On Its Own Terms

Aurora Greenway (Shirley MacLaine) is tearing through the halls of a hospital again, barking commands and ignoring procedure, fueled by maternal instinct and driven by a whim of iron.

The last time Aurora upset the on-duty nurses this way was back in 1983, when, during the final third of “Terms of Endearment,” she maintained a fiercely loyal deathwatch over a daughter who was dying of cancer. Now, during one of the early scenes for a sequel--or, as the producers would prefer, a continuation--called “The Evening Star,” she’s prowling the intensive-care unit in search of her granddaughter, Melanie (Juliette Lewis), who has just botched a halfhearted suicide attempt.

Aurora is understandably distraught--she feels partially responsible for driving her granddaughter to despair--but that doesn’t keep her from seeking total control of the situation. And she’s more than a little miffed that Patsy (Miranda Richardson), her late daughter’s best friend and Aurora’s longtime rival for Melanie’s affection, has come along for the ride. As the two women jockey for position at Melanie’s bedside, they swap insults and catty comments.

Patsy: “Well, it was my house she came to, not yours.”

Aurora: “She must have assumed with your 40th birthday coming up, you’d have plenty of pills on hand.”

But then the women are interrupted by the onrush of other concerned loved ones. First there’s Bruce (Scott Wolf of TV’s “Party of Five”), Melanie’s no-account boyfriend. Then Teddy (Mackenzie Astin), Melanie’s brother. And on and on, until what started out as an intimate commingling of teary grief and bitchy one-upmanship evolves into something not unlike the stateroom scene in “A Night at the Opera.”

Which is just the sort of wild mood swing that writer-director Robert Harling is striving for.

“Cut!” Harling cries from his position behind the camera. “Great!”

And then he rushes over to his cast to give and receive suggestions to make the scene even better.

“The Evening Star,” which recently wrapped filming in Houston for a November release, is Harling’s first effort as a feature film director, the next logical step after his years of success as a playwright (“Steel Magnolias,” which he also adapted as a screenplay) and screenwriter (“Soapdish,” the upcoming “The First Wives Club”). Between camera setups in the shuttered hospital that has been taken over as a movie location, he concedes that, as a novice, he has a daunting task ahead of him.

“I think this movie has to be made for people who don’t know of ‘Terms of Endearment,’ ” Harling says. “It has to stand on its own terms, the story has to be its own thing.”

With a wan smile, however, he adds: “But it’s also based on one of the most beloved movies of all time. And I know that. A lot of my friends have said, ‘Isn’t it a little insane to make a sequel to “Terms of Endearment”?’ And I just say, ‘Well, lucky for me, I’m crazy.’ ”

Or, perhaps, “foolhardy.” That’s how Shirley MacLaine describes the enterprise, only half-jokingly, as she relaxes in her trailer, tending to the peroxided curls that are Aurora’s pride and joy.

“It’s extremely intimidating,” she says, “to take what turned out to be such a beloved example of family expression and interpersonal relationships--and then try to do it again.

“But I loved the idea of catching up with Aurora 10 or 15 years later. She’s my favorite character. And let’s face it: She is probably the best part I’ve ever had.”

MacLaine earned an Academy Award for playing Aurora Greenway, the frightfully self-assured grande dame of Houston’s ritzy River Oaks neighborhood, in “Terms.” The Oscar-winning comedy-drama--written and directed by James L. Brooks from a novel by Larry McMurtry--followed Aurora through two decades or so of a love-hate relationship with her equally strong-willed daughter, Emma (Debra Winger).

The movie ended with the two women coming to terms with each other shortly before cancer claimed Emma’s life. By the time Aurora and her latest lover, ex-astronaut Garrett Breedlove (Jack Nicholson), were assuming responsibility for Emma’s three small children, there wasn’t a dry eye in the house.

At the start of “The Evening Star,” also based on a McMurtry novel, however, it’s made clear very quickly that Aurora and her grandchildren haven’t lived happily ever after. (Garrett has long since flown the coop, in search of greener pastures and younger women.) One grandson is in jail for drug possession, another works as a tow truck driver to support his girlfriend and their child. And then there’s Melanie, the one who takes after her mother the most. Like her late mom, Melanie has an unfailing knack for choosing Mr. Wrong, and a deaf ear for any advice that Aurora might offer.

“Actually,” Juliette Lewis says with a giggle, “Melanie’s probably the most normal character I’ve played in a long time. I mean, sure, the whole family is dysfunctional. But, hey, nowadays, that’s normal, isn’t it?”

As she did in “Terms of Endearment,” Aurora seeks some respite from the messy chaos of her strained family ties by seeking romance. She finds what she is looking for--sort of--in Jerry Bruckner (Bill Paxton), a very attractive, and considerably younger, psychotherapist. But even this dalliance is not enough to distract Aurora for long from her self-appointed chores as the mother of all mothers.

