MOVIESSmith Bites the Hand That Feeds HimTheatergoers...

MOVIES

Smith Bites the Hand That Feeds Him

Theatergoers watching Kevin Smith’s “Jay and Silent Bob Fight Back,” which opened Friday, will spot a few friendly swipes at Miramax/Dimension Films--the company that released it. The big boys went along with it, the director told the Washington Post, because it looks hip being in on the joke.

Jay to a drug dealer on an L.A. street: “Can you tell me how to get to Miramax?” Drug dealer: “[Expletive], yes! Miramax accounts for 78% of my business!”

Characters played by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck also take aim at some of the Miramax movies in which they’ve appeared, including “Good Will Hunting” and “Reindeer Games.” Still, Smith points out, even a good sport has his limits. Miramax co-chair Harvey Weinstein did ask that Smith take out two bits--one about the male frontal nudity in “The Crying Game” and “The Piano,” and another in which animals reenact scenes from films like “Shakespeare in Love.”

“Harvey called me and said, ‘What did I do to you?,”’ Smith recalls. “I said, ‘Well, you did drop my last picture.”’ “Fair enough,” Weinstein replied.

The picture in question was “Dogma,” which was picked up by Lions Gate Films. It turned out to be Smith’s most financially successful flick to date ($30 million in the U.S. and Canada).

Another inside joke on the “Silent Bob” front: a new Web site devoted to bashing the film--and its director--was actually set up by Smith’s company, View Askew.

“Anyone with a little Internet knowledge could have figured that [we] registered the site,” the Web site’s Ming Chen told USA Today. “The real geeks are going to find out who it was--we’ll see who’s got too much time on their hands.”

Exploiting a Classic, Kramer’s Widow Claims

Karen Kramer, widow of director Stanley Kramer, isn’t taking well to comparisons between Jerry Zucker’s “Rat Race” and her late husband’s 1963 madcap comedy, “It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World.”

She is not only the guardian of Stanley Kramer’s legacy, she explains, but she’s peddling her own sequel of the movie to MGM/UA--with several of the original stars attached.

“The sad truth is that Mr. Zucker tried to build a better mousetrap and failed--exploiting a brilliant classic that was the daddy of its kind to create an inferior, unauthorized imitation,” she told The Times. “If Stanley were alive today, he would have stood up for what was moral and ethical, which certainly is lacking in this situation. It’s a case of artist’s rights.”

Kramer was particularly riled by an ad in which “Rat Race” was referred to as a “Mad Mad Mad Mad Race”--a grievance addressed in a letter she received from Arthur Cohen, Paramount’s president of worldwide marketing. He assured her that there was no intent to capitalize on the Kramer film--and said that the quote in question, from a Time magazine critic, would be removed from future ads.

A Zucker quote in Wednesday’s Times added fuel to the flames. “In this movie, we have comic actors--not comedians--who have invested in their characters,” he said. “... The humor comes out of the story and acting as opposed to saying, ‘OK, now it’s time for Buddy Hackett to do his shtick.”’

Hackett was part of Kramer’s all-star cast, which included Jonathan Winters, Milton Berle, Phil Silvers, Buster Keaton, Ethel Merman, Mickey Rooney, Edie Adams and Sid Caesar.

“That movie was a cut above the comedy today, which is all about cursing and sex,” Caesar told The Times. “Far from being ‘shtick,’ it was rooted in character--not a bunch of jokes strung together.”

Adams, too, lashed out at the direction comedy has taken: “Those of us who have been in the business a year or two longer than Zucker know that most comics are great actors and very few great actors can do comedy. Perhaps he should have done a remake of [Zucker’s own] ‘Airplane!’ and put a whoopee cushion on each seat.”

Zucker says the idea for the film originated with Paramount chief Sherry Lansing. The goal was to do an “ensemble comedy chase movie,” along the lines of “Cannonball Run,” “Around the World in 80 Days” and the Kramer film, he said. Mimicking any one picture wasn’t part of the plan. And his comment about Hackett was a clumsy way of lauding his cast and writer--not tearing down what came before.

“I don’t like the comparisons either,” he told The Times. “Different situations, different characters. And I apologize 1,000 times for my statement. Hackett, Caesar ... they’re heroes of mine. It’s one thing to offend Mark Fuhrman--but these guys are the kings of comedy.”

RADIO

Union Supporting ‘Democracy’ Staff

The flagship station of the Pacifica radio show “Democracy Now!” is not a “safe and appropriate working environment,” the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists declared Thursday.

The program on the left-leaning Pacifica network airs weekday mornings on KPFK-FM (90.7), and normally originates from WBAI-FM in New York.

The show’s host, Amy Goodman, has maintained that threats and intimidation from WBAI managers forced her and her staff to begin broadcasting “Democracy Now!” from an off-site studio last week. Pacifica officials have not only refused to air what they call “unauthorized” broadcasts, but suspended the staff without pay until it returns to work at WBAI.

AFTRA had reached an agreement with Pacifica that the network would investigate Goodman’s allegations, during which the programs’ staff would return to work at the station. But AFTRA has now rescinded its recommendation, saying that subsequent incidents changed its view of the safety at WBAI.

Larry Drapkin, a Los Angeles-based labor lawyer for Pacifica, said AFTRA is free to file a grievance, but that the workers must return to the station in the meantime. Goodman, for her part, said she and her staff are fulfilling their responsibilities and won’t return to WBAI until their safety is ensured.

QUICK TAKES

Harrison Ford’s wife of 18 years has filed for legal separation, citing irreconcilable differences. Ford, 59, and his wife, screenwriter Melissa Mathison Ford, have been living apart since October 2000. She is seeking joint custody of their son, Malcolm, 14, and daughter, Georgia, 11, according to the Los Angeles Superior Court petition. (Ford has two adult sons by his first wife Mary Marquardt, whom he divorced in 1979.) Ford’s agent, Patricia McQueeney, said that the couple “remain amicable.”