Q and A: Week of Oct. 10

SHARES

BY Unknown 07:12 0

Q and A: Week of Oct. 10

Q: I read in your column a few months back that Alicia Silverstone had given birth to a son, and it got me to thinking if she has plans to return to the big, or small, screen soon? — Darren F., Portland, Ore.

A: Alicia returns to her comedic roots with the help of Amy Heckerling, who also gave the beautiful actress her big break when she was chosen to portray Cher in the classic high-school comedy “Clueless.” With Amy writing and directing and Alicia starring, the new film “Vamps” is gearing up to bring to the new influx of vampire movies what “Clueless” brought to high-school-comedy movies.

“Vamps” centers on Alicia (“Goody”) and Krysten Ritter (“Stacy”) as they try to live as “good” vampires in New York City. “Vamps” also stars Sigourney Weaver and Malcolm McDowell, and should hit theaters some time next year.

Q: With the Emmy Awards a recent memory — and Jane Lynch doing a fabulous job hosting — I was wondering if you could tell me who will be the host for the next Academy Awards? — Deidre S., via e-mail

A: Actor/comedian Eddie Murphy, 50, has been selected to host the 84th annual Academy Awards. The ceremony, which is to be held Feb. 12, 2012, will mark the first time that the funnyman has hosted the show. His selection as the only host marks a return to the single-host format, which has gone by the wayside in recent years as the Academy opted for multiple hosts — some choices successful (Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin) and some not so successful (James Franco and Anne Hathaway). Eddie says he is “enormously honored” to be given hosting duties, and I’m excited to see what he has in store for viewers.

Q: I’m so glad that “The Mentalist” has returned for its fourth season, and I wanted to know when the previous season would be out on DVD. — Steven S., Akron, Ohio

A: Simon Baker and the rest of the crew have their work cut out for them this season, but now you can relive season three — which proved to be spellbinding and suspenseful in its own right — anytime you’d like at home, as Warner Home Video recently released it on DVD. “The Mentalist: The Complete Third Season” is a five-disc collection featuring all 24 episodes, plus two featurettes and some unaired scenes.

Q: I know you’re a fan of “Conspiracy Theory with Jesse Ventura,” so you might be able to tell me: Will it be back for a third season? — Patrick L., via e-mail

A: I am thrilled to report that truTV recently announced that an eight-episode third season of “Conspiracy Theory” will air in 2012, with Jesse at the helm and June Sarpong at his right hand, along with newcomers Tyrel Ventura (Jesse’s son) and Sean Stone (Oliver Stone’s son). Like me, I’m sure you can’t wait to see a new season of myth-debunking, truth-seeking and Ventura-style entertainment.

Q: I really loved Ann-Marie Johnson on “In the Heat of the Night.” What can I see her in now, and is she married with children? — Virginia, C.

A: I can’t even begin to list Ann-Marie’s film and TV credits, as there are way too many of them, but I can tell you the first series I remember seeing her in was “Double Trouble” back in 1984. Since then, she has been featured in “Hill Street Blues,” “I’m Gonne Get You Sucka,” “In Living Color,” “Melrose Place,” “Ally McBeal,” “The X-Files,” “JAG,” “Pursuit of Happyness” and “NCIS.” Her most recent projects have been “Leverage” and “Fairly Legal.” Ann-Marie, 51, has been married to actor Martin Grey since 1996, and they have no children.

Q: I was watching an older movie called “Dracula III” with Rutger Hauer as Dracula, and I could have sworn the red-haired vampire also plays the assistant D.A. on “Law & Order: SVU.” Are they the same person? Also, was Mariska Hargitay, also of “SVU,” ever on the TV show “Freddy’s Nightmares”? — Kevin B., Edmore, Mich.

