POLTERGEIST III ARTICLES
I'd like to acknowledge and thank Criag Sinclair and Celia for obtaining and posting many of the following articles and pictures. Craig has an excellent library dedicated to Heather O'Rourke at www.library.heatherorourke.net (free registration required). Celia also has contributed many great elements to www.heatherorourke.net.
July 7, 1987 Tuesday, SPORTS FINAL EDITION
"Chicago Tribune"
REEL NEWS . . .
When Heather O'Rourke was in Chicago filming "Poltergeist III," 7-year-
old Kim Otterson wrote to say she'd been told she looked like the young
actress and wondered if she might be able to meet O'Rourke before she returned
to California. Thanks to unit publicist John Iltis and a cooperative O'Rourke,
Kim met Heather a few days before filming was completed--and followed up with
a note to INC. that said "If you were here, I would hug you." Eleven-year
old O'Rourke, by the way, finished her schooling this year with an "A'
average. . . . Sneak previews of "Robocop" will be held at several area
theaters Friday; the movie opens July 17.
Copyright 1987 Chicago Tribune Company
Chicago Tribune
From:
December 21, 1987 Monday, SPORTS FINAL EDITION
"Chicago Tribune"
SCENE 2 'CHICAGO MOVIE' TAPS A FINANCIAL WIZARD, TOP DIRECTOR
By Robert Cross.
With a script, financing and direction, Tempo Productions' all-Chicago motion picture can begin to take shape. People with the necessary skills all work locally in a city that has fast become a film capital. Here are some of the professionals who would work on our movie.
Prop master
William Dambra is the king of objects. Rings, watches, pens, briefcases, telephones, canes, umbrellas and guns-especially guns-fill his prop boxes and the shelves of his 10-ton truck.
His late father, Joseph Dambra, provided props for Chicago-made commercials. Billy (as coworkers call him) is an electrician who grew up in Addison, Ill., and got into film 10 years ago as a gaffer, or lighting installer, on commercials. Six years later, when he noticed that film productions brought their own prop departments into Illinois, Dambra decided he could help fill a gap in the local movie industry. He began acquiring things.
Dambra has become a human pack rat and a professional armorer licensed to handle automatic weapons. "Three years ago I did a pilot for a series called 'Lady Blue,' and I was renting a lot of the weapons," he recalled. "Now I own 400 guns, which I keep at my warehouse in Franklin Park. I have enough to start a small war-and win. I supplied all the guns for the 'Crime Story' series and some for 'The Untouchables."'
Dambra haunts junk shops and flea markets. "I just accumulate," he said. "Just on my truck alone, I must have $20,000 worth of props."
The "Crime Story" TV series kept Dambra busy for several months, even after the locale shifted from Chicago to Las Vegas. Because the series is set in 1963, Dambra spent a lot of his spare time poring over old Sears catalogues to ensure authenticity.
Dambra's dedication became apparent to moviemakers as he assisted Hollywood prop masters on "Risky Business," "Sixteen Candles" and "Through Naked Eyes." Now he has a partner, Sherwin Tarnoff, and an assistant, Barbara Schuppert.
"I developed my own business from the film industry," Dambra said. "It's called Weapons, Chicago Style. People from out of town can come in and say, 'Hey, this company can do the job. We don't have to bring in anybody from Los Angeles anymore.' It helps me, and it helps the city, too."
Script supervisors
When asked to describe the initial step they take when hired for a film, many professionals will say, "First, I break down the script." They go through the pages, marking sections that will engage their specialties, such as locations, lights or costumes.
Druanne and Mary Carlson break down the script into the tiniest pieces of all. They must keep track of it precisely through the entire production.
As North Shore teenagers, Druanne, now 25, and Mary, 27, learned the business from their parents, industrial-film directors Don and Dru Carlson. Their brothers, Don and Robb, are assistant camera operators.
Long before the production faces a camera, the Carlsons sit down with their scripts and time every scene, imagining, for example, how long it might take a thug to beat up a hero or a ghost to whoosh across a bedroom. They recite all the speaking parts and time those.
During the filming itself, they scrutinize all the action and dialogue to make sure it fits together, because scenes frequently are filmed out of sequence. For example, one morning the crew might work on a "master shot," showing the entire scope of a particular sequence. Hours, or days, later, the director will shoot closeups for the same scene. The script supervisor sees to it that action and dialogue match the earlier shot precisely.
Mary has supervised scripts for "The Killing Floor," "Date Night," "Big Shots" and "Light of Day." Druanne earned major credits for the first time last year with the "Jack and Mike" television series and "Open Admissions," a CBS Movie of the Week.
At one time, Mary thought she might break with family tradition, so in 1979, she started taking pre-med courses at San Diego State University. "But right after 'The Blues Brothers' filmed here, my mother called me and said, 'Get home. There's so much film work starting in Chicago. Let's go!"'
Both Carlsons said they want to direct someday, and their current line of work gives them an infinitely detailed understanding of the complexities involved.
"With script, it's just nonstop concentration," Mary explained. "If somebody picks up a shovel in one scene, the shovel has to be there five scenes later. And we might shoot that fifth scene on the first day of production."
Set decorator
Not long ago, a stylish apartment magically appeared inside a warehouse at 2500 W. Roosevelt Rd.
About 100 yards away from the apartment, which, in reality, was a set built for MGM's "Poltergeist III," Linda Sutton commanded a space that resembled a department store loading dock. From her cluttered desk, Sutton surveyed shelves full of lamps, paintings and framed photographs. Her four helpers, scrambling to prepare another "Poltergeist" scene, squeezed themselves between dense stacks of tables and chairs.
