heroes in a half shell return for more halfhearted fun in “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows.” Every bit as noisy, brain-numbing and lowbrow as its predecessor, the Michael Bay production never strays from basic blockbuster formula. It’s fast food en-tertainment destined for a short run atop the box offi ce charts and an even shorter lifespan in the pop culture zeitgeist.

Although the franchise has remained active in animation and video games through the years, the heroic quartet named after famed Renaissance paint-ers — Leonardo, Raphael, Donatello and Michelangelo — went dormant in live action fi lms for two decades, until 2014’s “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” resurrected the phenomenon. At the time, some longtime fans took issue with reinventing the turtles as motion capture-animated heroes, especially in the con-text of a sleek, soulless, steel-crushing action extravaganza a la Bay’s “Trans-formers” productions. But worldwide audiences didn’t seem to mind one bit, and the fi lm brought in just under half a billion in global grosses.

ChangesEven with that success, a few (argu-

ably) notable changes were made for the follow-up. Director Dave Green (a rela-tive newcomer whose only feature credit is the family sci-fi pic “Earth to Echo”) assumes helming duties from Jonathan Liebesman, the roles of villain Shredder and his henchwoman Karai have been re-cast (with Brian Tee and Brittany Ishiba-shi, respectively) and Johnny Knoxville no longer voices Leonardo (the duties are assumed by his mo-cap portrayer Pete Ploszek, with Noel Fisher, Jeremy Howard and Alan Ritchson back as Mi-chelangelo, Donatello and Raphael). Not that any of it matters much when visual spectacle still takes precedence over coherent plotting, and the human char-acters retain all the gravitas of generic placeholders who accidentally made it into the shooting script.

The basics of the plot — a term that

can only be used very loosely — go something like this: Shredder enlists the help of nerdy mad scientist Baxter Stock-man (Tyler Perry, trying to have fun and getting nowhere) to open up a portal to another dimension, where the nefarious mutant blob Krang (voiced by Brad Gar-rett) plots to escape and take over Earth. But enterprising journalist April O’Neil (Megan Fox, seemingly even more dis-interested than before) catches on and alerts our turtle heroes to fi ght back.

Unfortunately, even after they saved the city in the last fi lm, the turtles are resigned to living a secret life in the sewers, and April’s wisecracking cam-eraman Vern (Will Arnett, the most dig-nifi ed human here) becomes the public face of their actions. Still, they’re vis-ible enough that they catch the eye of aspiring detective Casey Jones (Stephen Amell, nothing but sarcasm) and eventu-ally police chief Rebecca Vincent (Laura Linney, who must have lost one hell of a bet).

ExcuseBut really, everything that happens in

the movie is just an excuse to pile one CGI setpiece on top of another. Audi-ences will see cars fl ying through the air, turtles skydiving and an alien invasion cribbed directly from “The Avengers” playbook. And they will meet additional cartoony foes including the moronic mu-tant lackies Bebop (Gary Anthony Wil-liams) and Rocksteady (wrestler Stephen “Sheamus” Farrelly).

The turtles are even more central this time than they were in the last fi lm, as the humans become deserved after-thoughts to their brotherly squabbling and bonding. And yet the screenplay by returning writers Josh Appelbaum and Andre Nemec still does little to fl esh out the basic personalities that turned these unlikely superheroes into endur-ing icons (their roots in alternative com-ics having long ago been bowdlerized by their success as a commercial enter-prise).

Anyone left unimpressed by the sur-face-level shenanigans typical of Bay in

the previous fi lm won’t fi nd anything to change their minds here. The technical contributions are as slick and shallow as any random “Transformers” entry, and the obnoxious soundtrack especially grates as it veers between cacophonous explosions, shrill line deliveries and thuddingly predictable song selections from Edwin Starr’s “War” to Wreckx-n-Effect’s “Rump Shaker.”

Also:LOS ANGELES: Composer Thomas Newman laughs when recalling an email he received from producer Lindsey Col-lins three years ago, asking him to con-sider scoring a movie she and director Andrew Stanton were working on. “It’s about a fi sh,” she wrote.

Newman took the job. After all, his fi rst collaboration with Stanton, “Find-ing Nemo,” hooked them three Oscar nominations. Another four noms came for their work on 2008’s “Wall-E.” Both pictures earned Stanton the Oscar for best animated feature.