A: You are correct on both counts. Diane Neal did indeed play Elizabeth Blaine in the straight-to-video vampire movie “Dracula III,” starring alongside Rutger, Roy Schieder and Jason London. And back before Mariska was detective-extraordinaire Olivia Benson on “SVU,” she did indeed have a role in one of the “Freddy’s Nightmares” episodes, playing medical student Marsha, whom Freddy — played by the always-scary Robert Englund — harasses on Halloween, driving her to the brink of madness.

Q: The TV show “The Mentalist” shows Ashley Gable as producer. Is she a daughter or granddaughter of Clark Gable? — Juanita S., St. Clair Shores, Mich.

A: Ashley Gable, who recently took over as executive producer of the CBS crime drama, is not related to the iconic actor, known best for his role of Rhett Butler in “Gone With the Wind.” Clark had two children: a daughter with actress Loretta Young named Judy Lewis, who has a daughter named Maria, and a son with actress Kay Williams named John Clark Gable, who has a son named Clark James and daughter named Hayley. Ashley Gable — who, again, is no relation to Clark Gable — is a prolific writer and producer, working on such shows as “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” “Xena: Warrior Princess,” “Crossing Jordan” and “The Mentalist,” to name just a few.

Q: Will the horror series “The Walking Dead” be back for another season? — Donna C., Warner, Okla.

A: AMC has rewarded “The Walking Dead” with a 13-episode second season (up from a six-episode first season), which is scheduled to begin Sunday, Oct. 16, at 9 p.m. ET. For those unfamiliar with the critically acclaimed series, it is based on the comic-book series of the same name and centers on a group of people who’ve survived a zombie apocalypse and are searching across America for a new, safe home away from all the killer zombies.

Q and A: Week of Nov. 1

SHARES

BY Unknown 13:00 0

Q and A: Week of Nov. 1

Q: Is it true that a sequel to “Top Gun” is in the works? — Fred D., Akron, Ohio

A: All MiG-28s point to “yes.” While it is still in the early stages of development, “Top Gun 2” is in Paramount’s sights, although the production company will not confirm anything on the record at this time. Tom Cruise (pictured left in the original, with Kelly McGillis) was said to have been approached for a cameo in the sequel, but studio officials are quick to deny that claim. I think it’s still a possibility that Maverick will make an appearance; they just want it to be a surprise for us fans, so they are denying it. However, all of us nosy-pants on the Internet make surprises quite difficult to pull off, wouldn’t you agree?



Q: I am glad to see that “Conspiracy Theory With Jesse Ventura” is back for its second season. I was surprised truTV gave it the green light to go ahead in the first place, since most channels try to stay away from anything even the slightest bit controversial. — Lisa J., via e-mail

A: I know what you mean, and I’m happy that truTV is sticking by its most controversial show (its record-breaking ratings for its first season didn’t hurt, either). The governor himself told me how proud he is of the network for taking a chance on his show: “I give truTV a lot of credit. They’re showing a great deal of courage for putting this show on television. They came on board with both guns blazing. I have to tell you that I couldn’t be happier.” For more of my chat with Gov. Ventura, go here. Trust me, we cover some really good stuff!

Q: I finally had the chance to see “You Don’t Know Jack,” the HBO movie with Al Pacino starring as Jack Kevorkian. Al was great, as usual. Did he meet Dr. Kevorkian before portraying him? — Britney F., San Antonio

A: Al Pacino told The New York Times that he did not want to meet the doctor to prepare for his role, as he wanted to discover the character himself and didn’t feel that meeting him prior would be productive. He said he “prefers playing a real character, someone who exists, because it gives a kind of credibility to what you are doing.” Al has since signed on to another HBO biopic, this one being a David Mamet-written film about Phil Spector. I am thinking he won’t be meeting with Phil beforehand either.

Q: Can you tell me if Scott Caan of “Hawaii Five-O” is related to James Caan? — Joyce C., via e-mail

A: Scott, 34, is indeed the son of legendary actor James Caan. Scott, who plays Danno in the revamped version of the hit 1970s police drama, has been building quite a resume for himself. He has appeared in “Ocean’s Eleven,” “Ocean’s Twelve” and “Ocean’s Thirteen,” as well as “Varsity Blues” and “Into the Blue.”