For the last eight years, Sutton has been converting empty stretches of warehouses, dormant factories, etc., into "rooms."
Sutton, who majored in art and drama at the University of Hawaii, broke into films here in 1979 as a production assistant, a "gofer." A year later she began assisting set decorators for the "Chicago Story" TV series. By the sixth episode, Sutton headed the department.
After that she created sets for "Lady Blue," "Listen to Your Heart," "Nothing in Common" and the "Crime Story" series. Her job, in essence, is to produce authentic interior designs for make-believe people.
"I go out and find all the pictures for the walls, the furniture, carpeting, blinds, knickknacks, magazines, ashtrays, pillows," she said. "I select them so that the rooms will coincide with the director's vision of the characters in the film and the production designer's overall design."
Usually she buys the goods for her sets because the long-term rental would exceed the purchase price. The clutter surrounding her desk belonged to MGM; later the studio would auction it off, sell it to crew members at half price or keep it for future use.
"The hardest part in decorating is giving life and reality to the set," Sutton said. "It's not the furniture so much as it is the little oddball things people collect that tell us so much about them. A lot of actors and actresses have told me that my sets have helped them understand their characters.
"In preproduction (the planning sessions held weeks before shooting begins), we discuss the personalities of the characters, what their income would be, their backgrounds, their likes and dislikes-regardless of whether any of that information is mentioned in the script."
Working with a crew of 10 at the beginning and paring it down to four after all the artifacts were in place, Sutton decorated 40 sets for "Poltergeist III," the story of an upper-middle-class family besieged by a ghost.
Sutton has come to know the characters well. They adore art but are definitely limited by budget. They are warm people, but their environment must look slightly cool. "We wanted an icy kind of edge to the look of the whole show," Sutton disclosed. "Eventually the whole home gets covered with ice. That's the poltergeist taking over."
After the movie wrapped, Sutton planned to resume decorating an Old Town house she has been renovating. "It will take me a long time," she said, "because I hate to shop."
PHOTO: Script supervisor Mary Carlson (right) with other film workers
on the set of "Poltergeist III."
PHOTO: Tribune photo by Carl Hugare. Prop master and human pack rat
William Dambra, with set decorator Linda Sutton, checks out one of
the prop guns at his warehouse of ready-for-rent movie objects.
Copyright 1987 Chicago Tribune Company
Chicago Tribune
Odessa American - July 3, 1987
GIRL ENJOYS THE THRILLS
Nashville, Ten - Eleven year old Heather O'Rourke, who'd appeared in "Poltergeist" and it's sequel, sought some thrills at Opryland theme park after completing three months of filming "Poltergeist III".
After Heather rode on the Screaming Delta Demon, a wheeled bobsled ride, ride supervisor Beth Erickson said, "She let out a pretty good yell."
Heather's parents, Jim and Kathy O'Rourke, said they had been in Chicago since April for filming of the third "Poltergeist" film and were touring Nashville, Florida, New Orleans, and Memphis on the way home to San Diego.
Heather, whose line "They're Heere" chilled audiences in the first "Poltergeist" movie role, stopped by the theme park Wednesday.
The latest film, she said, invovles more magic and physical stunts than the first two haunted house films.
'Poltergeist' Star Heather O'Rourke Dies at Age of 12
By BURT A. FOLKART,Times Staff Writer
Heather O'Rourke, the terrified youngster sucked into a spectral vacuum by supernatural spirits in the "Poltergeist" films, has died on an operating table at a San Diego hospital, it was reported Tuesday.
The 12-year-old ingenue, who finished filming "Poltergeist III" last June in which she starred as the angelic Carol Anne Freeling for the third time, died late Monday afternoon.
A spokeswoman for Children's Hospital of San Diego identified the cause of death as intestinal stenosis–a severe bowel obstruction that the girl evidently had from birth. The obstruction caused an infection that, in turn, brought on septic shock. The shock prompted full cardiac and pulmonary arrest, the spokeswoman said.
Her agent, David Wardlowe, said she had been rushed to the hospital after complaining of abdominal pain.
Heather's parents, who live in Big Bear but are also believed to have a home in San Diego, were too distraught to comment, Wardlowe said.
Ron Pennington, a spokesman for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures Inc., where the "Poltergeist" films were produced starting in 1981, said the studio "extends its sympathy to her parents and family."
What proved to be her final film will be released this summer, he added.
Heather, who was also seen regularly on television's "Happy Days," "Webster" and "Still the Beaver," brought two catch phrases into the language with the first two "Poltergeist." The first was "They're heeeere!" which she said with eerie calm after coming into contact with strange forces while peering into an apparently blank TV screen. The second was, "They're baaaack!" which was featured in the sequel.
The "Poltergeist" films, first released in 1982, told of a mid-America family living an idyllic life in the suburbs, whose young daughter begins communing with creatures she sees on her television screen.
Soon family pets begin to die and trees, blown by hurricane-force winds, come smashing into the home of the terrified Freeling family.
Carol Ann is sucked into a light source coming from a closet, and her helpless parents are left only with her screams.
Finally the family turns to a parapsychologist to exorcise the demons.
Heather came to films in a tradition that dates back to Lana Turner when that actress was supposedly (but wasn't really) discovered at a drugstore counter.
Heather was 5 and sitting in the MGM commissary, said her former manager, Mike Meyer. Steven Spielberg, who co-wrote and produced the first of the "Poltergeist" series, saw her and asked if he could talk to her. He was told that she did not talk to strangers.
But she got permission, and that eventually led to her role in the film.
Heather is the second actress from the "Poltergeist" movies to die young. Dominique Dunne was strangled in October, 1982.