“She expects so much from people,” MacLaine says, “that they can’t live up to it. And out of her expectations come her frustrations. And her judgments. And her behavior. I think that’s why a lot of people identified with Aurora. Because they’ve either known somebody like her--or they are like her.

“She has no built-in censor about what’s appropriate and what’s not. She just says what’s on her mind. That’s sort of like what I am. . . . But I find her imperious wit is something I don’t have the talent for. I have a bawdier wit. In that respect, I’m totally unlike her. I’d like to have that, her sense of royalty. But I really see myself as a commoner. There are things that I put up with that Aurora would never put up with.”

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Certainly, Aurora would not have waited in place for more than two years, as MacLaine did, while Brooks struggled to get “Terms of Endearment” green-lighted. During that period, MacLaine recalls, “every picture I thought about doing, Jim would know about. And he would come to me and say, ‘Nope, nope, nope--you’ve got to wait.’ It took him that long, and every studio in town turned him down. Twice.”

Indeed, MacLaine says, Brooks himself had occasional doubts about the mainstream appeal of a comedy that took such an abrupt detour into tragedy.

“I think more people than we realized at the time wanted to hear about the dilemma of cancer,” MacLaine says. “But I remember Jim was very concerned. He’d ask me, ‘Can we do a comedy and then make a 180-degree turn halfway or three-quarters of the way through, and have the daughter dying?’ And I had to admit, that was pretty audacious.”

Eventually, Paramount agreed to make “Terms,” albeit with a severely limited budget and shooting schedule. MacLaine recalls the actual production as a period of frayed nerves and sporadic outbursts.

“No blows were struck,” she insists, contradicting reports of an off-camera squabble between her and Winger. “But it was worse than you’ve heard. I didn’t tell all of it in my book. And nobody has, really, because nobody would believe it.”

Smiling her most enigmatic, Aurora-like smile, MacLaine adds: “And I’ll just leave it at that.”

After so much Sturm und Drang, it came as a stirring validation for the makers of “Terms” when the film proved to be a resounding financial success. Even so, when author McMurtry wrote a sequel to his original novel in 1992, it took almost as long for the second book to begin production as a movie.

It wasn’t that the original participants weren’t interested. MacLaine was eager to do it again. So were producers David Kirkpatrick and Polly Platt. Even Nicholson agreed, after extended contractual negotiations, to offer a brief reprise of his Oscar-winning supporting performance as Garrett Breedlove.

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The chief stumbling block, MacLaine says, was finding someone willing to direct the sequel.

“We went through four or five directors,” MacLaine says. “Frank Oz was going to direct at one point. Oz was on it, then Michael Ritchie was on it. Michael Hoffman [“Soapdish,” “Restoration”] was about to be, or seriously considering it. Lasse Hallstrom seriously considered it.

“But nobody could really get to the point where they felt they could traipse around in Larry McMurtry-Jim Brooks territory comfortably. Nobody except Bob.”

MacLaine and Harling had met when MacLaine co-starred in the film version of “Steel Magnolias.” They struck up a friendship that continued during all the many drafts of the “Evening Star” screenplay.

“Bob spent so much time on the script,” MacLaine says. “And he’s a Southerner. He’s not from Texas, mind you, but he is from Nacogdoches, La. So he understands the territory.

“And I noticed: Everything he said about the script when some other director would want him to change something would be a directorial statement. He knew what everyone should wear, he knew how the shots should be. He had already placed his camera, because he’d done so many versions of the script. He was thinking and talking like a director.

“So finally, one day, I just turned to everybody and said, ‘Why don’t we just use Bob? He wants to be a director, that’s his thing in life. And I’d be willing to do it with him. After all, the first time out was with a first-time director. Why not this time too?’ ”

If Harling feels any trepidation about going where more experienced directors preferred not to tread, he does a great job of hiding it. On the “Evening Star” set, he admits only to worrying about booby-traps that, as a screenwriter, he set for himself.

“I now have such new respect for the directors that I’ve worked with,” Harling says. “When you’re sitting there, where I live, right out the middle of cotton fields, and you’re writing a scene, you may get to a point where you’re a little conflicted about how this will end or where the transition will be--that sort of thing. And finally, you’ll just say, ‘Ah, they’ll figure it out.’

“Well, now, all of a sudden, I’m the guy who has to figure it out. It’s like I threw 200 boomerangs that are coming back to me.”

Harling fully appreciates that he has a tough act to follow, especially when it comes to striking the right balance of heart and humor. But he also realizes that many people who see his film will have never seen Brooks’ original.

“We’ve always treated this as a continuation [of “Terms”],” Harling said. “But the whole idea of picking up 15 years later after the first movie allows all of us--the audience, the cast members--to start out on the same foot. We’re telling fresh tales. We’re showing the characters at different points in their lives.”