Interview: Jesse Ventura Is in Search of the Truth

SHARES

BY Unknown 08:04 0

Interview: Jesse Ventura Is in Search of the Truth

One thing about Jesse Ventura is that you always know you are going to get 100 percent from him. From his earlier days as a Navy Seal to pro wrestler to actor to governor of Minnesota and now to investigative journalist, Jesse attacks everything with passion and commitment. As his record-breaking series Conspiracy Theory With Jesse Ventura begins its second season tonight on truTV at 10 p.m. ET/PT, you can expect even more of that impassioned truth-digging.

This season, he and his band of investigators look into the JFK assassination, the BP oil spill in the Gulf, Area 51 and other controversial hush-hush topics. Being fascinated with all of these subjects, you can bet your sweet bippy I was more than excited to speak with the Governor about Conspiracy Theory.  (All photos courtesy truTV)

Celebrity Extra: I just want to tell you that I am thrilled to interview you. Not just as a journalist, but my husband and I are huge, huge fans of your show.

Jesse Ventura: Thank you. We got eight more of them that are going to be better this year than they were last year. I think this season’s even better. From the production side it’s better, because whenever you do the first year of a show, you kind of fly by the seat of your pants on what works and what doesn’t work. The second year you have a much better idea of where you’re going and the direction you need to go and what you want to achieve. So, I think this year’s shows are going to be even better as far as editing and things like that go.

CE: And the first season too you were just breaking records all over the place for truTV so they must be thrilled to have you back for a second season as well.

JV: Remember this is a bottom-line business. If you’re not successful at it you’re certainly not going to be back. But you know what? I give truTV a lot of credit. They’re showing a great deal of courage for putting these shows on television. In fact, I won a Stony award this year, which is given out by High Times magazine — you know, the marijuana magazine?

CE: Oh yeah.

JV: That’s why it’s called a Stony. In fact, they hold the formal thing at the Ford Theater in L.A., and Cheech and Chong are the hosts. They gave me a Lifetime Achievement Award this year. They gave it to me because they felt my show should get a Lifetime Achievement Award because of the fact that I was able to even get it on TV.

CE: How did the whole idea even come about to do Conspiracy Theory in the first place?

JV: Well, it came about one day when I was with the people I work with in L.A., my agent and all the people out there. We were talking one day and somehow we got on to the assassination of President Kennedy, about which I’ve read every book I can get my hands on for the past 25 years. And I started passionately talking about a bunch of the stuff that I knew, and my agent looked around the room and he said, “People, this is a TV show waiting to happen.”

We just kind of put our heads together and decided what we wanted to do and started shopping it. We had initial interest with another network, but they didn’t seem to have the money to get the job done. Then truTV found out, I don’t know exactly how, but they came on board with both guns blazing and said: “We’ll take care of this show. We want to have this show.” I’ve been there ever since, and I have to tell you that I couldn’t be happier because like I said, it takes a lot of courage to do what they’re doing.

CE: I’m sure a lot of the subjects you are going to cover this season are just astounding, but can you think of some jaw-dropping, what-the-heck kind of moments that stick out for you that'll really surprise the viewer?

JV: Well, you know, naturally the confession, we have a confession to the John F. Kennedy murder. First time ever you’ll hear it on television and see it. It's a deathbed confession from father to son. That’s pretty dynamic for me because I’ve been studying it for 25 years. The people who I thought did it, did it. 



The other one that really got to me is the conspiracy on our fresh drinking water. They are privatizing water and they are going to control people in countries by drinking water, because there is only so much on the planet. International corporations are taking it over, and it's something you need to survive. It’s like the Native American Indian chief that I talk to in the show. He looked me right in the eye and he says: “Governor, remember this, as hard as it is to realize, we can live without oil. We cannot live without water.”