Miss Dunne, then 22, who played Heather's older sister, had tried to break off her relationship with her boyfriend. Los Angeles chef John Sweeney was convicted of voluntary manslaughter and sentenced in November, 1983, to the maximum 6 1/2 years in prison.
Heather "always looked like 'Alice in Wonderland' and could memorize a 60-page script in about an hour," Meyer said.
"Of all the things she was proud of," he added, "[she was proudest of] being elected president of her fifth grade class at Big Bear Elementary School."
CONTROVERSY: HEATHER O'ROURKE'S GRIEVING MOTHER TELLS WHY SHE'S SUING HER CHILD'S DOCTORS FOR WRONGFUL DEATH
It's an eerie site. The angelic 12-year-old sits patiently in a chair while
a makeup artist transforms her into a demon from hell. Despite the circumstances, her spirits are
high. She thinks that the film she is making in Chicago, Poltergeist III, will be a winner. "This is really good.
I think it's the best." she says. She was only 5 when she made the first Poltergeist film, playing
a child kidnapped by evil spirits. She says she liked that one. But Poltergiest II didn't pass muster.
"I thought is was too boring," she says. "I don't think it would scare anyone."
Heather O'Rourke gave this interview last June. Had Fate been kinder, Heather would be jetting about the country now,
promoting Poltergiest III, which opens this week. But on Feb 1st, seven months after she finished filming, Heather died of
cardiac-pulmonary arrest and septic shock, the result of an undetected intestinal blockage.
The news was startling. How could the popular child have died so suddenly?
Heather's mother, Kathleen O'Rourke Peele, 38, is furious over what she believes is
the answer. Last month, she filed a wrongful death suit in California Superior Court
in San Diego County, claming her daugther's illness was misdiagnosed eventually causing her
death. The suit's primary defendants are the Kaiser Foundation Hospital, and Southern California Permante Medical
Group, a plan in which paitents are treated by a rotating staff of physicians. Kathleen states
that she received a letter-dated March 30, 1987-from Dr. James Tipton, of L.A's Kaiser Foundation Hospital
saying that there was "conclusive radiographic evidence for Crohns' disease (a chronic inflammanation of the
bowel) The suit charges that the operation performed on Heather on the day she died at Children's Hospital and Health
Center in San Diego established conclusively that she did not have Crohn's disease but an acute bowel obstruction
due to a congenital stenosis. "It was an intestinal blockage that had probably been
there since birth." says Kathleen. "The X-rays taken, if properly read, would have disclosed that this was the kind of
condition that should have been treated surgically." Says Kaiser spokesman Alan Mann: "We have reviewed the case exensively,
and are satisfied that the diagnosis made, and the care provided, was accurate."
Beverly Hills attorney Sanford Gage, Kathleen's lawyer, is seeking unspecified damages.
"It covers both the personal loss (the emotional stress suffered by Heather's mother) and the
economic loss," says Gage. "The economic loss is difficult to project, but from our
premilinary investigations, I'd say we're talking about a career that was very sizable, maybe greater
than $10 million. Gage claims the suit wasn't intentionally filed to concide with the release of Poltergeist III.
"It's taken my office three and a half months to obtain all the records and the X-rays and put them in the hands
of medical experts," says Gage.
Sitting in Gage's office, Kathleen dissolves into tears while publicly talking about her daugter's death for the first time.
"The first month was awful. I had to force myself to get up, to eat." she says. "Shopping was almost impossible. What Heather like best
was coordinate in one color, from shoes to earrings. Another thing, I couldnt cook in the kitchen anymore. Heather loved pies, cakes and cookies,
and I used to make them for her, in the beginning I didnt know if I was going to make it. I thought, "Why go on?"
The first sign of Heather's illness, Kathleen said, appeared in January 1987.
Heather was at home at the time with her mom, step-dad Jim Peele, 45, and sister, Tammy now 16,
at their three bedroom house in the woods of Big Bear, California, 120 miles east
of LA. The simple A-Frame house had been purchased with the money Heather had earned.
(Kathleen married Jim,a part time truck driver, in 1984, three years after divorcing Micheal O'Rourke,
a construction worker who is Heather and Tammy's father.) Heather began feeling nauseous.
Kathleen took her to a Kaiser facility in San Diego;
she had enrolled her in the Kaiser plan earlier by her ex-husbands
union. "I had taken her to Kaiser three or four times that month." says Kathleen.
Then Heather's feet began swelling, Kathleen took her back to Kaiser, where they put
her in the hospital for a few days of test. They discovered that she had a parasite called
Giardia, and gave her the drug Flagyl, to kill it. The drug seemed to work.
"Essentially, Heather was fine." says Kathleen. "You know how kids are. They bounce right back." But
Kathleen, who considers herself an overprotective mother. took Heather back to Kaiser for a follow up visit, just
before filming Poltergiest III. "They did an x-ray after giving her this chalky, white barium stuff to drink." says Kathleen.
"And they found that the parasite was gone, but they there was still some kind of inflammnation. They called what they saw
Crohn's disease, and they put her on cortisone and sulfa.
During the time they were in Chicago for Poltergeist III, April through June,
there were no symptoms, says Kathleen. However, she did take Heather to a private
doctor there to get her off the cortisone, which had caused her face to puff up. She was rather
embarassed about her "chipmunk cheeks"" says Kathleen. Heather was gradually eased off the cortisone.
By September her face went back to normal proportoins."She was delighted." recalls Kathleen.
To celebrate the end of shooting, Heather, her mother and her truck driver unhitched the cab of his 18-Wheeler,
and spent two months, July and August driving from Chicago, to Disneyworld in Florida, and back to LA. "It was the vacation
of a lifetime." says Kathleen. "Heather's health seemed excellent"
Just before starting Poltergeist III, the family moved from Big Bear(the doctors had told Kathleen parasites were more common
in a mountain area) to a large two bedroom apartment in Lakeside, Cali. There seemed to be no cause for alarm until Sunday, Jan 31, 1988.
