Page 8 - The Michigan Daily - Weekend etc. -March 4,1993
Witty 'PlyrLite'

by Sarah Weidman
- Life is a vicious circle, and it re-
volves that way in "Mistress.". In the
reflective fashion of "The Player," the
movie stars Robert Wuhl as Marvin , a
screenwriter/director. Marvin once
wrote a film about a painter who loses
his mind and kills himself. Sounds a bit
morbid? Well, the actors playing the

Mistress
Directed by Barry Primus; with
Robert Wuhl, Martin Landau and
Robert De Niro.

producers and investors in "Mistress"
thought so, too. They want to rewrite it.
Directed by Barry Primus, "Mis-
tress" is a comical view of the ordeal of
getting a movie made in Hollywood.
Marvin keeps busy in L.A., directing
bizarre home instructional videotapes
on "cooking and the stars," while his
sniveling wife (Laurie Metcalf) is open-
ing a restaurant in New York City.
Marvin's former college professor Jack
Ross (Martin Landau) finds an old manu-
script of his and wants to produce it.
Marvin needs the work and recognition
as much as Jack needs to reclaim his
reputation, so the two go into business
together. What follows is a witty and
complex story of the artificiality that
goes on in the "The Big Orange."
Jack lets Stuart, the twenty-four year
old son of an Oscar winning screen-
writer,join on as a third wheel. Stuart is
normally a bland guy who tries not to
say too much and admits that he's "just

here to be used." But once he starts
talking abouthis plans for the script, the
passion flows. However, Marvin has
no plans to change his script and insists
on keeping it the way it was written.
Unfortunately for Marvin, that's not
the way things work in Tinseltown -
particularly when investors played by
Robert De Niro, Danny Aiello and Eli
Wallach join in. Just selling the script to
them means changing it as they speak.
The backers are more interested in get-
ting their mistresses in the movie than
about the script itself. They have their
own vision of the role for their woman,
and this causes problem for Marvin's
attempts to maintain originality.
Watching DeNiro is reason enough
to see the movie. His role of Mr. Wright
is a smart-assed conniver with money
to blow. He knows the power he holds
in the business and treats people like
dirtbecausehecan. When Stuarttries to
sell him the story, Wright shoots him a
look and asks, "How old are you, son?"
Stuartresponds, "Twenty-four." Wright
says flatly, "Talk to me in five years,"
then turns to continue his previous con-
versation.
Marvin, in response, kisses Wright's
butt. It's hard not to sympathize with
the screenwriter. The pressure of the
business gets to Marvin, to the point
where his real life blends with his art,
paralleling the script.
"Mistress" quietly emergesasawitty
satire which makes you laugh and wince
a little. It's "The Player Lite."
MISTRESS is playing through
tomorrow at the Michigan Theater

by David Pava
Cliff Eberhardt and Kristina Olsen are concert
tour veterans. Cliff began when he was sixteen,
playing with his big brother. He has since moved on
to touring with the likes of Richie Havens, and a
budding solo career. "I used to play lead for Richie,"
,Cliff said. "We toured together a bunch. I would
come out and open for him and then I would play
lead for him."
Kristina Olsen used to tour cross-country in a
pickup truck. "I used to sleep in the back," she said.
"It used to get really cold in the back and my breath
would condense on the roof of the pickup truck...
I had this big old down bag and the next day while
I'd drive all day long the sunlight would hit the roof
and it would make all that moisture condense and
drip on that sleeping bag. So I had a very soggy
bunch of tours."
Kristina traces her love of music back to her
childhood.
"I was born in San Francisco," she said. "I grew
up there during the sixties. Itwas pretty wild. That's
kind of where I got my love for folk music, I would
say. My mom took me to hear people like Joan Baez
back then, and Steve Goodman, and Bob Dylan. In
fact my first record player came with a free copy of
'Like a Rolling Stone,' by Bob Dylan. It was pretty
wild."

