The Front
THE INSIDER Who’s getting up to what
I The notorious antipathy of American Equity to English stage actors taking English parts in the US isn't. it seems. an all-British ban. Regulations that require American theatre performers to take British parts in the US - the thinking being a Yank can play a Brit just as well as a Brit can play a Brit — have been relaxed for Glasgow's theatre babel, whose Uncle Vanya is touring the US. Graham McLaren's production of Tom Leonard's adaptation of the Chekhov classic has apparently been granted exemption on the grounds of its distinctive ethnicity. ie Yanks cannot play Scots as well at Scott can play Scots. Perhaps future Scottish touring companies can be directed to the English-actor free USA.
I The ongoing debate (not least on The List’s letters page) that's made the French arthouse film The Pornographer such a. if you'll excuse the term. hotbed o! controversy has now taken a new turn. The 11 second scene in which a woman gives a man a blow job. which caused such hot-collared consternation on its cinema release earlier in the year. has been excised from the film for its VHS and DVD release. Excised that is if you want to purchase the film from any high street retailer. Those who require their arthouse cinema full and unabridged will be forced to pay a visit to their local sex shop. the only outlets that will be able to stock the uncut Pornographer since the British Board of Film Classification has slapped an R18 certificate on it. The film’s star, former Francis Truffaut leading man Jean-Pierre Léaud, is said to be bemused that the BBFC has effectively labelled him a porn star.
I Meanwhile. over in Glasgow. school kids will have the opportunity to grill BBFC representative Murray Perkins over the organisation's conduct. Many will be glad to hear that the event. which is being hosted by the Glasgow Film Theatre on Monday 28 October as part of the National Schools Film Week. will not take place in context of The Pomographer. rather the war film Black Hawk Down. That said. the latter film's unrelenting scones ot graphic violence. which continue for around two hours. coupled with Black Hawk Down's stridently pro- American. anti-foreigner propaganda make it if anything a far more exploitative film than The Pornographer. Should be plenty for the kids to talk about. then.
I By way of the last word on sex (for now), Hollywood filmmakers have petitioned America's federal court to stop companies from re-editing their films - removing sex, violence
8 TH. LIST 3—17 Oct 2002
Insert your own joke about big choppers here
TIM
CRIMSON PETAL
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WHITE
MICHEL FABER
and cursing — for home video and DVD release. Directors’ Guild president Martha Coolidge said: “It is wrong to cut scenes from a film, just as it is to rip pages from a book.’ However. the Utah-based CleanFlicks. which has been busy sanitising Hollywood filth for family viewing. has responded by filing a law suit which
asks the court to guarantee the company's right to re-edit films under the US Constitution‘s First
I Amendment. the right to free I speech. Free speech as long as it's not Hollywood's. huh?
I The boys and girls at Canongate publishing were getting placed the other night (Insider knows this because their Edinburgh offices share the same building as The List). Getting pissed with good reason — two good reasons. in fact. First. they have a huge success on their hands with Michel Faber's new novel The Crimson Petal and the White. Faber's doorstep of a book hit the New York Times I bestseller list at lucky no 13
’ and has been sold to foreign publishers for a pretty packet. It's the publisher's greatest success to date. The second reason for Canongate's Iibations is the appearance of another of their books. Yann Martel‘s The Life of Pi. on the Booker Prize shonlist. That 's a first for Canongate. and Insider wishes them the best of luck at the forthcoming awards.
‘i don’t mind being thought of as nice though
‘ THE QUOTES it’s probably quite
inaccurate.’
Alan Titchmarsh clearly harbours his own bad-boy tendencies.
‘Noel and Liam are like girls the way they carry on.’ The hard man of pop, Ronan Keating.
‘Porno is an example of a book we didn’t reject, we just never saw it. We had no idea it existed.’
Booker Prize judge Professor Lisa Jardine clear/y hasn 't read a newspaper this year.
‘Emma and I are still convinced that we’ll all get back together one day.’ Mel B breaks the terrible news.
‘l don’t really want to carry on stuffing pies down people’s trousers and pouring beans over people’s heads}
Chris Tarrant reflects on his sophisticated media career.
‘Inhaling too deeply from either can damage your heahhfi
Richard Holloway just says no. To the Testaments.
‘Enrique lng . . . oh, fuck off; that bloke from Spain.’ Ozzy Osbourne tactfully attempts to introduce the swivel-hipped singer at the MTV awards.
‘I don’t really plan to be doing this for more than eight years.’
Pop princess Holly Valance seems overly optimistic about the length of her chart career.
I was Golden Bollocks for a
while but i knew it wouldn’t last. ’ ’ ‘ ' If]
Fame is a right load of old shit.’ Jamie Oliver brings himself to the boil.
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