On this morning, Heather had woke up vomiting. During the day,
Kathleen had Heather drink Gatorade, which Kaiser recommended as a stomach
remedy. The next morning, Feb 1. Heather got up and informed her that she was going to school.
"I told her, no your'e not!" says Kathleen who tried feeding her some toast. She said "I cant even swallow"
Then I noticed her fingers and toes were blue, and she started to breathe real heavy, kind of fast. And her stomach was distended. I called our
local doctor and his office said, "Bring her right in." About 20
seconds later, she fell on the floor. That's when I called paramedics."
Suffering from septic shock, Heather was still conscious when the paramedics arrived. When one asked her
if she was feeling bad, she said "A little" On the way to the ambulance, Kathleen says she told Heather "I Love You" and Heather
said "I love you too." They were the last words mother and daughter exchanged. During the less than 10 minutes it took the ambulance to drive to American Medical'
International Hospital in El Cajon, eigth miles away, Heather suffered cardiac arrest and lost conciousness. The paramedics tried to revive her. She arrived there at 9:25 am.
She was "technically dead" says Kathy Beaudoin, the head of nurses.
The doctor resuscitated her, they helicoptered her to Children's Hospital and Health Center
in San Diego, about 20 miles away, where she arrived at 10:45 am in a critical state. Kathleen was joined
at the El Cajon facility by husband Jim. who hadn't been allowed to to ride in the ambulance.
At Children's Hospital Kathleen and Jim were told that Heather had suffered Cardiac arrest and that her pupils were fixed,
which could mean she had suffered brain damage. Suspecting a bowel obstruction, the doctors asked for permission
to perform exploratory surgery on her abdomen. They agreed. On finding an obstructed bowel, the doctors corrected it, "But it was too late." lawyer Gage says now,
"She was too far gone". At 2:43p.m. she was pronounced dead.
"I was in shock" says Kathleen. "I felt like someone was taking a knife and turning it and turning it."
A service took place on Feb 4, at the Lakeside Memorial Chapel. The next day the final burial rites were held at Pierce Brothers in Weswood, Cali.
"It was an open casket. I asked for it." says Kathleen. Before the casket was closed, Kathleen put a gold chain around Heather's neck that had the letters F-R-I-E-N-D hanging from it.
She kept the companion chain spelling B-E-S-T. She used to tell her friends that I was her best friend and not just her mom.
Kathleen shows off pieces of a quilt she is making in Heather's memory. Each square of heavy white cloth has been imprinted in color with pictures of Heather, her family, her friends, ads from the Poltergiest films
and publicity stills. "When I lost Heather, it was like I lost my shadow," says Kathleen, holding the still unsewn squares in her hands. Whatever the outcome of the lawsuit, my life will never be the same."
February 6, 1988
Section: NEWS
Edition: Valley
Page: N4
SERVICES HELD FOR CHILD STAR
HEATHER O'ROURKE EULOGIZED AS REAL IN A WORLD OF PLASTICS
JEFF WILSON Associated Press
Family and celebrity friends including Henry Winkler, Linda Purl and Ricky Schroeder attended funeral services Friday for "Poltergeist" child star Heather O'Rourke.
Heather died Monday from infection caused by a congenital intestinal defect. She was 12.
"To all who knew her, she was genuine. In a world of plastics, she was real," the Rev. Dennis Estill told the 120 mourners during a simple 20-minute service inside the Westwood Memorial Park Chapel.
Others at the service included "Poltergeist" co-star Zelda Rubinstein and entertainer Morey Amsterdam. Pallbearers included her manager, Mike Meyer, and agent David Wardlow.
Heather's open pink-and-gray metal casket was set amid several floral arrangements. The tiny walled cemetery 10 miles west of downtown maintains a bucolic setting despite being surrounded by high-rise buildings.
Estill, a family friend, said Heather wanted two things in her life.
"She wanted an Academy Award. She wanted a Rolls-Royce," the minister said, adding that now "She is wearing a crown to wear through eternity."
"We've all been blessed to share in the love of Heather," Estill concluded.
After the funeral, the casket was carried 100 yards to a sun-splashed mausoleum wall and sealed in a ground-level crypt near one occupied by the late actor Peter Lawford.
Nearby are two other Hollywood actresses whose lives ended abruptly.
Thirty yards away is the grave of one-time child star Natalie Wood, who drowned off Santa Catalina Island in 1981 at age 43, and another 100 feet away is the crypt of Marilyn Monroe, who died at 36 of a drug overdose in 1962.
Other celebrities whose remains are at the Westwood Cemetery include Donna Reed and Darryl F. Zanuck.
Heather died during emergency surgery at Children's Hospital of San Diego. Hospital spokeswoman Terry Merryman said she died of septic shock due to congenital stenosis of the intestine, or bowel. That means she died of shock caused by infection in the blood, which in turn was caused by a birth defect that made a section of her intestine abnormally narrow.
The blond youngster's character warned "They're heeeere!" in ''Poltergeist" and "They're baaaack!" in the sequel.
Filming was completed on a third "Poltergeist" movie last June.
Heather also appeared in several television shows, including "Happy Days" and "Webster."
The family had a private viewing at Lakeside Funeral Chapel in San Diego before Friday's funeral.
Illustration:photo
Mourners gather Friday near the casket of Heather O'Rourke at
Westwood Memorial Park.
