TV Director Shriner's First Feature Is a "Hoot"
April 7, 2006By MARTIN A. GROVE
Hollywood Reporter
"Hoot" helmer: In a marketplace as crowded with movies as it now is, virtually no weekend ever sees only one new film go into wide release.
For a time, however, it appeared that the first weekend in May would be a rare exception with only Paramount's "Mission: Impossible 3" opening wide. That changed recently when New Line shifted its and Walden Media's family comedy "Hoot" from late April to May 5. Going up against "MI3" shouldn't hurt "Hoot" since the two films are targeted to very different audiences. It's a distribution strategy that brings to mind the weekend of June 23-25, 1989 when Disney's family comedy "Honey, I Shrunk the Kids" arrived to a solid $14.3 million while Warner Bros.' "Batman" kicked off with $40.5 million.
While "Hoot" marks Wil Shriner's feature directorial debut, he's been helming television shows going back to the early 1980s. Written by Shriner, the film is based on the 2002 best-seller by Carl Hiaasen. A longtime Miami Herald columnist, Hiaasen had already written some 10 novels for adults since 1986 before turning to young readers with "Hoot." Shriner, of course, is a familiar name from hosting his own television series, acting in films like Francis Coppola's "Peggy Sue Got Married" and directing episodes of hit TV shows like "Frasier" and "Everybody Loves Raymond." Produced by Frank Marshall and by singer-songwriter-author Jimmy Buffett, who also did five songs for the film, "Hoot" was executive produced by Toby Emmerich, Kevin Reidy and Gregg Taylor. Starring are Luke Wilson, Logan Lerman, Brie Larson, Cody Linley and Tim Blake Nelson.
Talking recently to Shriner about how the movie reached the screen, he explained, "It all began about 2 1/2 years ago in Key West. I met with Carl Hiaasen and Jimmy Buffett over a fish sandwich. Jimmy had bought the rights to 'Hoot' the book from his fishing buddy Carl. Carl had made a film once before called 'Skinny Dip' that left a little bit of a bad taste in his mouth in terms of how it eventually came to the screen. He was concerned that the movie stayed somewhat true to the book. So our promise over that fish sandwich was, 'Yes, let's get a script that we all like and then we'll go out and shop it.' Jimmy said, 'How do you do that?' And I said, 'Well, the best way would be to have a script that we like and I would be willing to write that script under the condition that I direct the movie.'"
