Mulgrew May Leave Voyager
ate Mulgrew, who plays Captain Kathryn Janeway on Star Trek: Voyager, may be getting ready to abandon ship.
According to numerous reports--including an item in the Jan. 10 edition of The New York Daily News--Mulgrew would like to devote more time to her family and her stage career.
However, Paramount is reportedly denying the rumors, and Variety quoted the studio as saying Mulgrew "cannot imagine not participating in (the show's) entire run, whatever that may be."
Missing Dr. Who Episode Found
he BBC Online reports that a copy of the long-lost 1965 Doctor Who episode "The Lion" was discovered by a film buff from Napier, New Zealand.
The missing show is the first installment of a Who story called The Crusade, which starred William Hartnell as the Doctor and featured actor Julian Glover as King Richard the Lionheart.
While the BBC also has a copy of the third episode from The Crusade--called "The Wheel of Fortune"--the second and fourth installments remain missing and are the only two episodes from the show's second season that the BBC does not have. Unfortunately for Who fans, 30 of the 45 episodes from season three and 34 of the 43 episodes from season four are thought to have been destroyed or lost.
The discovery of "The Lion" is the greatest Who find since all four episodes of the story The Tomb of the Cybermen turned up in Hong Kong in 1991.
Battlefield Earth Director Set
oger Christian, a second-unit director on Star Wars - Episode I: The Phantom Menace, has signed on to helm Battlefield Earth, according to Variety.
The film is based on the famous L. Ron Hubbard SF novel of the same name and is being produced by Franchise Entertainment.
John Travolta will star in the flick and will also earn a producer's credit for the project, which was bounced from MGM and Fox after its budget topped $100 million. Now that the picture is at Franchise, its price tag has reportedly been trimmed to the $70 million range.
History Channel Looks At SF
he History Channel plans to air a one-hour show called In Search of History: The Truth About Science Fiction on June 8.
The project is being produced by Weller/Grossman's Lisa Riehn, who formerly worked on the Sci-Fi Channel show SF Vortex.
"It's an overall look at where science fiction became a reality," Riehn said. "Throughout the show we look at every place where science fiction and science collided."
The Truth About Science Fiction will feature interviews with numerous scientists and SF personalities, including noted authors Harlan Ellison and Larry Niven, and well-known fan Forrest J Ackerman.
Verbinski Flies From Mars
ousehunt director Gore Verbinski will no longer helm the upcoming Disney SF flick Mission to Mars, according to Variety.
Verbinski reportedly dropped the project due to budgetary concerns and creative differences with the movie studio, leaving behind a paycheck of about $2 million in the process.
Disney is looking for a new director to handle the picture and is reportedly interested in either Sam Raimi or Frank Marshall. The film is about a rescue mission to Mars sent to find a previous expedition that disappeared after finding something mysterious on the Red Planet.
Dante To Direct Sixth Day
oe Dante, the director behind DreamWorks' heavily animated SF flick Small Soldiers, has agreed to helm the cloning thriller The Sixth Day.
According to Variety, the Phoenix Pictures project is about a helicopter pilot who is replaced with a clone and later hunted by the agency that duplicated him.
Production on the $40 million flick is expected to begin by June, though no cast has been set. Dante's other credits include Gremlins, The Howling and Innerspace.
Zemeckis, Silver Build Dark Castle
ontact director Robert Zemeckis and Matrix producer Joel Silver have joined forces to create Dark Castle, a Warner Bros.-based film company that focuses on mid-budget horror flicks, according to Variety.
Supernova writer William Malone has agreed to direct the company's first film, a remake of the 1958 movie House on Haunted Hill (not to be confused with the upcoming DreamWorks project The Haunting of Hill House), which will carry a price tag of about $20 million.
Dark Castle plans to produce original pictures as well as remakes of classic works with an emphasis on horror films from the 1950s and 1960s. Zemeckis, who also helmed all three Back to the Future movies, will primarily serve as a producer at Dark Castle, although he will likely direct from time to time.
Heavy Gear II Gets Pre-Order Bonus
F gaming fans who place pre-orders with Barnes & Noble's online store for a copy of Activision's upcoming mech simulation Heavy Gear II will receive a free strategy guide to the game.
The promotional offer was launched Jan. 12 on Activision's Heavy Gear Web site and will run through early March.
In Heavy Gear II, players are tasked with leading an elite strike force of mechanized warriors that operates behind enemy lines on a distant planet. "Piloting some of the most superior mechanized units ever created, players embark on a series of covert missions to reconnoiter, destroy, sabotage and mislead enemy forces," according to Activision.
Crank! Publisher Calls It Quits
ryan Cholfin, the editor and publisher of the eclectic SF magazine Crank!, said he's suspending publication of his widely acclaimed but often uneven periodical.
"I kept it going this long by pulling rabbits out of hats each time Crank! ran into trouble, but, folks, there are no more rabbits," Cholfin wrote in a message he posted on the Crank! Web site.
Cholfin ends his "endless tale of financial crisis and irregularities" after a run of eight issues that, while not a fiscal success, nevertheless achieved his goal of serving up stories "unlike anything you're likely to find in [a] science fiction or literary magazine." The authors who appeared in Crank! ranged from established masters such as Ursula K. Le Guin to rising stars like Jonathan Lethem.
In September 1998, Tor Books--where Cholfin works as an editorial assistant--released a collection of 17 stories from Crank! entitled The Best of Crank!.
White Wins Sapphire Award
atricia White's electronic book A Wizard Scorned (Hard Shell Word Factory) earned the 1998 Sapphire Award for the best science fiction romance of the year.
The second place winner was another electronic book, Jennifer Dunne's Raven's Heart (New Concepts Publishing), while Laurell K. Hamilton took third place with her novel Blue Moon (Penguin).
The Sapphire Award is bestowed annually by readers of the Science Fiction Romance newsletter, who select from a list of 10 nominees. The award was created in 1995 in order to raise awareness of the SF romance field, which includes books in which both science fiction and romance are intrinisic to the story.
Briefly Noted
- The new syndicated SF series Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's The Lost World will make its U.S. premiere on Direct TV in February, according to Variety.
- Babylon 5 thespians Patricia Tallman (Lyta) and Jeffrey Willerth (Kosh) have announced their engagement, according to the Zocalo newsletter.
- The independent SF movie CUBE, which stars Deep Space Nine actress Nicole de Boer, will be released to video on Jan. 26.
- Lycos has created a special Star Wars section on the Web that includes, among other things, a clock that is counting down the seconds until the premiere of The Phantom Menace on May 21.
- The April issue of the comic book Astounding Space Thrills will feature a painting by acclaimed SF artist Frank Kelly Freas, according to Astounding writer Steve Conley.
- Halloween H2O director Steve Miner has agreed to helm Dimension Films' upcoming supernatural flick Ghosting, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
- Principal photography has commenced on Universal Pictures' supernatural thriller End of Days, which stars Arnold Schwarzenegger.
- Lady Naomi Mitchison, the "doyenne of Scottish literature" who wrote several SF&F works during her impressive tenure as an author, died Monday, Jan. 11, at the age of 101, according to AP.
- The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America Inc. has posted the list of preliminary nominees for the 1998 Nebula Awards on the SFWA Web site.
- The Kaleidoscope Media Group has agreed to distribute Gravity Angels, a full-length digitally animated 3-D SF film originally created for the Internet by Brilliant Digital Entertainment.