The pair reunited for Disney/Pixar se-quel “Finding Dory,” set for release June 17. Stanton can be forgiven if he waxes poetic about the composer.

“He’s the De Niro to my Scorsese. He’s my muse,” Stanton says, during a break in recording Newman’s 83-piece orchestra at the Sony scoring stage. While writing “Nemo,” Stanton listened only to the scores of his collaborator, who had also worked on such fi lms as “American Beauty” and “The Shaw-shank Redemption.”

“I knew what his music would do in spots that might seem innocuous or be-nign on the page. ... There are complexi-ties of emotion that can only be captured and expressed with music.”

Stanton says Newman has brought a maturity to his projects. “While other musicians have about four or fi ve fl a-vors, he can just keep fi nding shadings within shadings.”

Some of the characters from “Nemo” return to the new fi lm, but don’t expect the “Dory” score to be a rehash of the 2003 original.

Actors share H’wood story

Travolta and Lowe onsecret of long careersLOS ANGELES, June 2, (RTRS): When John Travolta sat down with Rob Lowe at Variety’s “Actors on Actors” studio, they bonded im-mediately. It wasn’t just about their impressively long careers, though they did swap tales about the pitfalls they’ve faced throughout. Or their ability to transition from television to fi lm and back again. But Lowe stunned Travolta (and the audience) with his tale of being disappointed at missing out on the role of Chris-tian Troy in “Nip/Tuck” — and confronting Ryan Murphy. When he fi nally met the producer, Lowe said Murphy told him, “Rob, don’t you know I wrote that part for you?” But the script never made its way to the actor, because, as Lowe recalled, Murphy was “not Ryan Murphy yet,” he said. “Isn’t that a great Hol-lywood story?”

John Travolta: What I fi nd the most interesting, is that whether you are doing a dramatic character or a humorous character you always ap-proach it with a sense of humor. So I want to know who in your family or who you were brought up with that infl uenced you with comedy? Because you’re clearly a genius with that.

Rob Lowe: Thank you, and I would say the same about you. I was infl uenced as a kid by watching early “Saturday Night Live.” I must have been about 11, 12 or 13 when it came out and I was obsessed with it. I think I know more about early “SNL” than probably the people who were actually on it.

Travolta: It’s your timing, I think, with your sense of humor. Be-cause people have a sense of humor, but they don’t always have a sense of timing.

Lowe: You’re born with it or you’re not, I think.

Travolta: I agree with that. Was there any personal situation in your family that incited comedy as well or did you purely get it from outside sources?

“I think we are character actors trapped in leading man bodies.”

Lowe: I think you’re born with it. But my mom and dad are certainly really articulate.

Travolta: Were they funny?Lowe: I would say they were non-

professionally funny. I didn’t grow up in a house where comedy was really appreciated. It’s one of the things I think frankly I discovered in those sort of lonely teenage years, I found that I liked comedy.

Travolta: Well, you’re really good at it. Even in your portrayal in “Behind the Candelabra,” there’s humor in that, too. By the time you say, “Lee won’t like it,” when Matt wants to have a dimple, you’re warn-ing him that it might be a problem.

Lowe: He wanted your dimple, clearly.

Travolta: And “The Grinder” even proves that because that char-acter, my God! It’s so original, but I think it’s your take on it, too. Be-cause only an actor would know what it’s like to want to stay in char-acter. We all know that if you win at something, you get stuck in that win. And your character got stuck in the win of being a lawyer.

Lowe: Totally.Travolta: So now, what’s he go-

ing to do when he goes back home to his hometown and he’s suddenly pretending he’s a lawyer? But in a psychotic, hilarious way. It’s so clever and original, but only some-body with your timing could do that.

Lowe: I want to shift to you, my good friend. Because there is no one like you. From the very beginning I have been a fan and your work speaks to the living of my life. I can remember my fi rst love, our fi rst date was “Grease.” I can remember the fi rst time I watched a show that wasn’t on black-and-white televi-sion was “Welcome Back Kotter.” I can remember getting into European fi lm through “Blow Out.” I can re-member going out and buying cow-boy boots after “Urban Cowboy.” And on and on and on. And then as I became an actor, watching you navi-gate the seasons that we’re all going to have if we are lucky enough and talented enough to survive, that’s been the greatest inspiration for me, above and beyond your work, your ability to do that.

