I was spending this work week at the Red Roof Inn in Cranberry Township, just north of Pittsburgh, one of the few motel chains that offer Showtime network rather than HBO. This evening Showtime presented Horton Foote's "The Convicts," the story of a thirteen-year-old boy in 1902 Mississippi, on a sugar cane plantation. The plantation is worked by convicts from a nearby prison, under the watchful eye of the elderly Confederate veteran who owns the plantation, portrayed by Robert Duvall. The boy, named Horace, played by Lukas Haas, lives with an African-American couple who work on the plantation, James Earl Jones being head of that house. Horace runs the plantation's small store. Some relatives are visiting the plantation owner, one of whom is played by Carlin Glynn, Mary Stuart Masterson's mother. Peter Masterson, Ms. Masterson's father, directed "The Convicts." At one point, Horace tells Duvall's character that he has no brother, only a sister. His sister and mother live in Houston now that his father is dead. Horton Foote would continue Horace's story into the post World War I era when Horace would travel to Houston to visit his mother and sister. His sister's name: LILY DALE, a character Mary Stuart Masterson would portray on both the stage and for Showtime in 1996.
The new discussion board, dedicated to the movie "Fried Green Tomatoes," along with the career of Mary Stuart Masterson, is the winner of the Tavern's site award. Chris's discussion board is more evidence of growing interest in, and support for, Ms. Masterson's film and television projects. The more websites, bulletin boards, and internet forums, the better. Hollywood types will see in all the "buzz" on the internet that we all want to see Mary Stuart Masterson in more movies, more television shows and specials, and more daytime and late night talk shows. Let there be more sites throughout the internet! Good work on a fine board for the fans, Chris.
A visitor going by the internet name Towandajo (Yes, "Towanda, the incredible Amazon woman: TOWANDA!!!") sent me an e-mail about her new FRIED GREEN TOMATOES discussion forum. She sent the URL along with an invitation for any of our visitors to stop by and leave some comments. As "Fried Green Tomatoes" will be shown in the long version three times this month on USA Network, you might want to give Towandajo's forum a try.
There is a new index page providing access to all the pages of archived news items from the FYI page. This feature will allow new guests to review older news reports on MSM with faster loading pages. There is an index page for the movie reviews that used to be accessible only through links on the FYI archived pages. We also added a page to track the talking book cassettes which feature Mary Stuart Masterson's voice providing the narration. Links to Amazon.com provide additional information about the books and the authors, along with reviews and the opportunity to purchase her talking books.
We broke the 1,000 barrier with 1,204 visitors in January. Thanks to all for giving the Tavern a fine start in the new year!
A visitor calling himself "NYCPapito" reported via e-mail that the Mary Stuart Masterson movie "The Florentine" will soon be available at purchase prices on DVD format. VHS cassettes can be purchased for a little over $80 (US) from the same source. The release date is March 2, 2000. The information is available through the link provided below. Be sure to enter "The Florentine" into the site's search engine.
Both of the Tavern's correspondents, Mari Garcia and Claudia Kehl, supplied breaking news about the new Mary Stuart Masterson prime time drama series for the CBS television network. The new show, titled "The Further Adventures," will debut in the 2000-2001 season.
Claudia, the Tavern's Swiss correspondent, found this link to news about the upcoming CBS series "The Further Adventures." With all the hacking that took place throughtout the US internet, it was difficult to bring up the page when I first tried the link. When you get into the ULTIMATE TV site, you may have to use the search engine there to bring up the article. Try searching under "Mary Stuart Masterson," or "The Further Adventures" if the article does not appear.
As the series "The Further Adventures" developes, the Tavern will open a separate page for news about the new Mary Stuart Masterson starring project. Just before the showing of the pilot movie on CBS, we will announce the existence of an internet forum and chat room for fans to post their thoughts about each episode of the series. There will also be chat capability. Keep watching the FYI Page, and the page for "The Further Adventures" as events unfold.
Our dedicated correspondent, Claudia Kehl, resides in Switzerland, but she has the uncanny ability to ferret out some pretty interesting stories about Mary Stuart Masterson. On 11/15/1999, Ms. Masterson appeared on the Donny and Marie syndicated talk show and revealed that she is engaged to marry Damon Stantostefano, the director of the recently released comedy, THREE TO TANGO, starring Dylan McDermott ("The Practice"--ABC Network; "Hamburger Hill") and Neve Campbell ("Party of Five"--Fox Network; "Scream," and "Scream 2"). Claudia provided a link to Hollywood.com's premiere coverage. You can access that site by either writing down the URL below, or cutting and pasting it to the Webcrawler search engine. I used Webcrawler to get in the first time, but when I embedded the link on a photo of MSM, the link would not work. I also tried embedding the link in the phrase "Two to Tango," but still could not get the access to the site. Good luck. There is a nice photo of Ms. Masterson at the premiere of THREE TO TANGO on page six of the site.
Here is the URL: http://www.hollywood.com/pressroom/premieres/threetango/threetango6.html
Congratulations to Mary Stuart Masterson and Damon Stantostefano for their engagement. Many happy returns to both of you, and the Tavern's best wishes for a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year together!
The news of a CBS television developement deal with Mary Stuart Masterson was confirmed on the Mr. Showbiz website, which is accessible on the Links Menu page of the TAVERN. Ms. Masterson will be appearing in either a series of her own, or in several CBS movies for television, starting in the 2000-2001 television season.
Claudia Kehl reports that the Mary Stuart Masterson independent film, "The Book of the Stars" will be screened at the Sarasota, Florida Film Festival during the week of January 12, 2000. The festival is sponsored by Regal Cinemas, and their web site has some nice things to say about the movie. "The Book of the Stars" also stars Jena Malone, Delroy Lindo, and D.B. Sweeney. The film is now on the FILMOGRAPHY page with a link to the Internet Movie Database.
