A First Film in the Cards

Cigar smoke chokes the small, unair-conditioned room tucked behind the kitchen of Little Joe’s, the shuttered Italian restaurant in Chinatown. A dapper Sylvester Stallone sits at a poker table with five other men, his sturdy hands working a deck of cards. The camera occupies one corner. Thandie Newton slinks around in a red dress while sleight-of-hand expert Paul Wilson guides the actors on their next move. Behind them is a table stacked with $2 million in fake cash.

It’s just before noon on day 15 of the shooting of “Shade,” a picture about card sharks starring Stuart Townsend, Gabriel Byrne, Jamie Foxx, Melanie Griffith and Stallone. The film is a first for writer-director Damian Nieman, 32, a Loyola Marymount grad who 18 months ago was working nights and living off credit cards.

Suddenly, the room is silent. All eyes are on Stallone.

In this, the film’s climactic end scene, his character, a legendary card player known as “the Dean,” is going up against a young con artist (Townsend). Stallone cuts the cards, deals them and delivers a line he will repeat half a dozen times during the next hour: “Looks like everybody’s going the distance.”

Nieman wrote “Shade” after spending months around the world’s best “card mechanics,” many of whom he met at the Magic Castle in Hollywood, and was planning an independent production, but within months, Stallone was attached to the picture. Nieman is still amazed.

Stallone walks off set to joke with the makeup artists and get a quick back rub. After several takes to get the card-cutting scene just right, he holds his hands out and cracks a joke. “As you can tell, these hands are not meant for dexterity,” he says.

Then he wanders over to offer advice to actor Jason Cerbone (Jackie from “The Sopranos”) on playing the “young Stallone.” “You know the Mona Lisa?” Stallone asks his eager protege. The actor nods. “It’s that sly smile.... People can’t read you. That’s all it is.”

The Birthday ‘Border Girl’

A microphone crackled, and the crowd inside Le Meridien’s bar on Tuesday night cocked their heads quizzically, trying to locate the voice. “I’m ... excited ... to ... here,” said the headless voice, which belonged to birthday girl Paulina Rubio, who turned 31 the day before. The belated birthday party doubled as a release party for her new album, “Border Girl.”

In the background, a stream of Rubio’s music videos played, soundlessly, on TVs above the bar. Scattered on tables and near a fountain outside were copies of People en Espanol, an issue dedicated to “las 25 bellezas Latinas.” Rubio was No. 1, the cover girl. (Her album “Paulina” was the biggest-selling Latin album in the U.S. last year.) And although her image was ubiquitous this night, it was easy to miss the actual Mexican-born singer and actress. Well-wishers easily obscured the little star, who wore a sky-blue slinky dress and sat on a corner couch in the back.

Dr. Sharon Zadanoff, acupuncturist to the stars and Rubio’s confidante, sat nearby.

“She gives and gives and gives,” said Zadanoff. “I know it doesn’t look like it right now,” she said, as Rubio received yet another silver-wrapped present. “But she has to be [available]. Always 100%.”

On cue, a couple came for a photo with the singer. Rubio gave a smile.

“Everything is coming together,” said Rubio. No, she was not surprised to find herself feted like this in L.A., she said. She was only grateful. “It’s yin and yang, you know,” she added, philosophically. “The planet is getting smaller, It’s like my music, global.”

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City of Angles runs Tuesday through Friday. E-mail: angles @latimes.com.