JOHN McCOY/DAILY NEWS
AP (June, 1987)
Movie explosion triggers unexpected fire
OAKBROOK TERRACE, Ill.
An explosion meant to blow up six cars in the final scene of the film ''Poltergeist III'' triggered a blaze Wednesday that caused an estimated $250,000 damage to an office building, officials said.
Two firefighters and a maintenance man were slightly injured and about 150 members of the movie crew had to be evacuated from a parking garage beneath the building, said Oakbrook Terrace Fire Protection Agency Chief Tony Barton.
For the final scene of the movie, six cars were piled on top of one another in the underground parking garage and covered with white styrofoam to simulate ice and freezing temperatures, Barton said. A charge was then set off.
The scene was to have appeared to take place in a cold environment - but the styrofoam caught fire and turned the garage into a flaming, smoke-filled inferno.
''They put a charge out there to explode the cars and I talked to them and the stunt men and the demolition men said that there was nothing to worry about,'' Barton said. ''So I just had four firemen standing by.''
When the fire got out of hand, a full contingent of 25 firefighters and six pieces of equipment were brought in. The fire burned so hot that the concrete in the parking garage cracked, Barton said.
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures Inc. was filming the scene of ''Poltergeist III'' on the second level of the underground parking garage in the 10-story, twin tower Oakbrook Terrace office building in Oakbrook Terrace, a suburb about 25 miles west of Chicago.
The fire, which burned for about 90 minutes, caused extensive damage to the parking garage and parts of the rest of the building sustained smoke damage, he said. Damage estimates were put at $250,000, Barton said.
--------------------
By Michael Wilmington
Tribune movie critic
September 12, 2004
If Gary Sherman has his way, Chicago will become a thriving center of independent movie production sometime next year -- for the first time since Charlie Chaplin's old silent film studio, Essanay, went bust in 1917.
"That was a long time ago," Sherman mused recently. "But we're going to change all that."
Sherman is an unassuming guy whose mild appearance belies his filmography -- he wrote and directed "Dead and Buried" (1981) and "Wanted Dead or Alive" (1986) -- and his big Chicago dream: to bring back movie production here, in a big way, with "A-list" directors and stars in locally produced movies. To that end, Sherman has been working with Columbia College Film Department Chair Bruce Sheridan and local film offices and labor unions on an ambitious project called The Directors' Studio of Chicago.
Sherman, born and raised in Chicago, began making movies here in 1966, first as a documentarian ("The Legend of Bo Diddley"). After detours to London in 1969 and Los Angeles in 1980, he moved back here two years ago.
"When I came back to Chicago to try and help Chicago [get] back on the map as a production center," he recalls, "I thought one of the only ways we [could] do that is to facilitate, develop and produce our own product here in Chicago. I had to come up with a way to do that -- [beyond] tax breaks and union cooperation."
It wasn't easy. In recent years, Chicago, like many American cities, has seen local production melt away, while the big studios send most of their location crews to movie-friendly Canada, even when the setting is Chicago, as in the Oscar-winning "Chicago" or the current "Wicker Park."
That's the trend Sherman wants to reverse.
"One of the great things going on in Chicago is the educational facilities here," he said. "And the largest film school in the world is right here in Chicago: Columbia College. There are 2,500 students in the film school. I ended up meeting Bruce [Sheridan] and we talked a lot about the fact that production modeling on a professional scale was something missing from the school.
`Amazing idea'
"I realized that if we were to [create] a professional studio within the academic community and offset the costs, we could bring professional A-list movies here. Bruce and I thought it was an amazing idea," he continues. "We could offset a significant cost of making each movie by the fact that the school would be contributing -- not to the budget of the picture, but providing all the infrastructure for the studio. The students would be able to use the studio as well as be able to watch the films being made there."
That's the idea: Columbia College builds a studio for both its students and professionals -- and The Directors' Studio finances pictures (at minimal budgets of $7 million to $10 million), backing dream projects that top filmmakers have been unable to sell to the Hollywood companies. The filmmakers and the studio would then split the profits ("without creative accounting," Sherman says with a smile) 50-50.
"For 7-to-10 million," he explains, "we can get a product that would be the equivalent of a $40-to-$50 million Hollywood movie."
Hollywood's pigeonholing
"Having been subjected to the pigeonholing of Hollywood myself, I realized that once you become a studio-approved director, your chances of ever making your own film again are zero," he says. "You make the films that the studio wants you to make."
Sherman certainly has been typed. An admirer of Alfred Hitchcock, Sergei Eisenstein, Juan Luis Bunuel and Roman Polanski who has worked steadily for decades as writer or writer-director on movies and TV films, he has long been slotted as a horror or crime specialist. But before he broke into the mainstream in the '80s with genre movies such as "Poltergeist III" (1987), he earned cult renown for violent low-budget shockers such as 1972's "Death Line." Later, he won critical plaudits for his cop show "Missing Persons" (1992-94), shot in Chicago.
Indeed, "Death Line," starring Donald Pleasance and Christopher Lee in a tale of monster cannibals in a London tunnel, was named one of the 10 best British horror films of the 20th Century by the British Film Institute and revived in 2002 at The New York Film Festival.
"What excites me most about this project is that we're not just going to be making films, we're going to be making art," he says.
So, will Sherman tackle any of his own labors of love at The Directors' Studio -- including a '30s-style romantic comedy script that is his personal pride and joy?
"Maybe when it gets going," he says. "Before that, I'll be too busy."
Copyright © 2004, Chicago Tribune
ENTERTAINMENT; Pg. C4
'Superstitious hogwash' irks Poltergeist actress
By Rob Salem Toronto Star
"I do not buy into this superstitious hogwash," Zelda Rubinstein states emphatically.
