This is this reporter's third review of writer-director Mark Christopher's tribute to the legendary disco, Studio 54, which was to have been immortalized in Miramax's 54. It is appropriate that so many versions of one review of 54 should be written, because, unknown to most audiences, there is more than one 54.
The 54 which so many people have waited more than a year to see was filmed by Christopher and stars Ryan Phillippe as Jersey-boy turned Studio 54 bartender "Shane O'Shea," Mike Meyers as 54's notorious owner, "Steve Rubell," Salma Hayek as "Anita," Breckin Meyer as "Greg Randazzo," the busboy who is married to Anita and befriends Shane, Neve Campbell as Shane's soap-star dream-girl, "Julie Black," Sela Ward as Shane's sexy mentor, "Billie Auster," and (for those who were wondering) 82-year-old Ellen Dow as "Disco Dottie." That is the order in which the cast biographies appear in Miramax's publicity material, and is presumably, the order of importance of the roles the characters had in Mark Christopher's movie. Then Miramax's corporate parent, the Walt Disney Company, got hold of the film.
Regular readers of this reviewer's work will recall that last December this reporter did a story on Tony Danza's self-destructive and career-shattering criticism of Ellen DeGeneres, whose series aired on Disney-owned ABC. A highly placed source at Disney has revealed exclusively to this reporter that, public statements to the contrary, memoranda among the highest corporate officers at the Walt Disney Company indicate that Disney "took a bath" financially on "Ellen," and that continuing to air the series cost the company considerably.
Now that "Ellen" is off the air, Disney has apparently decided to avoid sticking its corporate neck out again with Gay or Lesbian material, and so Miramax, the cinematic money machine which brought out The Crying Game and the soon-to-be-released Velvet Goldmine which supposedly features a love scene between macho heart-throbs Christian Bale and Ewan McGregor which continued long after the director yelled, "Cut!" was forced to submit 54 to the indignity of a screening before "a test audience."
This "test audience," composed of who knows what sort of people -- mechanics from Maywood, homemakers from Pacoima, street people trying to score a free lunch in an air-conditioned theater, Àquien sabe? -- decided that they didn't like 54 as Mark Christopher had written and directed it and as Miramax chief Harvey Weinstein had approved it. This mysterious "test audience," whose composition must be one of the most closely-guarded secrets in Hollywood, didn't like: the length of the movie; Shane's bad-to-the-bone nature; busboy Greg's good-guy image; the love triangle between Shane, Anita and Greg; the come-uppance which Christopher had filmed for the morally-impaired characters in the film; and they really disliked what was probably the single most-discussed scene in the original movie, Shane's kiss with Greg.
As a result of the opinions of this rag-tag "test audience," the word came down from above: refilm 54 (or most of it, anyway). Recalled to New York a few months ago at enormous expense (Disney stockholders, take note!), the principle actors found themselves filming what this reporter regards as a completely different film. In Walt Disney's 54, Shane has a significantly nicer, softer side; Neve Campbell found herself shooting new scenes with Ryan Phillippe, completely altering her character of Julie Black; nice-guy Greg was transformed into a thief and drug pusher; the love triangle disappeared; and, most significantly, The Kiss was cut completely from the movie.
In an interview conducted months before the reshoot for Interview, Ryan Phillippe, who began his career as (too chaste for anyone's taste) Gay teen Billy Douglas on One Life to Live, discussed The Kiss, which was to be, ironically, his first overt act of on-screen Gay affection. Phillippe, who lives with actress Reese Witherspoon, which suggests which court he plays ball in, shrugged off any suggestion of controversy by responding that he was just acting, and that the acting was made easier simply because he and co-star Breckin Meyer are old friends. For year's Phillippe's attitude towards any controversy over his Gay or sexually provocative roles has seemed to be: "Get over it, people, I'm an actor -- I act." The Walt Disney Company, however, despite domestic partner benefits and so on, can't seem to get over founder Walt's own homophobia, and The Kiss disappeared, along with most of 54's continuity and credibility.
The result is what can only be styled Walt Disney's 54, which is, in this reviewer's rating system: NW2, Not Worth $2; even as a double-feature at a bargain matinee it is a gyp. The sad, sad facts are, however, that Mark Christopher's 54 would obviously have been the best drama of the summer (or at least the best drama in which no one gets machine-gunned in the opening three minutes) had it ultimately been edited by artists and not by accountants. What is screening now is a beautiful, artful, tuneful, but thoroughly disjointed, incoherent and homophobic film.
54 is still a break-out movie for Phillippe and for Mike Myers (who proves the old saw that comedians make the best dramatic actors), but it should also have been a break-out film for Salma Hayek (Fools Rush In, Mi Vida Loca and the up-coming Frida, about Mexican artist-turned Lesbian icon, Frida Kahlo) and also for Breckin Meyer (Can't Hardly Wait, Pre, and Clueless, the movie); instead, their parts were cut drastically and their characters butchered at the behest of Disney's "test audience."
This very harsh review should not in any way be taken as critical of the creative people who actually made 54. They did a fine job. They also had no say in what the Walt Disney Company did to their fine work after they'd gone home.
Perhaps Disney Chairman Michael Eisner, as he watches the price of Disney stock fall, can at least take comfort in knowing that his company's mangling of 54 has, perhaps, made some homemaker from Pacoima happy, and the bums of Hollywood Boulevard will certainly enjoy the air-conditioning at the Vine Theater when 54 reaches it -- in about two weeks, by this reviewer's estimation.
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