Television - Dec. 7, 2001

TELEVISION

Lurie, ABC Collaborate on a D.C. Drama

Writer-director Rod Lurie delivered a script to ABC on Tuesday--the pilot for a Capitol Hill drama series, his TV debut, on which he’s executive producer.

Lurie will direct the first installment, likely to be shot in February. And if the network gives the project a go, he expects to be behind the camera on other episodes in the 2001-02 season. Casting for the pilot has not yet been announced.

He told The Times that he came up with the idea for the show shortly after finishing “The Contender,” the 2000 Beltway drama he wrote and directed. Though comparisons with critically acclaimed “The West Wing” come to mind, Lurie draws distinctions.

“This show is less about political issues than human drama,” he said. “More about living in D.C. than life in the White House. We’ll be concentrating on the private lives of power players--the people who run the world. Our protagonist is a female staff assistant who rises in power during the course of the show.”

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Letterman Gains on Leno in November

“The Late Show With David Letterman” slightly narrowed the gap with “The Tonight Show With Jay Leno” during the November rating sweeps. Letterman averaged 4.4 million viewers per night, up 1% compared to November 2000, while Leno fell 8%, to 5.9 million. “Late Show” made even bigger strides among the young-adult demographics most sought by advertisers.

With his show based in New York, Letterman has garnered significant media attention since the events of Sept. 11. ABC’s “Nightline,” meanwhile, averaged 4.9 million viewers, a 7% decline versus the same stretch last year, when news viewing received a major boost from the post-election controversy.

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THE ARTS

Rude Awakening for Conductor Boulez

Noted conductor Pierre Boulez, 76, was on the podium during the elegant opening night of the European Month of Music, in Basel, Switzerland, on Nov. 1. The next morning, he was awakened at 6:30 by a knock on his door.

Local police confiscated his passport and train ticket, telling him he was suspected of being a terrorist. The French conductor remained in his hotel room until they conferred with computer files in Zurich and returned two hours later.

“It was absurd--kind of a Kafka story,” he told The Times on Wednesday, speaking by phone from his Paris apartment. “One night I’m at a very public occasion--every official in Basel was there. That this happens a few hours later--very unsettling, but funny, in retrospect.”

The source of the charge, Boulez later learned, was a 1966 story in Germany’s Der Spiegel in which he jokingly proposed a solution to what he considered the “sloppiness” of many opera productions.

“I said that one solution would be to bomb all the opera houses--an ironic statement, of course. They apparently took it seriously, more than 30 years later. The authorities also claimed that I made threatening phone calls to a Zurich critic in 1995 for giving me a bad review. That’s not exactly my style. The local paper said the police should send me an apology, but I haven’t received anything yet.”

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Performance to Usher in Schoenberg Awards

When Kent Nagano brings his German Symphony Orchestra Berlin to the Music Center on Sunday for a concert performance of Arnold Schoenberg’s massive “Moses and Aron,” he’ll take the opportunity to inaugurate an award sponsored by the orchestra and named for the famed and controversial Modernist.

The first-ever Schoenberg Prize will go to British composer, conductor and pianist George Benjamin, 41. In awarding the prize’s 25,000 deutsche marks (approximately $11,000) to Benjamin, the judges, including Nagano and Pierre Boulez, cited Benjamin’s work as diverse and demanding--yet also accessible to the general public.

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POP/ROCK

Destiny’s Child to Test Their Solo Talents

The members of Destiny’s Child plan to go their own ways for a while, taking time off from the group to concentrate on solo projects. Already, lead singer Beyonce Knowles has a featured role in the upcoming “Austin Powers” sequel, and Michelle Williams and Kelly Rowland have discussed solo albums.

The Grammy-winning trio has been omnipresent over the last couple of years, with back-to-back multiplatinum albums, a string of hits, a recent tour, a new holiday disc--even dolls made in their images.

Knowles assured E! Entertainment that the group is not breaking up. “Destiny’s Child put out four albums in four years, which is unbelievable. That doesn’t happen a lot,” she said. “We’ve been working, Kelly and I, since we were 9, nonstop. So I think Destiny’s Child is going to take a little break.”

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QUICK TAKES

Anne Bancroft will return to the stage for the first time in two decades in the world premiere of Edward Albee’s “Occupant.” The two-character play, to be directed by Anthony Page, will open off-Broadway at the Signature Theatre on Feb. 4. It is loosely based on artist Louise Nevelson. Bancroft’s last stage appearance was in 1981’s “A Duet for One.” Encouraged by its success with the recent “Surviving ‘Gilligan’s Island,’” a behind-the-scenes account of the show’s history, CBS is reportedly developing other movies in a similar vein. Sources say the next project could be a look at the 1960s series “Batman,” and that other nostalgic movies are being considered....Actress Cate Blanchett and her husband, writer Andrew Upton, became parents to a son in London this week.... “Terminator 3” will start shooting in April, according to Variety. With a reported budget of more than $170 million, it will be the most expensive picture ever green-lighted .... USA Today reports that Neil Diamond and Melissa Etheridge are recording a new version of his hit “America,” from 1980’s “The Jazz Singer,” in which he starred. It will serve as theme music for NBC’s promotion of the 2002 Winter Olympics.

Elaine Dutka