The Tampa Tribune from Tampa, Florida • 46

THE TAMPA TRIBUNE, Tuesday, September 25, 1979 Prominent Tampa Attorney Is A ho A Movie Producer V'. v.vV" 4 i Vv tS -X 1 I I fl A V1 i '1 r' 'f A'' a '-it ''H I I'Xv A 'V whom Rood met through his "golfing buddy and partner in the oil business," actor James Garner. The method by which Rood's company shoots a picture the brainchild of business associate Sargent is faster, cheaper and easier than the way most major movies are filmed. Instead of traveling to exotic locations, using special effects, building sets, hiring hundreds of extras and putting cast and crew up in hotel rooms for months, SEE simply films stage performances. Period.

The Richard Pryor concert films were ungla-morous, straightforward documents of the comic on stage; nobody else was shown. It was just like sitting through a live performance except that it was a movie. The Sammy Davis Jr. film is similar in that it was shot on stage, although there are many other singers and dancers in the performing cast. Rood said the SEE film crews use up to 10 35mm movie cameras to capture the necessary performance footage jn a theater and then everybody collects his paycheck and goes home.

The rest is a quick job of editing the piles of film and getting the finished, quickly made movie out to the theaters. "As soon as 'Richard Pryor ended, 'Sammy Stops the World' opened and as soon as that's over we'll release Rood said. "Gayane," (pronounced guy-an-A), is an uncut, filmed performance of the Riga Ballet Company on the stage in their mother Russia. Rood says it will represent the first, but by no means the last, SEE attempt to produce and release a purely artistic movie on a grand scale. "I've seen the film several times and it's a big hit with all the ballet people," said Rood, who calls himself a "so-so" ballet fan.

"I think people will go to see it." The local proceeds for the movie will go to the Tampa Ballet Company, said Rood. And the attorney said the proceeds from the currently running "Sammy" will go to Berkeley Preparatory School in Tampa, where his three children (all now practicing attorneys) received their "excellent" pre-college educations. As is characteristic of the attorney's speech when discussing movies, statistics related to the success and failure of film ventures roll off his tongue as easily as some people name their children. "Did you know that in 1977 people bought more tickets to ballet than they did to professional football?" Rood asks. "Of course, the ticket prices were different and football is only played a few weeks a year, while ballet is done year-round.

But that's a lot of tickets." Rood said that if his company's more commercial films, like the first three efforts, are successful enough, SEE will produce more "cultural" films. ByGREGTOZIAN Tribune Staff Writer You can throw away all your notions that big-time movie producers have to be cigar-chewing, balding guys who call, everybody, "sweetie baby" and wouldn't be seen dead without their sunglasses and diamond pinky rings. Meet Ed Rood Sr a 64-year-old, soft-spoken, conservative dresser who as well as being a prominent Tampa attorney and civic mover and shaker is on his way to a second career as a successful movie producer, Friday, Rood's third major motion picture opened in Tampa movie houses and 300 other theaters in the United States. The 90-minute musical (showcasing the talents of one-man-show Sammy Davis called "Sammy Stops the World," follows close at the heels of Rood's first two movies, a pair of live-comedy pictures starring black stand-up funnyman Richard Pryor. "To tell you the truth, I never saw the pryor film, although I have a tape of it here," Rood said, speaking from behind the desk in his downtown Tampa law office, "He's not my idea of entertainment, Rood added, explaining his refusal to view or have his name associated with Pryor's thoroughly profane but hilarious concert films.

"I didn't want my name associated with the films in the credits. I still teach Sunday school," the attorney said. But while Rood is not bragging about the content of his first two movies, the Tampa businessman readily acknowledges "Richard Pryor Live In Concert" has enabled him and his associates at Special Event Entertainment Theatre Network Inc. (SEE) to continue their blitzkrieg style of moviemaking. "We spent about three quarters of a million dollars making 'Pryor said Rood, "and so far, according to Variety, it's made $22 million for us." With that kind of working capital, and three major films now in nationwide distribution, Rood and company are planning to launch a non-stop slew of live performance movies, he said.

Rood who admits his theatrical experience is limited to "very small parts in high school plays" said he first became interested in getting into movie producing when he was the president of the state Junior Chamber of Commerce. "It's a clean business and an excellent source of revenue. I tried to get them interested in getting movies made here," Rood said. "Within 55 miles of Tampa we have every kind of location you'd need to make a movie, except mountains." Rood said he became involved in the Pryor film at the suggestion of director Bill Sargent, Tampa attorney Ed Rood third major motion picture, "Sammy Stops The World," opened here Friday. and optimistic about his own film future, he laments the lack of interest in moviemaking among other businessmen in his home town.

