Star Turns From the Vaults of PBS

Nearly a decade before “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” transformed him into a superstar, Robert Redford got his first big break in 1960 starring opposite Jason Robards in the acclaimed four-hour, public-TV version of Eugene O’Neill’s “The Iceman Cometh,” which was directed by Sidney Lumet.

And he’s not the only famous face who graced the small screen in classical drama before hitting it big. Dustin Hoffman, Kevin Kline, Meryl Streep, John Lithgow and Glenn Close all starred on PBS in theatrical adaptations early in their careers.

Thanks to the Broadway Theatre Archive, “Iceman Cometh” and 69 other dramas that were produced by PBS’ WNET-TV in New York are now available on video ($40 each). They include Lithgow and Streep in “Secret Service” from 1977; Faye Dunaway in “Hogan’s Goat” from 1971 and Dustin Hoffman re-creating his off-Broadway role in 1966’s “Journey of the Fifth House.”

Over the next two years, Broadway Theatre Archive plans to release a total of 300 digitally restored adaptations of plays from PBS’ “Great Performances,” “Theatre in America” and “Hollywood Television Theatre,” and such commercial network series as “Hallmark Hall of Fame” and “Dupont Show of the Month.”

“We have been working on this for four years,” says Basil Hero, president and chief executive of Broadway Digital Entertainment, parent company of the Broadway Theatre Archive.

“I have always been surprised that Broadway, in particular, has never successfully made the leap to television. The only way it did was through staging original productions for television. I was curious what that body of work was.”

So Hero checked out several shows at the Museum of Television & Radio in New York and also talked to an expert on the performing arts in television at Lincoln Center. He learned there was an “extraordinary body of work out there that people have just forgotten about.”

“The more research I did,” Hero said, “the more I realized that a lot of these prints were in danger of deterioration. No one thought to amass the category and bring it under one roof with the purpose of preserving it digitally and reintroducing it to the public.”

But there were many copyright obstacles he had to overcome. “We sat down with the best copyright lawyers in the country and said, ‘Let’s attack this en masse as a category, and see if we can’t get favored-nations status from the writers and the unions and the entire artistic community.’ They cooperated.”

After obtaining material from the three major commercial networks, Hero went to KCET in Los Angeles and WNET in New York. “They were sitting on three or four of the greatest libraries,” Hero says. “KCET had ‘Hollywood Television Theatre,’ and WNET had all the ‘Great Performances,’ ‘Theatre in America’ and ‘WNET Playhouse.’ We then acquired all the rights to KCET and WNET products.” They’ll share in the profits.

The Broadway Theatre Archive spent the next 18 months restoring the 70 WNET titles and clearing the rights with the authors. Another 30 titles will soon be cleared and available by year’s end.

Among the KCET-produced titles slated for release within the next year are “Birdbath,” “The Andersonville Trial,” “Steambath” and “The Chicago Conspiracy Trial.”

Hero hopes to have all 300 titles restored, cleared and available by 2002, including such vintage network fare as 1959’s “The Moon and the Sixpence,” starring Laurence Olivier; “The Glass Menagerie,” with Hal Holbrook and Shirley Booth; “Hedda Gabler,” starring Ingrid Bergman; and “Little Women,” with Florence Henderson. Copies of all 300 eventually will be donated to the Museum of Television & Radio too.

The videos--and a catalog of current titles--are available at https://www.broadwayarchive.com, or call (800) 422-2827.

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New to DVD is Paramount’s “The Talented Mr. Ripley” ($30), Anthony Minghella’s well-crafted psychological thriller based on Patricia Highsmith’s novel. Set in Italy in 1959, the mystery stars Matt Damon as a poor young psycho who insinuates himself in the life of a rich playboy (Jude Law). Gwyneth Paltrow, Cate Blanchett and Philip Seymour Hoffman also star.

The digital version includes a beautiful wide-screen transfer, two music videos, two trailers, a better-than-average documentary and cast and crew interviews.

Another featurette examines how Minghella chose to use classical music and jazz to tell the story of Ripley. Damon spent two months learning the piano, and Law spent several weeks learning the sax for his part

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The body count climbs ever higher in “Scream 3” (Dimension, $30), the supposedly final installment in the popular suspense-thriller-horror-comedy franchise from director Wes Craven. Back from the first two are David Arquette, Courteney Cox Arquette, Neve Campbell and Liev Schreiber, along with Parker Posey, Patrick Dempsey and Scott Foley.

The digital edition includes some very funny outtakes with commentary from Craven and other crew members, plus a less effective alternative ending and other deleted scenes, including two versions of the opening.