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About Griffin daily news. (Griffin, Ga.) 1924-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 17, 1977)
On set of '‘Rollercoaster 9 By Dick Kleiner HOLLYWOOD - (NEA) - We’ve had fires, floods, earthquakes. We’ve had folks in jeopardy on planes, ships, trains. It would seem the men making disaster movies had about run out of locales for their tragedies and near tragedies. But here we are with “Rollercoaster,” a movie in which a bunch of peo ple riding an amusement park ride are in big trouble, grave danger. About the only thing left is a film about a runaway tricycle. Os course, Jennings Lang, who is producing “Roller coaster,” insists it’s really not a disaster movie. And, as he explains it, it isn’t. It’s more of a trying-to-prevent-a disaster movie. The gimmick in this one is that an extortionist threatens to blow up rollercoasters in various amusement parks un less the authorities come up with a lot of loot. Timothy Bottoms plays the villain and George Segal is the man who is forced by circumstances to be his adversary. They were shooting recently at Magic Mountain, a relative ly new amusement park north of Los Angeles. It’s big, modern, clean — and it boasts a dandy rollercoaster, just right for the big climax of the movie. It's called the Magic Moun tain Revolution, and it goes up, down and over a series of hills on the site. Its big feature is a complete loop, with the rollercoaster train completely upside down for a second or two. Time after time, as director Judy Collins stretches voice By MARY CAMPBELL AP Newsfeatures Judy Collins has six gold LPs and says she thinks she’s head ed soon for her seventh, for “Bread and Roses,’’ which went on sale last September. The rousing title song, re leased as a single, “didn’t be come a household word,” so an other cut from the album, “Ev erything Must Change,” is being released soon. Her biggest single hits have been “Both Sides Now,” “Su zanne,” “Amazing Grace” and “Send in the Clowns.” She says, “ ‘Amazing Grace’ wasn’t the biggest in sales but it was probably most important in terms of opening up markets among people who weren’t my GOODE NICHOLS Furniture Co. Home of BEAUTYREST MATTRESS & BOX SPRINGS @ithday§ale Final Clearance On Women’s Shoes s 5 &’7 Taken From Regular Stock. Values to $32. Group Men’s Shoes *lO to *l6 Group Children’s ]Q (1 . Shoes Bto 10 Men’s Belts y 2 price OPEN ALL m egk DAY WED. «■! W * SERVICE SHOES '.QU AUTY ■S99I 125 South Hill Street Cameras roll and so do actors James Goldstone called for action, the cars came swoop ing around the bends, dove down the hills, climbed up the other side and then, with the extras screaming and shriek ing, looped the loop. The big problem, Goldstone said, was to keep up the level of enthusiasm among the ex tras riding the rollercoaster. “You have to keep telling them not to get bored,” he said. “You have to tell them to keep screaming, no matter how many times they’ve ridden it.” And they’ve ridden it a lot. The extras and the principal actors are getting blase about it. Bottoms rode it some 30 times. George Segal rode another one 40 times. This is the third amusement park the company has shot in. The other ones were in Ocean View, a park near Norfolk, Va., and King’s Dominion, a park near Richmond, Va. The thread of the story has the extortionist (Bottoms) demonstrating his seriousness of purpose in the other two parks. He is successful at Ocean View, bombing a ride and killing 24 people. King’s Dominion is his second target, Magic Mountain his third. The only disaster in the film is that first tragedy at Ocean View. As Lang says, “This isn’t a disaster film — we only have one accident in the pic ture, and that’s near the beginning.” But it is the threat of impen ding disaster, the possibility that the other rollercoasters will come crashing down, that is, they hope, the thing that will make the public want to JUDY COLLINS fans before. I had religious Southerners for fans after that; they heard the song and loved it. And it helped with my Eng lish audience, too.” Miss Collins, who has hypnot ic eyes, has been singing pro fessionally for 18 years. “My son was two months old when I got my first regular job sing ing. It was in Boulder, in a little coffee house near the Uni versity of Colorado.” Her son, she is pleased to say, had no lasting effects from a bad accident on a sled sev eral years ago. “He is very musical, very bright. It’s nice see the film. Goldstone kept moving his camera, scampering up and down the hills to get new angles to capture the roller coaster as it thundered down the tracks. At one point, the camera was at the base of the hill, with the cars coming right down into the lens. “Please send the car now,” Goldstone ordered. And, via walkie-talkies, the word went out and the car started its ride. It came down the hill toward the camera and the camera crew involuntarily jumped. “The damn thing came right down my throat,” said one of the cameramen. As the passengers — all ex tras this time — rode the thing, they mostly had their hands raised. Apparently, that’s the new style of roller coaster riding. In my day, you clutched the bar with everything you had, but now you keep your hands up for fun. One of the riders said that the big, dangerous-looking loop was actually not very scary. He said that