"I'm trying to get people interested. If we could get one or two of the local banks to understand movies and movie loans, we'd be all right," he said, indicating that his primary concern would be to help the Bay area economy. Rood said he invited the mayor, members of the Chamber of Commerce and Committee of 100, a governor's representative and other commerce leaders to a reception and the opening of "Sammy Stops the World" to generate more interest in local film production. "If anybody wants to make a film in Florida, fd be willing to help," Rood said. "We're taking one boy from Japan, Canada, L.A.

and New York and bringing them together to play for the movie," Rood said. Rood said the film of the 28-Beatle-song play will be shot the first week in October and be released nationwide by Thanksgiving or Christmas. And other Broadway plays are in the works, as is the notion of using a new kind of entertainment process that is capable of sending live performance images to movie screens around the world from a unique camera that uses floating liquid to record images, instead of the standard medium, Rood said. 8 But while the Tampa attorney seems pleased "If you want to make money in this business you've got to aim for the young people, 72 percent of the movie audience is under 30," Rood clicked off. "But I'd like to, for instance, be able to make' a film of an opera I saw in Milano (Italy)." One project Rood will produce in the near future seems destined to be a smash with the "72 percent" portion of the audience he will be aiming for; the filmed version of the successful Broadway play, "Beatlemania." SEE plans to take one member from four separate theatrical productions of the play currently running worldwide, choosing the actors that look the most like the original Beatles.

fSammy' Stops The World; Viewers Get Off I NEBRASKA 1 XXX I Movie Review jf7 TTT $1.50 JH? Tj Tj 4 jjjjjP SEATED BEFORE Flofiltnd Mll Florida Ave Butch Blvdl Either Cinema 1 MR. NUKE'S AW mn mml MWfimr Jf TWO UHW-SM-fcOO-tHM-Midril Plv I HUNGRY SAMMY STOPS THE WORLD YOUNG WOMEN I ByGREGTOZIAN Tribune Staff Writer There are exactly 261 seats in theater number four of the Horizon Park 4 Cinema on Hillsborough Avenue. I know because I counted them. I counted them for something to do (anything to do) during the showing of a new film, "Sammy Stops the World," starring the admittedly multi-talented Sammy Davis Jr. Perhaps I would have felt guilty about getting up in the middle of the movie to walk up and down the aisle counting chairs had it not been for the fact that 260 of the seats were empty during my excruciating stay for the show.

Yes, I and I alone sat through "Sammy" in its entirety Saturday night. In fact, I had the dubious distinction of being the last person (not in the employ of American Multicinema) out of the Horizon Park 4 building that night. And let me tell you, as I walked out stunned by what I had attempted to watch on the screen with a theater employee eyeing me accusingly for having kept him at work to the bitter end, it was as close to starring in a real-life episode of "The Twilight Zone" as I ever want to come. To be perfectly fair, there were five MfjiM Critic's roting: Zilch Rated: PG Stars: Sammv Davis Jr. Director: Mel Shapiro.

Contains minimal suggestive language. Now Dlaying at the Horizon Park 4 and Varsltv 4 cinemas. WW'11 WW Teenage Betrayal PIUS ARMED SERVICE 3 XXX RATED FILMS COMING SOON LIVE BURLESQUE ON STAGE (Are they androids or something?) seemed to be appreciating the show, although they weren't sent into convulsions by the magic of the evening. And Sammy Davis voice has never been better. But the play he and his leading lady, Marian Mercer, are forced to act out is one of the most uninteresting phenomena I have ever witnessed.

The lines are as hackneyed as the advertising copy for a new laundry soap and most of the songs while the performers are capable (Who is culpable?) are lousy and allowed to go on seemingly forever. The one high point of the evening comes when Sammy Davis Jr. and cast sing a rousing, gospel version of "Gonna Build a Mountain" 30 minutes into the movie. And I suppose the final number, "I Gotta Be Me," was done well. But by that time I was dumbfounded by one hour and 45 minutes of the slowest-moving film I have ever seen.

Nobody else was around to hear the swan song Saturday. When, at the close of the movie, Sammy asks another character in the play about his life, I admit I was on the fringe. "Has it really been 35 years?" Sammy asks. "No, I doubt it," I screamed back at the screen, my voice echoing in the understandably empty theater. "But sweet mother of pearl, how it seems like it." XXX FILMS MIONITE SHOWS fRI.

SAT. ail I79-05M Rush right info ffiowaMJohiisoii! specials end other people sitting with me during the first 10 minutes of "Sammy Stops the World." But by the time the film was half over (I knew it was the halfway mark because I kept, for some reason, staring at my wristwatch) even the last two hardcore film buffs had vacated the premises. I do not know what makes Sammy run, but after Saturday night I know only, too well what can make even Sammy (Davis Jr.) fans run out on his latest film. It is simply a terrible movie. The film is composed of live-performance footage of a Long Beach, show Davis did based on "Stop the World, I Want To Get Off (which he has performed recently on the legitimate stage).

Director Mel Shapiro seems to have a good grip on what he wanted the camera to be doing during the filming; the accompanying singers are all able, the sets are interesting and the audience ISl.SO'TIl 3:30 P.M. FOR STARRED)) FEATURES! LAST 1Q DAYS A I NJ 35-9 55 "NORTH DALLAS 40'H "DRACULA" Septembei'30. 2:00 3:55 5:55 7:55 9:55 NOW! 6:00 "SEDUCTION OF JOE TYNAN" IS EREAKISG "ROCKY II 55 "NORTH DALLAS "SAINT JACK" (R) Save on Chopped Beefsteak. WIT 2.00-4)0-6:00 "MR. MIKE (HONDO VIDEO SHOW" sept.

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