This is not the sort of thing you expect to hear from the actress who played Tangina Barrons, the very small medium, in all three Poltergeist movies.
But then the 4-foot-3 Rubinstein, in town last week to talk about the just-released Poltergeist III, was not referring to her character's strange psychic abilities, or any of the supernatural goings-on in the Poltergeist movies. She was talking, albeit reluctantly, about the Poltergeist curse.
Of course, there is no Poltergeist curse. Just a series of tragic coincidences, culminating with the sudden death (from septic shock) of Rubinstein's 12-year-old co-star, Heather O'Rourke, just nine months after they finished work on Poltergeist III. Screen sister strangled
O'Rourke was the fourth Poltergeist actor to die since the original movie was released six years ago. Her screen sister, Dominique Dunne, was strangled to death by ex-boyfriend John Sweeney in 1982. Poltergeist II actors Will Sampson and Julian Beck both died after making that film, Sampson (best known for One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest) during an emergency heart/lung transplant, Beck from cancer.
Given the macabre subject matter of the movies themselves, questions about a Poltergeist curse would seem inevitable. And by now, one assumes, Rubinstein must be sick of answering them.
"I am indeed sick of talking about it," she said. "This is not a jinxed movie.
"If people are ill, they terminate. And there were people who were ill - who were cast in ill condition - in the film. They added to the film, they passed away. May they all rest in peace.
"In the case of Dominique, she was a victim of passion. There but for God go we. And Heather's death was a true tragedy also.
"But if you wait long enough, we'll all be dead, either from natural causes or at the hands of some meshugenah (crazy)."
She's still coming to terms with the death of young O'Rourke. "I was very grieved. I am very grieved. I miss her very much."
Rubinstein was surprised that watching O'Rourke's final performance in the finished film wasn't a more painful experience for her.
"It was not difficult for me, because Heather existed, and I'm glad that she was captured on film. I did not find it painful, although I expected it to be. Actually, it was like . . . I don't know, like one more kiss."
But life goes on for the versatile Rubinstein, who has just finished a 12-week run in The Cherry Orchard at the Arena Stage in Washington D.C., and is planning to produce a jazz album for a Seattle-based group she's discovered. She says she'd like to try a TV series in the near future.
And, though Tangina Barrons appears to have made the ultimate sacrifice at the end of Poltergeist III, there's always the chance she might return for another sequel.
"Well, I think everything is possible. So much of it depends on the economics.
"And the availability of Tangina," she adds with a smile.
By Rob Salem Toronto Star
They're back.
Yes, they're back, all the ghoulies and the ghosties and the things that go bump in the closet, the sort of stuff that has plagued the Freeling family for six years now, first in Poltergeist, then in its 1986 sequel, Poltergeist II.
But this time it's different. It's different in the way that most third-time sequels are different, in that even the best of movie concepts will start to wear a little thin by this point. But different too in that, no matter what your feelings about the movie itself, you will find its other, real, tragic subtext almost impossible to ignore.
The movie itself is fine, as far as these things go. This sort of enterprise tends to stand or fall on its special effects, and the Poltergeist effects have, as a rule, been among the classiest of the genre. Poltergeist III is no exception. It's all done with mirrors, most of it anyway, with all sorts of weird reverse images reflecting things that don't really exist.
This time the haunting takes place, not in suburbia, but in downtown Chicago: specifically, an ultra-modern condo/office/mall complex, complete with art gallery, swimming pool and lots of convenient underground parking, all connected by endless miles of elevator shaft, so you never have to go outside. In other words, it is Yuppie hell, even before the ghosts get to it.
But, as I said, the movie is fine. Or would be, if not for the sad fact that Heather O'Rourke, the angelic 12-year-old actress who played Carole Anne Freeling in all three Poltergeist films, died suddenly in hospital from toxic shock just eight months after completing this last one.
This is certainly not the first time a movie has been released after the death of one of its stars. It happened with the late Natalie Wood and Brainstorm - coincidentally, another MGM film. And there is also the sad case of Twilight Zone: The Movie, in which Vic Morrow and two children were actually killed on the set.
And, incredibly, this isn't even the first time this has happened to a Poltergeist film. Actress Dominique Dunne was killed shortly after the release of the original Poltergeist, and both Will Sampson and Julian Beck died after finishing Poltergeist II (Beck's eerie presence really was the second film, and is approximated here by Nathan Davis to considerably less effect).
Now, I'm not trying to make any occult connection here: quite the opposite, in fact. Despite the deaths of each of these fine actors, we as an audience were still able to enjoy and appreciate what turned out to be their final performances.
But there is little enjoyment to be had watching Heather O'Rourke in Poltergeist III. Only sadness.
Poltergeist III
Starring Heather O'Rourke and Zelda Rubinstein. Screenplay by Gary Sherman and Brian Taggert. Directed by Gary Sherman. At the Uptown (Yonge at Bloor, 922-3113). AA
Star Watch: Stardom Eludes Tom Skerritt
By BOB THOMAS, Associated Press Writer
How can a serious actor such as Tom Skerritt hold his own amid the pyrotechnics of "Poltergeist III"?
"You don't even try in a special effects picture," he admits. "'Aliens' had the same feeling. You simply do them to learn from the filmmaker. What you get out of it is to learn about lenses, how to use the camera effectively, some of the tricks of the trade.
"I'm more interested in being a director and in learning about that process than in being an actor in front of a camera. It's not a very exciting thing being an actor in front of a camera."
His attitude may help explain the Skerritt film career. He seems always to be working, but he has never ascended to superstardom. He and Robert Redford made their film debuts in the 1962 "War Hunt." Redford became an instant star; Skerritt didn't.
