HBO’s Strategy for Controversial AIDS Film

At HBO, which prides itself on tackling controversial subjects, making a movie of Randy Shilts’ landmark book, “And the Band Played On,” proved tougher than anyone expected.

First came the four-year task of translating the exhaustive, politically charged work on the early years of the AIDS crisis into a commercial film. Then, some 18 drafts of the screenplay later, came a very public feud with director Roger Spottiswoode, who accused the pay cable service of “sanitizing” and “trashing” his effort.

Now, with the movie set to premiere Sept. 11, HBO is trying to turn public opinion in its favor by screening a rough cut for influential AIDS activists.

Leaders of 17 major AIDS groups, including the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, AIDS Project Los Angeles and the American Foundation for AIDS Research, were shown “And the Band Played On” this week, along with reporters from major publications.

The strategy could have backfired if the film had been judged a dud. But a relieved HBO reports that the response was mostly favorable, which is supported by those who attended the screenings.

Lee Werbel, executive director of GLAAD/L.A., calls the $8.5-million movie “very positive and very powerful” and “as true to that huge book as you could get in two hours.”

Dr. Mervyn Silverman, a subject of the book and the film as the former director of health in San Francisco, says the HBO work accurately captures the early AIDS years. “I think it’s a very interesting condensation of a very complex and controversial period in medical and social history,” says Silverman, now president of AMFAR. “As with anything, a certain amount of license is taken. But as a chronicle of what went on . . . it’s there.”

“And the Band Played On,” starring Matthew Modine and Richard Gere, is an ambitious effort to turn the events surrounding the AIDS crisis into mainstream entertainment. The negative publicity started building a month ago, when Spottiswoode, the respected director of “Under Fire” and “Shoot to Kill,” complained that he had been banned from the editing room as part of a conspiracy to tone down the content of the film.

Robert Cooper, senior vice president of HBO Pictures, concedes that post-Spottiswoode footage was added, but denies that there was any sanitizing of the subject matter. He and other HBO executives saw the rough-cut screenings as the best way to make their case.

“We felt it could not be judged as politically diluted,” Cooper said. “We go after every constituency you can think of. But there were too many questions that were simple to answer with a screening. So we thought, let’s go out there and let the chips fall where they may.”

Cooper already had one important advocate in his corner. Just a week earlier, he had shown “And the Band Played On” to Shilts in San Francisco, and the book’s author gave the production his blessing after having criticized some early drafts of the script.

Now that “And the Band Played On” has cleared its first critical hurdle, HBO, a division of media giant Time Warner Inc., plans to roll it out in a big way.

The completed version of the film will be screened for the press next month. On Aug. 14, HBO Chairman Michael Fuchs will show it to influential friends in New York’s fashionable East Hampton. From there, it gets glitzy premieres in Los Angeles and at Washington’s Kennedy Center.

*

Drive, She Said: Cars are also in the news, with revelations that Paramount Pictures Chairwoman Sherry Lansing rewarded the creative team behind “The Firm” with Mercedes-Benzes.

Lansing says she plans to give gifts routinely to Paramount’s biggest contributors as part of a plan to build team spirit at the studio, which has had major turnover.

“When we have a relationship with somebody who’s done extra things for the company over a long period of time, we believe in telling them how special they are to us,” she says. “We want them to be a part of the family for life.”

Mercedes brochures redeemable for one car were handed out to actor Tom Cruise, director Sydney Pollack and producer Scott Rudin last week. Another “Firm” producer, John Davis, was offered a car but he opted for a contribution to his favorite charity, the Fulfillment Fund, which sends disadvantaged kids to college.

Before that, the studio sent director Philip Noyce to Jamaica for meeting his completion deadline on “Sliver.” They also paid for him to come back, despite the film’s disappointing results.

How the gilded-set giveaways will play with the public is debatable. While extravagant gift giving is a Hollywood tradition, it’s not usually a matter of broad corporate policy. People considered it a big deal, for instance, when Warner Bros. gave Range Rovers to the creative team behind “Lethal Weapon 3” last year.

Lansing may also have a tough time convincing the world that someone such as Cruise, paid a reported $12 million plus a profit percentage for “The Firm,” needs any more thanks.

But others point out that the $400,000 reportedly shelled out for the luxury cars is chump change against the millions in profits that Paramount will reap from the “The Firm,” which has already grossed $45.5 million after just six days in release.