Celebrity Gossip / By Liz Smith
Will Zane’s ‘Phantom’ return?
Tribune Media Services
Updated: 09/05/08 6:32 AM
Remember when Kate Winslet spit in Billy Zane’s face in the movie “Titanic”? Sure you do — it was one of the great scenes, along with the ship going down.
Zane played Winslet’s greedy, rotten fiance, foisted upon her by a greedy, rotten mother, played by Frances Fisher. Well, after meeting Leo DiCaprio, as she was about to throw herself into the sea, Winslet’s character more or less came to her senses.
It was something of a miracle that Winslet and DiCaprio survived this movie. Both were clever afterward. She went on to do interesting independent films and he waited several years until that “heartthrob” stuff wore off to show what a serious actor he is.
Anyway, “Titanic” was probably Billy Zane’s most memorable role to the moviegoing public. But he did have a nifty cult success with the comic-book-themed 1996 movie “The Phantom.” (The comic strip had been a great success from the ’40s through the ’60s.) Critics praised Zane, Catherine Zeta-Jones and Kristy Swanson — the latter starred in the feature version of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” but the public was unmoved.
Then, “The Phantom” moved to video and DVD and found a healthy new life with a wildly appreciative audience.
Well, now we hear that Paramount has put a “Phantom” sequel into feature fast-track development with Zane, of course, reprising his original creation. Rumor has it that Zeta-Jones and Swanson will also do their roles again. Both these fab females over a decade later, look better than ever.
What with the success of “Iron Man,” “Transformers,” “Batman,” et al, Paramount figures now is the time for the dark and sexy Phantom to return.
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According to editor Kate Betts of Time Style & Design magazine, women are reinventing the business of style. This is in their “Ladies First!” cover story. It profiles 12 females who shape the way consumers think and act. The list includes Stella McCartney, Lemlem kids creator Liya Kebede, Bergdorf’s Linda Fargo, handbag queen Anya Hindmarch, Russian designer Kira Plastinina, France’s Lancome empress Odile Roujol, Luxe designer L’Wren Scott, the bead/embroidery expert Shamina Talyarkhan, Stardust Visions ace Victoria Brynner, art auctioneer Lorna Kelly, mega-mall maestro Shireen El Khatib, and president of Aramis and fragrance designer for Estee Lauder, Veronique Gabai-Pinsky.
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Back in 1988, Sen. Joe Biden already had presidential aspirations. He let the late Broadway producer Norman Kean give him a party at Tavern on the Green, according to PR’s Sy Preston. Kean was then identified with the nude and shocking “Oh! Calcutta!” Biden cleverly impressed at the party but refused to see the play; he didn’t want to have to answer those “Oh! Calcutta!” kind of questions.
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One of my favorite movie producers is the gorgeous Christine Forsyth-Peters, who has succeeded in La La Land in spite of her looks and in spite of having been super-connected in the past with hairdresser- movie maven Jon Peters and tycoon Sumner Redstone. She was dining at L. A.’s hotspot Sunset Tower Bar with reality star Janice Dickinson and Misao Arauchi, “Miss Universe Japan” 2001.
What do three femmes such as these have to say? Maybe producer Peters was chatting up Janice to bring fashion savvy to her new film “The Fashionistas,” announced last week. And “Miss Universe Japan” would be an asset as well.
Producer Forsyth-Peters’ next project sees her reteaming with director Donald Petrie. They shared success for “How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days.”
