Welcome to the Matt Damon Column,
a forum for sharing news among Matt fans.

6/30/99
ATPH news - Thus wrote Val:

... My mom phoned me with news published in The Santa Fe Bulletin (a smaller NM distributed in the SF area). She read a short blurb in Sunday's edition which mentioned that ATPH had wrapped up filming and was in post production. The major players had scattered to work on their next projects. According to ATPH publicist, a spring 2000 release is expected with a Santa Fe premiere planned the week prior to national release. Also mentioned were the tentative publicity photos which include Matt riding REDBO set against a NM sunset and headshots of Matt, Henry, & Penelope set against a photo of the hacienda.
TIDBIT FROM FILMING OF PRISON SCENES: In talking further with Nick (the extra in ATPH prison scenes), I learned an interesting tidbit. During the scene where Matt is attacked by another prisoner, there is a scuffle during which the choreography calls for Matt to be punched in the face. Apparently, the scene was so intense that the actor really did hit Matt causing his mouth to bleed profusely. Billy Bob instructed the actors to keep going. Apparently, the scene was just what Billy Bob wanted because this turned out to be the only take for that part of the fight scene.
Also, Nick e-mailed a photo taken of the extras in their prison garb--some scary looking guys there!

Variah wrote:

Yet another show has featured Matt, Ben and Howard Zinn, author of "A People's History of the United States." Here's what they said.
Matt Damon and Ben Affleck have turned to a controversial author as the inspiration behind a new television mini-series, one that without their pull, may have never gotten off the ground.
They may won an Academy Award, but Matt Damon and Ben Affleck are not forgetting their roots, and the man who influenced them more than anyone.
Matt: I lived next door to him when I was very young and so he had a very big impact on my entire family.
Matt is talking about his former Boston neighbor, professor Howard Zinn. Thursday night, the pair honored Zinn for forty-five years of social activism. The famed historian wrote the bestselling A People's History of the United States. Some call Zinn a radical leftist, but Matt and Ben call Zinn their "Zen Master."
Ben: He's, I honestly feel, a modern day role model and hero.
So big a hero, they even included a reference to Zinn in their Oscar winning movie, Good Will Hunting.
Scene from Good Will Hunting:
Will: You want to read a real history book, read Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States. That book will *** knock you on your ***.
Zinn was one of the first intellectuals to oppose the Vietnam War in the 60s, leading student rallies, flying to North Vietnam to meet with Communist leaders, and the professor persuaded African American students at all Black Spellman College to protest segregation in the South. The controversy cost him his job.
Zinn: Me, a source of controversy? Well, I guess anyone who opposes, you know, the orthodoxy, anybody who opposes a war...
Now Zinn's two most famous fans are turning their mentor's book into what could become a very controversial mini-series for Fox.
Ben: And we're very proud to be working with you on a People's History of the United States, the television event.
The 50 million dollar show will reportedly star Damon's love, Winona Ryder and Danny Glover. It will be Zinn's story of America through the eyes of ordinary Americans, a story that Ben and Matt say must be told.
Matt: There's no separating his actions and his words, and he's one of the few people in the world that I've met where that's the case.
The project is in the early stages of development, but so far Ben and Matt are not the writing team. The Oscar winners have hired another screenwriter.

This was in Wednesday(6/30)'s Daily Variety. I haven't copied the article here, but it's on the website if you're interested.
Denise Richards and Luke Wilson are the stars of 'The Third Wheel', the first movie from Pearl Street's production schedule. Noteworthy is that it starts production on July 13 in LA, just after ATPH and Reindeer Games have finished. But who knows how much involvement either will have - Ben's still got a role, but Matt's small role wasn't mentioned in the article.
Miramax is the distributor (big surprise there). Not a bad B-list cast, which could have been a lot worse. Is this why no casting news for Matt? Or is this project called a working holiday?

6/23/99
Someone has seen "Ripley":
Thus wrote Felicity:

Have a look at this one. It's from a column in the Hollywood Reporter.
"Paramount's marketing chief Arthur Cohen lauded Sherry Lansing's fall schedule of films. "One better than the other. Martin Scorsese's 'Bringing Out the Dead' with Nic Cage, Ving Rhames and Patricia Arquette is high drama at its best. Oscar-worthy, as is 'Angela's Ashes,' adapted from Frank McCourt's best-selling memoir -- audiences will cry. Emily Watson and Robert Carlyle star, with Alan Parker directing, and while it breaks your heart, you'll leave the theater uplifted by the triumph of the human spirit. 'The Talented Mr. Ripley,' based on 'Purple Noon,' is breathtakingly beautiful to look at, and Matt Damon delivers his most complex performance in a multifaceted role, with Gwyneth Paltrow and Jude Law co-starring, plus great jazz, set as it is around the '50s jazz boites in Rome. And, hey, it's sexy!"

