It was Arnold Schwarzenegger’s day, but Ellen DeGeneres nearly stole the show at ShoWest ’97 in Las Vegas Wednesday. At a luncheon thrown by Warner Bros. to promote their summer and fall movies, Schwarzenegger was on hand to receive the first ever Humanitarian Award for his work with Special Olympics and the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles. Accepting the award, he announced to a dais of film bosses and stars, “they’ve made a movie about Hollywood dedicated to all the executives up here. It’s called Liar, Liar.”
However, it was off-the-cuff remarks from DeGeneres, hawking her new film Goodbye Lover, that had the crowd of theater owners and distributors buzzing. “Are you sick of me yet?” she asked, alluding to non-stop coverage of her character on Ellen coming out. “I’m even sick of me. And I’m sitting down there next to Jonathan Taylor Thomas who keeps hitting on me. He has no idea.”
Comedians Robin Williams and Billy Crystal–hyping their Father’s Day–drew big laughs with a typically manic dialogue, there’s no denying it’s Batman’s year at Warner Bros. The Batmobile greeted luncheon visitors, and new Batman George Clooney, Schwarzenegger (who jokingly called the film Batman and Arnold), Alicia Silverstone, Uma Thurman and Chris O’Donnell were all present. While introducing the cast, director Joel Schumacher quipped that “Uma’s costume comes in an aspirin box.” Then came the film clips, with only Batman and Robin and Conspiracy Theory drawing the same enthusiastic reactions that many Sony films received yesterday.
The feeling was equally somber last night after the Twentieth Century Fox presentation. Shunning big-budget summer movies Speed 2 and Alien Resurrection, Fox focused instead on the animated Anastasia. After the trailer was shown and some musical numbers performed in a specially constructed ice rink in a tent in the Bally’s parking lot, some attendees said the film lacked the magic that Disney’s cartoon hits are known for.
While Fox eschewed A-list celebs, Warner Bros. had no shortage. In addition to the talent already mentioned, Matthew Broderick, Meg Ryan, Steven Seagal, Julia Roberts, Mel Gibson, Kevin Spacey, Danny DeVito, Kim Basinger, Dustin Hoffman, Angela Bassett, James Woods and Jodie Foster also appeared.
Paramount makes its pitch tonight, and ShoWest wraps up Thursday with a televised awards ceremony.
Source: E! Online
Author: Ken Neville