what shook him, rather, was when the cars rounded the corners. “It shakes like a Jeep on a rough road going around those corners,” he said. “But the loop itself is easy.” Still, the whole picture is giving stunt coordinator John Daheim problems. “It’s a hard picture for us,” he said, “because it's all un usual. When we’ve done things before, we know what to ex- to be able to brag.” His father, from whom she has long been divorced, has a Ph.D. in Eng lish literature. In 1976, Miss Collins spent six months touring, singing at sum mer festivals and, in the fall, singing on college campuses, ending with two December con certs at Carnegie Hall in New York. It was the most concen trated tour she had done since 1971. In 1972, she took most of the year to write songs, then did about 30 concerts yearly until 1976. She ended her 1976 concerts with “Bird on a Wire,” by Leonard Cohen, her favorite song, and included “Song for Duke,” which she wrote after Duke Ellington’s funeral, one of her favorite songs among those she has written. The “Bread and Roses” al bum, on Elektra Records, where she has been since the early 19505, includes “Take this Longing” by Cohen and “I Didn’t Know about You” by El lington, which she says, is a re make of “Sophisticated Lady,” with words by Bob Russell. Once Miss Collins was known as an American folk singer. But then folk music and its best known singers — except Pete Seeger, who remains a folkie — melded into the pop music stream. “After 1966 I wasn’t a folk singer per se. I had branched into Brecht and Weill, Italian Renaissance music, Jacques Brel.” Then she added contem porary American pop singers, from Randy Newman to Elton John, and also started writing songs herself. Unlike most pop singers, Miss Collins takes voice les sons. “I think my best qualities as an individual singer have to do with my phrasing and color ation, and all of that depends on the quality of my instrument — my voice. I really have high goals in mind and it takes a long time of studying and work ing to maintain good habits and not fall back into patterns that lead to tension. “The voice is an amazing creation; it can keep improv ing. It’s not like dancers who can’t dance beyond a certain age. As long as you’re not mis treating it, your voice will last until you want to give up the ghost. “I want to be prepared to do a Broadway musical or one woman show. This year I’ll concentrate basically on records, writing and TV. I’d like to put together a special.” In 1974, Miss Collins and Jill Godmilow made a film, “An tonia: A Portrait of the Wom an,” about conductor Antonia Brico, who had been Miss Col lins’ piano teacher in Denver. “I’m a Taurus and we want to have a lot of control, I’m told. “I felt I wanted to be in volved in every single minute step of that film. I financed it myself and directed it with an other woman. We edited it to gether — she did the physical editing.” The movie was nomi nated for an Academy Award, in the “best documentary” cat egory. Another plus is that the mov ie brought recognition — and performance offers — to Miss Brico. “She’s really cooking now,” Miss Collins says. “She hardly has a moment to her self.” pect and how to handle things. But we haven't done stunts with rollercoasters before.” Down in Virginia, two stunt people — one man, one woman — were hurt in a fall from a car. Daheim says the man catapaulted too far, dragging the woman with him. They weren’t hurt seriously. The next time, they knew how to handle it. The film has a big cast — besides Segal and Bottoms, Henry Fonda, Richard Wid mark and Harry Guardino also appear. Lang says he’s all for all-star casts. “An all-star cast,” he says, “makes it much easier for the writers. It simplifies the \ .Li jJJ Washington's Birthday gale > UP TO " OPEN FRIDAY 3:30 * M - Broken Sizes —One Os A Kind—Reduced From Our Regular Stock! No Alterations —Use Your Morrow Powell- Smith Roberts Charge Account Or £3 ggl MEN’S DEPT. 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In ‘Airport ’77,’ I have people like Jack Lem mon and Olivia DeHavilland. The writer doesn’t have to take time to build characters for them; as soon as they come on screen, the audience already knows what kind of people they are.” I asked Lang and Goldstone if they were worried, lest the picture give some would-be extortionist or disturbed per sonality any ideas. Could this film perhaps start a rash of attacks on rollercoasters and other amusement park rides? Page 17 Both of them felt any such danger was minimal. “I’m not worried about it,” Lang said. “In the first place, we show no details. The actual bomb isn’t a real-type bomb.” "Anyhow,” Goldstone said, “I feel that if a guy wants to do something bad, he’ll do it with or without a movie to give him ideas. If he wants to throw nails out of his car win dow, he’ll do it whether or not a movie shows such a scene.” The rollercoaster kept roll ing along, the extras scream ing as they went and waving their hands. It was just another day’s work on the rollercoaster. (NEWSPAPER ENTERPRISE ASSN. > -Griffin Daily News Thursday, February 17,1977 *£& > ftSfe* limW Ji IM / Tuwoiii! «Msf a>*\ \ &, '*-'■ ffiraaaE' • ’tST* Be llfflKMjkWOt S <* OiO W1 &4i WMNMMi WHO’S THE STAR? George Segal may be top-billed, but the Magic Mountain Revolution rollercoaster is the real at traction in “Rollercoaster.”