Strictly speaking, it isn’t unprecedented for a sequel to continue a story 10 or 15 years later, with stars of the original film returning to reprise their lead performances. But when you gaze at the relatively small list of examples--”Texasville” (the 1990 follow-up to 1971’s “Last Picture Show”), “The Two Jakes” (the 1990 sequel to 1974’s “Chinatown”) and, of course, “A Man and a Woman: 20 Years Later”--you won’t find many movies that clicked with audiences or critics.

At first glance, the odds appear to be stacked even higher against “Evening Star,” if only because “Terms of Endearment”--winner of five Academy Awards, including best picture--arguably is even more popular today than it was a decade ago. For one thing, the movie has long enjoyed the status of a classic. (And classics, as the producers of “Scarlett” will tell you, are notoriously difficult to sequelize.) For another thing, “Terms” still is a highly visible staple of cable TV and video outlets.

Producer Polly Platt read recently that “ ‘Terms of Endearment’ every year is the one of the most rented videos during the period around Mother’s Day. So lots of people are still eager to see it again and again, even after all this time. It’s still fresh in their minds.”

Even so, Platt thinks this may work to the advantage of “Evening Star.”

“If people are still able to see it, they’re aware of it,” she says. In sharp contrast, “The Last Picture Show,” which she produced with her ex-husband, director Peter Bogdanovich, “had never been on video at the time that ‘Texasville’ came out. People didn’t have access to it, unless they wanted to see [an edited version] on television. Peter finally got it out on video, with scenes that had been cut out years ago. But by that time, it was too late to help ‘Texasville.’ ”

“Texasville,” like “Last Picture Show,” also was an adaptation of a novel by McMurtry, the author of “Terms of Endearment” and “Evening Star.” (McMurtry also has written two follow-ups to “Lonesome Dove,” demonstrating just how little he is fazed by the challenge of making lightning strike twice.) But the producers of “Evening Star” are quick to make an important distinction: Their “Evening Star” is a sequel to the movie written by Brooks, not the book written by McMurtry.

David Kirkpatrick explains: “When Jim [Brooks] adapted ‘Terms of Endearment,’ he made several changes in the book and added and deleted characters. Like the character that Jack Nicholson plays--Garrett Breedlove, the ex-astronaut--he wasn’t in McMurtry’s novel. Paramount had the rights to the material Jim wrote. And that’s one of the reasons why it behooved us to make the sequel with Paramount.”

Since Breedlove was not a part of McMurtry’s novel, the movie role hung entirely on Nicholson’s involvement. If Jack didn’t do it, no one would.

But judging from Nicholson’s recent four-day shoot in Houston--which happened to coincide with the Lakers’ games in town against the Rockets--it’s clear that even if the role is small, it’s not easily expendable. Nicholson’s Oscar-winning performance as Aurora’s most challenging suitor provided “Terms” with much of its comic relief, and it managed to show a sensual side of Aurora that otherwise would have gone unseen. The ex-astronaut seemed to be the only man capable of sending the tough widow into orbit. Fifteen years later, he still has that ability.

It’s a sunny but sad day when he suddenly lands back into her life. Sitting in her backyard gazebo, the same spot where Breedlove told her he couldn’t stay grounded to just one woman in “Terms,” Aurora is going over the memories she has of another loved one she just lost and trying to decide where to scatter the ashes. Out of the corner of her eye, she notices his shadow coming toward her. Breedlove is again there for her when she needs him.

“Oh, Garrett!” she screams, before wrapping her arms around him and stomping her feet in delight. “What are you doing in Houston?”

Sly smile intact, the now gray-haired astronaut takes the seat across from her.

“Apollo reunion,” he mumbles. “A bunch of old astronauts trying to fit into old space capsules--not a pretty sight.”

It’s not long before the two old friends are back in a convertible--this one a luxury car, though, not a Corvette--and flying along the beaches of nearby Galveston again. Despite her age and the struggles she has had to endure, Aurora isn’t too old to be a dreamer or a romantic, and this scene makes it clear it just takes an astronaut to get her there.

As Nicholson’s last day of shooting ended, relief seemed to cross the set. It wasn’t that the actor made the rest of the cast and crew nervous. On the contrary, he was the excitement everyone was looking for after months of shooting--a point made evident when they all gathered around monitors to watch playbacks of him and MacLaine in action.

It was just apparent this his scenes, which come toward the end of the film, symbolized a certain amount of closure for both the project and the story of Aurora. Whatever it took to get the movie made, it was more or less made right then and there, and now it was time to sit back and watch the two stars reprise their award-winning roles together.

However or wherever it has come together, MacLaine is grateful to be back in stride as Aurora Greenway.

“To me,” the actress says, “she is such a celebration of contradictions. She’s a family heroine--all she lives for is her family. And, of course, she wants to bend them to her will. But she’s also rarely wrong. And the sweep of the film is so broad, so deep, so comic and so dramatic. And so tragic. I’m really sorry she’s going to die in this.”

And then, flashing another smile, MacLaine adds: “But you know, with me, I could do her after death. . . . “

Chris Riemenschneider, a freelance writer based in Austin, Texas, contributed to this story.