In 1970, Skerritt appeared with Elliott Gould and Donald Sutherland in the landmark comedy "M-A-S-H." While his co-stars went on to fame and fortune, Skerritt turned up in films such as "Run Run Joe" and "Big Bad Mama."
Shirley MacLaine, Anne Bancroft, Mikhail Baryshnikov and Leslie Browne won Academy Award nominations for "The Turning Point" in 1977. Skerritt as MacLaine's compassionate husband did not.
Again with the recent megahit "Top Gun," Skerritt drew little credit for his powerful presence as Tom Cruise's flight instructor.
If such happenstances bother Tom Skerritt, he doesn't show it. He continues taking jobs that interest him, ranging from guest appearances on "Cheers" to uncredited modeling of Guess clothes in magazines. The other day he was working on location at the University of Southern California in a farce called "Hunchback." It was originally titled "The Hunchback of UCLA," but that university declined to be associated.
Skerritt is a newcomer to MGM's "Poltergeist" series, playing the role of the late Heather O'Rourke's uncle. He confesses he hasn't seen the first two films.
He didn't have any qualms about joining in the middle of the series.
"I had a lot of confidence in the director, Gary Sherman," he said. "Generally, filmmaking is a matter of working with people whose work you enjoy enough to learn from. He had mounds of sketches of the way he was going to shoot the picture, all live special effects. I thought, 'This guy is an architectural genius.' Indeed, he had studied at architecture school in Chicago."
Skerritt still hasn't reconciled himself to the loss of Heather O'Rourke, the young star of all three "Poltergeists."
"She was an extraordinary person _ very intelligent, very together, very focused young lady," he remarked, eyes misting. Heather died on the operating table Feb. 2 at Children's Hospital in San Diego during intestinal surgery to relieve a congenital bowel obstruction. She had completed filming of Poltergeist III last June.
A Detroit native, Skerritt fell into acting at Wayne State University, and moved west to study at the UCLA film school.
"I never really took acting seriously," he admitted. "I was more interested in the process of making films. I did acting because I enjoyed it and found it therapeutic. But I also felt the responsibility that if I was going to direct or write I should certainly know how to act; it's an economy, a shorthand that you learn by doing. I fell into making a living at it."
Skerritt's career has taken a number of wrong turns. After "M-A-S-H," he was offered a role in a proposed TV series based on the film. He declined, figuring it would be "just another sitcom." Then his agents persuaded him to move to Italy, since Clint Eastwood and Charles Bronson had achieved stardom there. Skerritt stayed 3 1/2 years, but the same lightning failed to strike.
In recent times he has appeared in such fleeting films as "Silence of the North," "Space Camp" and "Maid to Order." But a "Top Gun" can offset such misses.
"I read 15 pages of that script and I wanted to do it," the actor said. "There was no doubt of its power in terms of commercial appeal. With Ridley Scott directing and Jerry Bruckheimer and Don Simpson producing, there was no way that was going to be anything but a terrific piece of film."
Out of "Top Gun" came Skerritt's debut as a fashion model. The Guess jeans people called him for a magazine layout, and he joined up.
"To tell the truth, I don't pay much attention," he commented. "When people come up to me and say, 'My God, you've been in every magazine, every periodical,' I have no idea. I read Time magazine, the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times, and raise my kids and mow the lawn, pretty much.
"That's No. 1, isn't it: You father children and you raise them. You don't run from the responsibility, as so many men seem to do nowadays. I don't conceptualize this business as anything other than the way I make a living to feed my family and pay the rent. It's just a job."
June 27th, 1988
Big Talent in a Small Package
By HILLEL ITALIE, Associated Press Writer
Zelda Rubenstein calls herself a character actress _ a good character actress, though not in the same category as a Meryl Streep.
But she is proud of the featured roles she's played.
"I can make a lot of people very real. I like people and that's going to have to show," said Rubenstein, who portrayed Tangina Barrons in "Poltergeist."
Rubenstein, who stands 4-feet-3, continues her role as the medium for the haunted little girl, Carol Anne, in "Poltergeist III."
"I loved 'Poltergeist III,"' she said. "I loved the script and I loved the spirit of it."
Rubenstein was a latecomer to the film world. After a childhood that she characterized as relatively normal, she earned a bachelor of science degree in Life Science from the University of Pittsburgh and spent 20 years working in a blood bank and as medical technician.
In 1980, she decided to travel.
"I did more dishes than I thought were manufactured. I worked on a shrimp boat," Rubenstein recalled. "I survived without compromising my standards of morality. I learned about having to use my wits. I got a lot of confidence out of traveling in Europe."
Rubenstein had long been interested in acting but only after traveling did she decide to pursue a career. She had pictures taken and put together a resume. She had three agents within a week, and in another week, she had landed a job as one of the voices of the "Flintstones Comedy Hour."
"When television came I thought that it had tremendous potential; the power of the medium is enough to exhaust you," she said. "Communications became more important as I matured. I just decided I needed to do something creative."
Rubenstein broke into movies in 1981 with a supporting role in "Under the Rainbow," which starred Chevy Chase and Carrie Fisher and several midgets and dwarfs. In 1982, she was cast in "Poltergeist."
"I only worked six days on that film: I came in; I did it; I observed; I didn't ask questions; I did my job," she said. "When I saw the screening for cast and crew, I almost dissolved. I suddenly realized that those six days had changed my life entirely. Nothing, not a single word I had put into the film had been cut.
"I realized that I was in the middle of a very big film."
Rubenstein has nothing but kind words for the film's director, Steven Spielberg.
"He's divine. He's very smart. An excellent director, very companionable. If I'm guilty of doing anything blindly," Rubenstein said in her best stage whisper, "it's loving smart men."