Her diverse musical palette is something Olsen
is especially proud of.
"I go across the board a lot," she answered. "On
the newest record there's a lot of down and dirty
funk blues. There's a jazz ballad. There's one song
that almost sounds bluegrassy... There's definitely
some things with rock sounds to them, but they're
all done on all acoustic instruments. The only thing
that holds it together as far as I'm concerned is the
fact that I wrote and sang all of them.
Cliff, however, shies away from the label of
singer-songwriter. "I play acoustic popular music.
I would say I'm much more pop and rock oriented
than most people who will be coming through the
Ark, which hurt me at first, actually. When I first
started touring after the album (The Long Road, on
Windham Hill) came out, it was that folk purist
stuff that was killing me. People would say, 'You
have this rock voice and you're playing real loud
and you're playing these clubs.' But now people I
guess have accepted the fact that there are many
different kinds of music."
"Music is music to me," he said. "I don't see
why they say, 'Oh it's just folk music,' or 'Oh, it's
just blues.' I hope everybody that plays music
stretches a little bit. I don't think traditional music
is ever going to come back to stay. It had its time,
you know?"

Cliff and Kristina dig music, each other

Cliff was asked about the songs he writes.
"I usually write about lack of love songs," he
answered. "I havea worse attitude than John (Gorka)
does about the whole thing. John's sad and I'm
pretty pissed off. I try to put a lot of irony and humor
in my songs because I think life is incredibly ironic.
I live in New York," he added.
Kristina and Cliff have played concerts together
many times, and show mutual admiration for each
other.
"I really dig Cliff," Kristina said. "He's got areal
edge to his voice. It's fun for us to get together. He
usually plays guitar on some of my stuff, so we
definitely jump on stage on each others' sets, which
is real fun. He's agood guy,andhe's agood dancer."
"I have done many gigs with Kristina," Cliff
said. "She was trying to teach me (to dance) onNew
Year's Eve. She's, like, a nut dancer. I mean this girl
lives for dancing. New Year's Eve she opened for
me in Maine and she had the whole place dancing.
She's very very sweet."
Kristina Olsen and Cliff Eberhardt are musi-
cally versatile and lyrically adept. Kristina can play
fifteen instruments. Cliff plays a wicked guitar.
Together, their musical styles complement each
other. And they can dance, too.
Clff Eberhardt and Kristina Olsen perform
Thursday, March 4, at the Ark. Tickets are $8.75.

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Bon Jovi rocks the Palace

BON JOVI
Continued from page 1
step back, away from it, and find out
who they were individually again," he
concluded.
Jon's introspection can be seen right
on "Keep The Faith." Six of the 12
songs on the album are not collabora-
tions with Samboraas on most Bon Jovi
songs, but rather written entirely on his
own.
"... On my solo record I got a chance
to air my laundry, and on (Jon's) solo
record, it was attached to a movie, so he
couldn'tkind of airhis views," Sambora
explained. "So I understood where he
was coming from with that. He was
waiting for me to get done with my solo
stuff and he was getting antsy so he had
to write some songs."
Bon Jovi has always stayed close to
its fans, even inviting "people off the
street" to help make the final song selec-
tions for their albums and, ultimately, it
will be the fans who decide how these
songs fare on the charts.

"The business guys in the music
industry can only push it down people's
mouths so much. But when the people
want it, when the fans want that kind of
music form and they want it to happen,
that's when you become successful.
That's why we're basically a people's
band. As I get older and more mature, I
start to realize that the energy of the
audiences I play to mean all the differ-
ence in the world between having a
great show and a good show," Sambora
said.
So far the people have spoken for
Bon Jovi, giving life to "Keep The
Faith," despite critics' initial uneasi-
ness about the album. So it seems that
Bon Jovi's niche is still there for them
because, although things have changed,
they really haven't changed that much.
"We're more grown up and we're
more focused," Sambora said. "And the
important thing is what we started out
with - the five guys and the music."

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Robert DeNiro arguing why Scorsese is such a god.

Bon Jovi used to be the kings of pop metal, before grunge came around.


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