Rigorous Productions
John Ritter is an out-of-work writer and
Tom Arnold is a sleazy agent in "Hacks."
ACTOR JOHN RITTER
Ex-TV star moves easily
between big and little screen
By Tim Ryan
Star-BulletinWhen John Ritter telephones without warning you soon understand why this actor of nearly three decades has lasted so long in an industry he later describes as "occasionally back-stabbing." "Is this a good time? I'll be happy to call back. It's too early isn't it? I'm sorry," Ritter seems to plead.
His role as Jack Tripper in "Three's Company" -- the girl-crazy chef who acted gay so he could live with two "chicks" -- solidified his place in television history. He became a '70s icon, falling over the couch in every episode, long before Chevy Chase started doing it on "Saturday Night Live." And, no, he says, there are no plans for a "Three's Company" reunion.
"We're going to let sleeping sitcoms lie," Ritter says from Los Angeles. It's not like Ritter needs the work -- like the desperate, underplayed character he plays in his latest film, the uproariously funny "Hacks."
The film debuts Saturday at 8:45 p.m. at the Hawaii Theatre has part of the Hawaii International Film Festival.
During and since "Company," Ritter has made more than three dozen films and television shows, including a couple of series: "Hooperman" and "Heart's Afire" with Markie Post.
He's one of those rare actors capable of big and small screen roles, and able to select roles based on what tickles his fancy, not simply salary.
"The truth is, I have very naughty pictures of people in high places so they have to hire me," he says. "OK. I have been very, very lucky."
Ritter doesn't think it was a risk to appear in the Oscar-winning "Sling Blade" as Vaughan Cunningham, a sweet, nerdy, dignified gay man who befriends a woman and her young son. (Trivia alert: Ritter named the character for the one he played in the first season of "Happy Days" as Richie and Joanie Cunningham's older brother.)
"No risk involved, because it was directed and written by Billy Bob Thornton," Ritter said. "And he's a genius. If he told me to do a somersault from a trapeze without a net, I know he would be there to catch me. He did and he was."
The hilarious, Hollywood-slamming "Hacks" is about a group of out-of-work screenwriters and actors desperate for work. Ritter plays Hank, a more experienced and seemingly more sophisticated screenwriter who turns out to be even more ruthless than his younger counterparts. He is, perhaps, the quintessential hack.
"Hey, I thought it was about cab drivers or guys with horrible coughs," Ritter jokes. "I loved the script because it was so irreverent toward Hollywood and I enjoy taking pokes at some of the puffed up self-important people who work out here.
"I knew it was going to be fun because of the people involved. I had worked with Dave Foley on 'Newsradio,' Richard Kind was a guest star on 'Hooperman' and I worked with Ryan (O'Neal) in 'Nickelodeon'."
Stephen Rea and Illeana Douglas head the "Hacks" cast. Brian (Rea) and his unemployed television scribe buddies, Hank (Ritter), Neal (Foley), Benny (Richard Kind) and Ira (Dusty Kay) are playing their weekly poker game with the usual banter, but secretly the guys hope to get hired by Brian as writers for his new show. Tom Arnold plays Danny, a sleazy agent.
"Hacks" was directed and written Gary Rosen, who based it on his early screenwriting years and his poker-playing buddies.
What exactly is a "hack?" Someone who hires himself out to do routine writing which often is banal or hackneyed, Ritter agrees.
"Some (writers) are obscenely wealthy and some are just scraping by," Ritter said. "Some once did something quite memorable and now are parodies of their former selves."
Ritter says "Hacks" is "pretty much" tongue-in-cheek, but that the blatant, traitorous, back-stabbing among buddies does happen. And writers do get desperate for storylines for episodic television; that's why viewers see so many recycled stories.
"You have to be successful very quickly and very frequently and it's very hard to write a consistently good show with so many stipulations from the network about things like time slot and demographics."
Ritter, son of cowboy television star Tex Ritter, broke into films in 1970 in a Walt Disney feature starring Kurt Russell and Wally Cox. He also did two "Hawaii Five-0" shows, both times as the bad guy.
"And both times McGarrett had me booked by Danno."
Ritter's advice for would be actors and screenwriters:
"Follow your heart ... and don't take yourself too seriously. Every once in a while you do a job and get nothing out of it except some nice catering; you're just out there like the monkey dancing for a coin in the hat.
"But I believe we all have an invisible golden thread through our hearts and every so often an artist can make you cry or laugh or make you think in ways you've never thought before."
The moral of "Hacks"?
"Hi! Welcome to Hollywood. Watch your back."
HIFF Weekend Schedule
Remembering ‘Robin Hood’
By Tim Ryan
Star-BulletinIt started with a bedside promise to an elderly man. Eddie Kamae met Uncle Luther Kahekili Makekau when he was filming his first documentary in Waipio Valley in 1988. Three days after that memorable meeting, Makekau, a rascal, free-spirited, colorful and controversial Big Island legend, was dead at 98.
Makekau was a philosopher, chanter, singer, poet, lover, part-outlaw, cattle rustler, warrior and rebel -- the Hawaiian version of Robin Hood, Kamae said.
His story is told in a 60-minute video documentary, the latest in Eddie and Myrna Kamae's "Hawaiian Legacy Series." It debuts Sunday as part of the Hawaii International Film Festival.
"Hawaiian Legacy" was born in 1986 out of the Kamaes' belief that Hawaiian voices, language, music and wisdom should be preserved on film.
Makekau -- educated on the mainland, secure in the wealth and privilege befitting a judge's son -- chose to live on the coast of the Big Island, drinking, courting and making friends, while fishing, planting and rustling pigs and cattle to meet his daily needs.
The film includes stories and memories from several people who knew Makekau, interwoven with the last footage of him, filmed a few months before he passed away on Thanksgiving Day.
Makekau was a man of many contradictions and competing impulses, caught between centuries, between eras, Kamae said. He was a warrior chief who came of age at a time when Hawaiian culture was at a ebb, when the Hawaiian language and practice of traditional skills were discouraged and forgotten.
He was descended from a long line of warrior chiefs from Maui and the Big Island. Along with his skills as a horseman -- he worked for many years as a cowboy on Maui, Lanai, Kauai, Niihau and on the Big Island's Parker Ranch -- Makekau also was a chanter, understood Hawaii herbs and healing plants, and was the last direct source of information on traditional kapa making in Waipio Valley.
"He was a Hawaiian man of an older time, who lived in our own time," Kamae said. "He was one of our last links with a long-gone spirit of that era."
Luther Kahekili Makekau—
One Kine Hawaiian ManWorld premiere: 7 p.m. Sunday
HIFF Weekend Schedule