The draught may be finally over - this from Felicity:

This was from Tuesday's Boston Herald. Let's hope filming has finished by then...
Celebs set to Challenge Fenway
by Gayle Fee and Laura Raposa
Tuesday, June 22, 1999
It'll be a regular Field of Dreams when Hollywood hunks Kevin Costner and Matt Damon step up to the plate at Fenway Park the Sunday before the All-Star Game to try to belt a few out onto Lansdowne Street.
Kevvie and our favorite Cambridge homeboy, who is a rabid Red Sox fan, will join two other sluggers with star power and eight former baseball biggies at the All-Star Celebrity Hitting Challenge at Fenway on July 11.
``Costner took part in last year's challenge in Denver, so he's a veteran,'' said Red Sox PR guy Dick Bresciani. ``We're still awaiting word on the two other celebs.''
We heard that retired Denver Bronco biggie John Elway, who picked up a Louisville Slugger during the 1998 All-Star Game, newly retired New York Ranger Wayne Gretsky and NBA legend Michael Jordan were names being bandied about for the baseballfest. But Bresciani said he's ``99 percent sure'' the all-star athletes won't be making the Fenway scene this year.
``I heard those names, too,'' he said. ``But there are either scheduling problems or they have other commitments.''
Bresciani said he's still awaiting word from Major League Baseball on the identities of the four Hall of Famers and four retired Red Sox sluggers who will team up with Matt and Kevin.
Here's how it works: There will be four teams with three players - a celeb and two baseball greats. They'll be playing for points. Obviously, the farther the balls go, the more points the teams rack up.
``There will be netting set up all over the field with various point scores on them,'' said Bresciani. ``Frankly, I have no idea what the winners get.''
Hey, just standing at home plate in Fenway Park will be prize enough for ``Good Will Hunting'' hunk Damon, who admits he had those Little League dreams of suiting up for the hometown team.
The Cambridge cutie is such a ferocious fan, dad Kent Damon sent videotapes of the Sox games to his son in Italy last summer where Matty was shooting ``The Talented Mr. Ripley.''
We hear Damon, who has rubbed elbows with ``Rocket'' Roger Clemens, would love to have retired Sox catcher Carlton Fisk on his celebrity hitting squad. And of course, the Track would love to have Matt bring his gamin galpal, Winona Ryder, to sit in the stands and cheer.
Such a photo op!
As for other stars making the All-Star scene, we heard that Kelsey Grammer of ``Frasier'' fame is planning to be in the crowd July 13 as a guest of Gov. Paul Cellucci.
The gov invited Kels to the game when he broke bread with the actor in Hollywood last April. The TV shrink already has made plans to shuttle in from New York, where he will be shooting ``15 Minutes'' with Robert De Niro. So we hope the gov remembers the invitation!
Which got us to thinking . . . Where would the gov score his tickets to the (probable) Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosafest???
``Well, if the governor needs tickets, he'd get them from us,'' said Bresciani. ``Major League Baseball just handles the national political types and other officials. I hope the governor doesn't want 100 tickets. Because we don't have that many to give him.''
Maybe Matt Damon will sell him a couple of his. Ya know, to spread Good Will and all that. . .

I had a chance to pick up a few British film magazines, Empire and Total Film. There were a few things about Matt in both. Empire named the Talented Mr. Ripley as #13 out of 20 of the most eagerly awaited films of this year. Also, in a story suspiciously like one that appeared on E!, Matt and Minnie's feud was discussed among a host of other Hollywood feuds.
Didn't love that one, since it called Matt a "meathead". Will this Oprah breakup story never die? Total Film had a two page spread on Matt and Ben. Basically, it lauds their success as one of the best things to happen to film in the 90's. It goes on to say that Ben seems to have positioned himself for stardom more aggressively than Matt who, the article says, "must content himself with literary adaptations such as The Talented Mr. Ripley, All the Pretty Horses and Cold Mountain that are so beloved of Oscar voters." So, they think he's doing Cold Mountain. I'll transcribe all the articles for you when I get home.
An Ideal Husband is showing over here, though it doesn't seem to be getting the hype of Notting Hill, which appears to be showing in every theater in Britain. Matrix and She's All That are also big here.

Damonites: I received an e-mail from Nick in Los Alamos, NM who worked as an extra for the penitintiary scenes in Santa Fe. Read about it on AINT IT COOL NEWS: . Thanks, Nick!

Elizabeth wrote to let me know of an intersting article which showed up on Mr. ShowBiz on 6/1. It seems that Corey Feldman, the actor, had some choice words to say about Matt and Ben, esp. the latter. Read the article

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