‘Autumn’ in Summer and Other Contrarian Bets

Older man, younger woman--anyone who’s seen a Sean Connery or a Robert Redford movie in the last 10 years is familiar with that scenario, so that won’t set MGM’s “Autumn in New York” apart from the pack. MGM is hoping that the glossy drama, which stars Richard Gere and Winona Ryder and opens Friday, will draw viewers simply because it’s the only heart-stirring romance of the summer. Strangely, studio marketers are employing a tactic with this big-star vehicle that is usually only reserved for schlocky movies, often in the teen horror genre: They are not screening the film for critics until the day it opens. Part of the strategy, sources say, has to do with the plot of the movie, which studio marketers believe will work better for viewers if they don’t have any inkling of what’s coming. Gere plays a hot-shot chef with a string of restaurants who has always been a ladies’ man. Then he meets Ryder, a young hat designer, and falls for her, hard. But in this relationship, there is trouble ahead. Will that prove troubling at the box office? MGM executives insist that the studio, whose chairman, Alex Yemenidjian, and vice chairman, Chris McGurk, have been in place for just over a year, is not dumping the movie but is spending upward of $20 million on prints and advertising to open it. They point to a raft of pricey 60-second spots that are already running on TV (such trailers usually run 15 seconds). One source acknowledged that this critic-less release is almost never done for a movie with this kind of celebrity wattage. “But that doesn’t mean it can’t be done. We’re not lemmings here. We’re not following the pack. . . . We trust audiences will make up their own minds. It’s a real romantic movie and we want them to not know what it’s about when they come.”

Another Look at Concert Security Fears

Pearl Jam, still reeling from the deaths of nine fans trampled at a Denmark show, will try this week to close that tragic chapter of their career, but for the music industry as a whole, the issue of concert dangers remains an ongoing story. Danish police investigators will travel to Florida this week to interview Pearl Jam--which has launched its U.S. tour after canceling the balance of its European dates following the tragedy--about the June 30 incident at the Roskilde Music Festival. Danish authorities say they are trying only to learn lessons now--a stance shared by the rock group. “We feel strongly that all aspects that may have contributed to the deaths and injuries at the festival be identified and examined from every angle,” the band said in a statement. Still, observers such as Paul Wertheimer, a crowd safety consultant in Chicago, say that tragedies spurred by overcrowding, mosh pits and festival seating are an uncomfortable topic to the concert industry as a whole. “There’s a complete hush,” says Wertheimer, who runs a Web site, https://www.crowdsafe.com, dedicated to the issue. “And things seem to be getting worse.” In the past week and a half, five people were injured at a No Doubt concert in Arizona, where several thousand fans rushed the stage, and a stabbing took place at a Vans Warped Tour show in Florida. Wertheimer wants the U.S. concert industry to embrace standardized safety guidelines (the sort that have been in place for seven years in England), thin out festival-seating crowds and make incident reports public. Some veteran promoters say the most effective way to protect a crowd is to know it well. Kevin Lyman, an organizer of both the Watcha and Warped tours (the former kicks off Friday at Universal Amphitheatre, the latter wrapped up Sunday in Texas), says he seeks out staff and venues that have “a street-level mentality” to help them quickly recognize trouble and handle it in a measured way. (He says the Florida stabbing was the first major incident in the tour’s six-year history--”and it rips me up at night.”) Lyman says the Warped shows have multiple stages and 30-minute sets to circulate the crowd. “If some guy is leaning on you for 12 hours, you’re going to hit him. So we stir the pot.”

What Makes ‘Sammy’ Run After Many Delays?

In the dubious-achievement department, “Sammy,” an NBC comedy premiering Tuesday night, has laid claim to a title you won’t see in any “Must-See TV” promotions. According to network sources, the animated program has the distinction of being the lowest-testing pilot--in terms of reaction from focus groups--in NBC history. A semi-autobiographical premise from “Just Shoot Me’s” David Spade, the show focuses on the relationship between a rising TV star and his father (Spade does both voices) and has been ill-fated from the beginning. It was given a production go-ahead in March 1999, mere weeks before a management shift at NBC’s entertainment division. By the time the series arrived, enthusiasm for prime-time animation had cooled. Thanks to “Sammy’s” negative test scores and poor ratings for another NBC animated entry, “God, the Devil and Bob,” the 13 episodes have sat on the shelf for months. At one point, NBC officials intimated “Sammy” wouldn’t be broadcast at all, finally scheduling the show for July--hoping to recoup some of their investment--then pushing it back to August, when viewing levels traditionally wilt, with plans now to run just four episodes. All of which raises the question: If “Sammy” is really that much of a train wreck, aren’t you just a wee bit curious?

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--Compiled by Times staff writers