Company Town : PentAmerica’s Nunnari Rolls Dice Again

In Hollywood they casually refer to him as “Johnny.” But Gianni Nunnari, president of PentAmerica Pictures, hardly strikes you as someone who’s bent on becoming Americanized.

He speaks in heavily accented English and is surrounded by fellow Italians most of the time. He also seems genuinely mystified by some of the local customs. Take those of the film community, which rolled out the red carpet for Nunnari, only to pull it out from under him.

Nunnari’s problems began shortly after he arrived three years ago, flush with cash from Italy’s Berlusconi and Cecchi Gori media families and hoping to establish a beachhead here.

Smelling easy prey, a deal-starved Hollywood sold him on a series of projects that everyone else had rejected, such as “Folks!” and “Man Trouble.” Then PentAmerica signed an ill-advised distribution deal with 20th Century Fox. By the time Nunnari caught his breath, he had run through an estimated $100 million and was fighting a reputation as a patsy.

“We knew it wouldn’t be easy,” Nunnari says, sitting in a suite of offices overlooking Los Angeles’ trendy Westside. “But when you sit at the table, you have to play.”

Now Nunnari, who looks like actor Robert De Niro on a very bad hair day, hopes for redemption. The last of his fully financed productions, “House of Cards,” opens today in Los Angeles and New York, before expanding to 18 other major cities July 2.

The Kathleen Turner film has a troubled reputation after sitting on the shelf for two years, but it also has the marketing savvy of Miramax Films behind it. While no one’s talking big bucks, Miramax hopes the movie will at least play to women and families. The feature release is also intended to spur all-important video rental business.

After that comes “A Bronx Tale,” which PentAmerica co-financed with Savoy Pictures. The $22-million movie, marking De Niro’s directing debut, has gotten high scores at test screenings, sources say. (PentAmerica also helped finance an earlier De Niro movie called “Night and the City.”) Further down the road is “Snake Eyes,” which stars Madonna, in conjunction with MGM. PentAmerica also has European rights on “North,” an upcoming Castle Rock Entertainment film.

Nunnari, 33, knows he could find himself back in Rome if things don’t start to click. The deal between the Berlusconis and Cecchi Goris ends next June, and there have been conflicting reports that the Berlusconis may pull out. Nunnari says even he doesn’t know the answer. “It’s really hard to follow what’s going on in Italy from here,” he says. “You never know.”

Losing PentAmerica would be a blow to Hollywood, which is heavily dependent on outside investment despite its often predatory treatment of newcomers. Japanese companies own two of the six major studios, and London-based Polygram has become a big independent movie maker.

Italian, French and German media firms provide key financing for companies such as Carolco Pictures and New Regency, and the French bank Credit Lyonnais has outright ownership of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Some of those investors have paid dearly for their Hollywood habits. Credit Lyonnais is said to be losing as much as $1 million a day on MGM, which it inherited after financier Giancarlo Parretti defaulted on loans, and Canal Plus has poured millions into troubled Carolco. At PentAmerica, executives have moved to cut their losses a bit more quickly.

Nunnari is no longer fully financing films. He is also operating on a picture-by-picture basis now, after initially announcing plans to finance as many as six major films a year for the international market, and to supply the Berlusconi and Cecchi Gori pipelines.

At the same time, Nunnari is doing some repair work on his own reputation. In his early years in Hollywood, he was known for having a hard time adhering to Hollywood’s manic work habits. On one occasion he missed an 11 a.m. appointment with the excuse that he had overslept.

But Nunnari and his colleagues insist that he’s actually burning the midnight oil now. If he harbors any resentment against Hollywood over his rocky tenure, he refuses to say so.

“Everyone learns lessons in business,” he says philosophically. “That’s not just true of Hollywood. I’ve been treated like everyone else.”

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They Said, We Said: One of the great non-events of 1993 is over. Columbia Pictures has decided against a threatened boycott of the Los Angeles Times. The studio had objected to a story that appeared in Sunday Calendar several weeks ago. The dispute concerned whether an unsuccessful screening in Pasadena of “Last Action Hero,” the costly Arnold Schwarzenegger film, actually took place.

In a letter to The Times last week, Columbia denied the screening occurred and demanded that the reporter be banned from future coverage of the studio. The newspaper refused to go along. After meeting with Times editors this week, Columbia said it was withdrawing its demand.

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Talk Is Cheap: If you’re tired of all the dialogue cluttering today’s films, then “Baraka” may be for you. The 70-millimeter feature, shot in 24 countries, is described as a graphic study of Earth’s evolution and man’s impact on the environment. It features plenty of music, but not one spoken word. The film, produced by Mark Magidson and directed by Ron Fricke, is being distributed by Samuel Goldwyn Co. and will open in September.