Like many movie actors, Rubenstein found herself being associated with her on-screen character.
"People stopped and asked if I would take a look at their home, what would I do in this situation," she said. "We have a very gullible population. I find it totally annoying. I'm a very private person."
Besides working in film and televison, she has appeared on the stage, and currently is in a Washington production of "The Cherry Orchard."
After "Poltergeist" became a hit, a sequel was inevitable. But the film's producers did not originally have Rubenstein in mind.
"I got a call indicating I would not be doing 'Poltergeist II,"' she said. "I wished them well and I cried for about four days. Then they called me to say that the actress was not doing it and I could do the role.
"I was not happy with 'Poltergeist II.' I thought it was ill-conceived."
But Rubenstein was not through with Tangina Barrons. In November 1986 she went to see "Wanted: Dead or Alive," a film directed by Larry Sherman.
"There were some shots that were so directorally gorgeous, I started crying in a movie that didn't warrant tears at that point," Rubenstein said. "So I made up my mind I would go meet the director afterwards, if possible."
Rubenstein walked into the lobby and spotted Sherman standing in the middle of a group of people.
"I went up to this man and I introduced myself and let him know I was just in awe. He knew who I was," Rubenstein said. "I shook his hand and gave him a hug. He said he hoped I would be happy because we would be working together soon. He was directing 'Poltergeist III.'
"I floated out of the studio."
Video View: Home Video Reviews
"Poltergeist III" (MGM-UA Home Video. VHS-Beta, $$89.95. PG-13)
"Poltergeist III" should have had all the flaws of its predecessors - cubed - in the negative exponential fashion of Hollywood sequels. It doesn't. It's excellent. (Sadly, it was the last film for child star Heather O'Rourke, who died during surgery after the movie's theatrical release.)
In this episode, the spirit world's demonic preacher Kane (Nathan Davis) is again determined to get Carol Anne (Heather O'Rourke) to guide him "into the light" on the Other Side again. No problem; you wouldn't have it any other way.
Tangina (Zelda Rubinstein), the chubby little medium from "I" and "II" returns to help Carol Anne, along with the doughty Tom Skerritt and Nancy Allen, who play Carol Anne's devoted uncle and aunt.
Skerritt is the manager of a sleek, mirrored high-rise building, the all-too familiar "complex of shops, offices and apartments." So ... what if ... the evil spirit moves into the building? Why, it's ... an Eighties nightmare!!! The building becomes a stunning, surreal maze of endless-seeming stairwells, filled with mirrored walls with spectral images, with crazy elevators that go crazy and demonic cars in a frozen parking garage.
Note that all the special effects were shot on-camera. Some of them are ingenious and utterly simple - and awfully scary.
Director Gary Sherman couldn't get all the originals' stars and couldn't afford the costly opticals and other lab effects, so he and co-writer Brian Taggert went after something different and succeeded brilliantly. Aces.
- By Scott Williams, Associated Press Writer.
They're coming baa-ack...
to scare you again. 'Poltergeist 3' starts production April 6 as another installment of the 1982 ghost story. Returning are Heather O'Rourke as the terrified little girl and Zelda Rubinstein as the psychic. Missing are JoBeth Williams and Craig T.Nelson as the terrified parents. The film will be shot on location in Chicago.
© USA Today
ROUND THREE WITH THE POLTERGEISTS
JoBeth Williams, who battled spirits in Poltergeist and Poltergeist II, has given some advice to Nancy Allen, who's starring in Poltergeist III.
"I ran into Nancy...and I said, 'You'd better be in great shape, because these movies really take it out on you.'"
Williams said she and Craig T. Nelson, her movie hubby, "had hesitations about doing even the first sequel. Much as I'm grateful for what the movies...did for my career, we felt we'd gone about as far as those characters would go."
Williams says Allen, star of ex-husband Brian De Palma's thrillers, will play her sister, who takes care of young Heather O'Rourke. Tom Skerritt is the male star.
© USA Today
POLTERGEIST III Review
Sad-sack sequels and silly superstition about a cast jinx are quickly overshadowing a remarkable movie. The original 1982 Poltergeist, directed by Tobe Hooper and co-produced by Steven Spielberg, was a powerful ghost story. The lackluster 1986 sequel, directed by Brian Gibson, distanced that memory. So did the notoriety attached to the deaths of several cast members: Dominique Dunne, the original's teen daughter, was strangled by her lover. Julian Beck, the evil Rev. Kane in the first sequel, died of cancer. Will Sampson, the Indian medicine man in Part II, died after undergoing a heart-lung transplant. On Feb. 1, the youngest member of the Poltergeist family -- 12-year-old Heather O'Rourke -- died from complications of an intestinal disorder. Now comes the dreadful Part III. Nothing here deserves note, except for O'Rourke, who finished the movie seven months before her death. While the other actors camp up the screenplay co-written by director Gary (Vice Squad) Sherman, O'Rourke acts the role she created at age 5 with thorough professionalism. Her character has been sent by her parents to Chicago to stay with an aunt and uncle (Nancy Allen and Tom Skerritt). The evil spirits who have haunted her from the first follow; so does the medium, played by an increasingly eccentric Zelda Rubinstein. ''Innocence is the only gift given in life; all else must be fought for,'' she mutters. Another character retorts: ''That's a lot of crap that doesn't mean anything.'' Precisely. Even the special effects -- the undead lurk in the hallway mirrors of a Chicago high rise -- fail to convince. O'Rourke's reactions are so authentic she compels belief; she seems to be the only one who realized that character integrity was the key to the first film's success. That is the mark of a true actress. She will be missed. (PG-13)