Travolta: I appreciate it because unbeknownst to many, my purpose in life is to inspire other people. If I inspire Rob Lowe to have the kind of career you’re having, so be it. Be-cause that is what I intended to do, is to make people be excited about creat-ing characters, music, dance, whatever they felt their passion was. I wanted to instill a bright light for them.

Lowe: Not only have you done it but acting to me, there are just cer-tain tools that you need in the tool-box. And one of the ones that you have that I love and I try to steal whenever I can — and I love that you mentioned “Behind the Cande-labra,” because that is one where I knowingly stole from the Travolta toolbox — is you have no fear of taking a big swing.

Travolta: As a matter of fact, if I don’t take a big swing or if I don’t do something that is brave, I almost am more frightened of that. The bigger the challenge and the more distant the character is from who I am, the more excited I get and the more at ease I get. So it’s almost a reversal of what people think. The truth for me is I’m being much more brave if you ask me to play myself because I don’t know who I am.

Lowe: I totally relate to that.Travolta: Do you?Lowe: It’s freeing to play “a char-

acter” in quotes. And I think one of the reasons that we’ve always been so simpatico, although we’ve never worked together over the years, is I think we are character actors trapped in leading man bodies.

Travolta: Completely! I have never overtly rejected the leading man concept, but I have always tried to twist leading men into charac-ters, because I am more comfortable playing a character than I am playing a standard role. I mean, I don’t even know what or who to compare that to, meaning what a classic leading man might be.

Lowe: It’s funny because the guys who were my heroes in terms of leading men growing up ironical-ly didn’t do that. Redford didn’t do it, Newman didn’t do it. They were leading men. Look at “Face/Off.” What you’re doing with that, when you’re doing Nic and Nic’s doing you, it’s unbelievable!

Travolta: I actually asked Nic during the shooting, “Do you think this is going to work?” and he said, “Yeah, I do.” It was tricky but be-cause John Woo was such a great director and was so clever in the way he shot things, we really did get away with being each other by watching each other’s dailies, by de-ciding collectively as partners what we would be. I remember giving him ideas of how I would do it and he would give me ideas of how he would do it. We would perform for each other, get hysterical over the choices and then go out and do them.

Lowe: That’s another thing, the joy. I have worked with a lot of ac-tors that I don’t feel any joy from.

Travolta: That’s too bad.Lowe: But I get that you laughed

your ass off. Whenever I watch something that moves me, I imagine that when they yell, “Cut!” those ac-tors fall around the set.

Travolta: Absolutely. The O.J. series, there were times where the Shapiro character was so unusual to me and my sensibilities that when my take was over I would have to laugh and so would the actors around me.

Lowe: That’s the most fun. When I do “The Grinder,” which opens up with a version of “The Grinder” TV show, it’s like being stuck on a hor-rendous hit primetime drama. And it makes you laugh out loud because it feel so real. It feels like that show could be a show that could be on TV.

Travolta: You and I both know how painful it is for some people to be on a drama for 10 years where they’re working 18 hours a day and to be in that zone, what you created was the reality of that.

“I’m being much more brave if you ask me to play myself because I don’t know who I am.”

Lowe: And the storytelling of “and that’s when I realized that the presi-dent was an alien!” Those poor actors that have to do it — my heart goes out them. But your Shapiro, that’s my fa-vorite show. It’s everything to me, it ticks so many boxes. It ticks the great actors who you love to see and want to see. You are doing an extraordinarily brave, again a big swing, which you have a knack for. You have a knack for standing out in anything you’re in, in a way that is unique to you. One of the things I also like about you is you come from television, went into mov-ies and now you’re in television. You follow the work wherever it’s good. What brought you back to television right now?

Travolta: There’s nothing new to the idea that television is taking over in a certain area that movies recently left off. And I personally believe that has to do with there’s more freedom interestingly enough in television than in movies right now. You can do more, and writers and directors are much more attracted to freedoms than they are to barriers. Television offers us freedom. So, whether it’s “Mad Men” or “Oz,” we’re taking bold and brave steps to the televi-sion-viewing audience. It’s been an evolution and almost a crescendo of these great pieces of material that are on television. I was enlightened by the magnitude that [executive pro-ducers] Ryan Murphy, Nina Jacob-son and Brad Simpson were on the frontlines of that. I was scared of it, to be honest, because I never wanted to be part of a guilty joy. That would not be my style at all. I wanted to make sure that there were other mes-sages that we were doing here. Now I feel a little more understanding of the situation that the family was in, the legal system, the judicial system.

Film