They are calling it "blue gold" right now. In fact, we heard that the Bush family has diversified out of oil and is now investing in water.

CE: What I like too is that you don’t mince words. When you say something you aren’t afraid of what to say. This must really only help serve you to ferret out the truth, because people are just really trying to hide everything from you.

JV: Well, the difficult thing for me is that most of the conspiracies deal with our government. The problem there is that you cannot get the government to even respond to you. We, as citizen, who pay their salaries with our tax dollars, if you go to the government to get a question answered about something controversial, you won’t get an answer. In fact, they won’t even entertain your question. You can’t even talk to anyone about it.


Every time we’ve tried to talk to somebody about 9/11 all they do is refer us to the 9/11 Commission Report. We’ve read that. We all know what kind of fraudulent crap is in that. What good is that going to do? That’s one of the things that troubles me is the fact that we are the taxpayers, yet the government feels that they don’t owe us any explanation for how they spend our money.


I had a guy this morning on Howard Stern tell me to get out of the country and called me a traitor. All because I question 9/11. I felt bad, because I should have quoted Einstein to him. You know what Albert Einstein said? “A foolish faith in authority is the enemy of the truth.” Albert Einstein ain’t who he is cause he’s dumb. That is what we have in this country now: a foolish faith in authority.

CE: Now, have you been threatened to put the kibosh on a story because you learned too much or it was too controversial?

JV: Nope. I have not been threatened at all not directly or indirectly that I know of.

CE: That’s good, because I know you are covering a lot of dangerous subjects that tend to scare most people. They just don’t want to get involved with it. Like you said before, the JFK assassination, Area 51 stuff, the Bilderberg Group. I’m eager to hear if you have an opinion on the apparent heart attack of Matt Simmons, the outspoken critic and expert of the BP oil spill who was basically saying that our government is hiding the severity of the whole spill.

JV: Well, they certainly are. We do a show on the BP oil spill, and it’s worse than that. I will tell you this, in probably 75 percent of the conspiracies that deal with our government that I have now investigated — 15 of them — I would tell you in at least half of those, at some point in time our intelligence and our gathering of facts led us to Halliburton. Halliburton seems to come up all the time. Interesting isn’t it? Halliburton is deeply involved in the oil spill. They bought out the cleanup people, Boots and Coots, three weeks prior. Now, is that circumstantial? Is that something that just happened?


The other thing we learned is the BP executives two to three weeks prior to the oil spill dumped the majority of their stock in their own company. But yet no one looks into that, do they? I look into it.

CE: I read something where you compare the Democrat and Republican parties to pro wrestling with all the posturing and all of that, and how it’s just a show because they're basically the same. Yet you also don’t support a third party. I was wondering why that is and what you think we can do to help? Are we broken beyond repair?

JV: Well, first of all, I don’t support the third party movement anymore. And the reason is, this the system that the Democrats and Republicans have created is so corrupt right now that the only way a third party will be able to compete is to corrupt themselves like the Democrats and Republicans have. So, we already have a two-headed monster; why would you want a three-headed one?


I now advocate the abolishment of all political parties. And I have good backing: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and especially John Adams. In fact, John Adams was quoted as saying, “The downfall of America would not come from the outside, it would come from the within when political parties take over the government.” I think we’re there.

CE: As you learn more and more about our government’s involvement with different conspiracies, and just how it’s operating in general, does it make you happy that you are out of it or does it make you want to return and clean some stuff up?

JV: No, it makes me happy I do what I do in exposing them, because I really couldn’t clean anything up. What can I do? Governors and even presidents can’t pass one law. Congress has to and the Legislature. So, unless they do it, you as Governor can’t do nothing. You can only veto. And then of course if they get two-thirds, they can override your veto. But as a governor, you can’t create a law. And as president, you can do certain things by executive order, which has been abused. So, certainly as president, I guess, you can probably be more of a dictator. But not that much.


Look what happened to President Obama. Obama ran on change. He said he’d get us out of Gitmo and he said he’d end the wars. Well, we’re not out of Gitmo and we’re further into the wars. Somebody must have taken him to the woodshed and told him that he doesn’t really run the country. Because that’s my true belief. I think the President’s just a figurehead.


I think I cause more damage doing what I do now.

CE: Exactly. You bring clarity to people who don’t even know where to look. A lot of stuff that you covered last season I wouldn’t have even thought to think that it even existed, let alone know to investigate it.

JV: Well, always remember, you’re not going to learn anything from mainstream media. Mainstream media is controlled today. They are only going to tell you what the government wants you to know. And they are going to put the government’s spin on it. There’s already, I think, a hundred and something CIA agents in mainstream media. They’re the spin.

CE: And your show reaches a broader audience than, say, Alex Jones or Jon Ronson and people like that, so what do you hope the American people are going to take away from it when they do watch your show?

JV: Well, I hope that they will wake up and realize that everything isn’t what it seems to be. And that when they are told something on the nightly news, always question it. Because there are two sides to every story. Probably more than two in some cases. But we only mange to get one side of the story.


Actually, I should go on the record with you also and state that I actually owe mainstream media a thank you. I want to say thank you to mainstream media, because if they were doing their job than me, my production crew and all of us would be out of a job. See, we cover the stuff they won’t touch, so that keeps us working. If they did their job, there would be no place for me to do it.


They can continue to report on which sports athlete cheats on his wife. They can continue to report on the death of Anna Nicole Smith, which they spent a month on and she still comes up occasionally. They can continue to report on the mosque in New York, which the Constitution allows, so that should be the end of the story. You can’t bend the Constitution according to popularity. The Constitution and the Bill of Rights are there to protect the unpopular things, not the popular things. Popular things don’t need protection. But yet, we seem to want to bend the Constitution to stop a community center from being built. But mainstream media, isn’t that what they cover?


What you have today with the media, the news media, is entertainment. And you know what the downfall was? The show 60 Minutes, and I’ll tell you why. 60 Minutes is a great show; don’t get me wrong. But up until that point in time, all networks wrote the news-office business laws, and they made up for it in their entertainment department. Then all of a sudden came the show 60 Minutes. And 60 Minutes cracked the top 10 and many times was No. 1. Well, all of a sudden the lights went on with the bean counters and they said, “Wow, you mean we can make money with the news?” And that is what you have now. You have the news creating the news to make money. And that is a dangerous precedent when the media starts to create the news.

CE: What do you personally get out of doing Conspiracy Theory?

JV: First and foremost, I get to work with my son. He’s one of the producers and directors on the show, and I find that very personally fulfilling to watch my son grow up and get better and achieve his success with the business that he loves. It isn’t every father who can work with his son unless he owns the business. So that part of it is great.


The other part of it is that it’s a passion for me now. I have so much distrust of my government today that I feel the only way I can fight them is to expose them. So, I’ve taken it on as more of a life’s mission at this point in my life to expose as much of the government as I possibly can for their fraudulent behavior.


And third of all, I’d be lying if I didn’t say you get paid well too. You know, what the hell? It’s a job. My shows are not documentary; they’re entertainment. Rather than having a scriptwriter, we take people who’ve lived the event, and we turn them into actors acting with me in the show. They don’t need scriptwriters, because all they have to do is tell what they experienced and know.

CE: Plus it’s more entertaining than many documentaries.

JV: I hope so. We try to make it that way, although I have to hold back for TV now and then. Like when they tell me I’m being chased by the Coast Guard. I was not being chased — I told them we were simply under observation. If they were chasing us, they certainly would have caught us. The Coast Guard can catch any fishing boat. That’s their job. So, I have to hold them back every now and then, because some of the producers try to get a little over-creative, and I have to bring them back to reality again occasionally and say: “Look, we have to tell the truth. We can not veer from that.” So, no, I was not being chased by the Coast Guard. I was merely under surveillance by them.