"Airport dramas hit TV, movies"

Sunday, June 13, 2004

Airport dramas hit TV, movies
The Hampton Roads (VA) Daily Press


A drunk pleads for another nip. A granny can't find her false teeth.
Newlyweds show up in a tux and wedding dress. Football hooligans swear and
terrorize those around them. Money is lost. Passports go missing. Purses are
stolen. Somebody's having a nervous breakdown. And someone else's lunch is
coming up on them.

Another day at the bar? No, another day at the airport.

Go ahead: Pick an airport, any airport. Don't show us which one. But we can
guess, with stunning accuracy, that whichever airport you picked, the
aforementioned drama, and much more like it, is going on.

And we love it. The life of airports and, indeed, the whole nine yards of
airplanes, air passengers and air travel, is something millions find
fascinating. Mention a recent flight you took and there's both immediate
sympathy for the inevitable hassle you endured and excitement over the fact
you jetted off to someplace wonderful, flying high above the clouds.

This summer promises to be the busiest air travel season since Sept. 11,
2001. And with it a jet stream of aviation-related events in pop culture:

"The Terminal" - Some say Tom Hanks could nab an Oscar nomination just by
reading a phone book. This is a similar test: Watching Tom Hanks spend
endless days and nights confined to an airport terminal. The Steven
Spielberg film, which opens Friday, has Hanks playing a Balkan immigrant who
becomes a resident of JFK when a war breaks out and erases his country from
the map. His visa voided, Hanks is unable to go back home, yet unable to
enter the United States. While living in the terminal, he meets and falls in
love with a flight attendant played by Catherine Zeta-Jones. We should all
be so lucky.

"Airline" - A&E Network has given wing to a second season of "Airline," a
reality series that chronicles the highs and lows of passengers on Southwest
Airlines at LAX and Chicago Midway airports. The original series, which is
on Mondays, was cleared for takeoff in January with 18 episodes. It quickly
became a hit for A&E, and the networks' youngest-skewing show. A new season
of 18 half-hour episodes takes flight July 5.

"LAX" - NBC is hoping for mile-high ratings this fall with a new drama
called "LAX," starring Heather Locklear and Blair Underwood. Set in the
airport's international terminal, the show will feature story lines peppered
with security breaches, tearful reunions, illegal immigrants, mission
children, runaway animals, drugs busts and drunken pilots. The world's
fifth-busiest airport is the setting for an ongoing power struggle between
the airfield chief, played by Locklear, and the terminal manager, played by
Underwood.

"The Billionaire: Branson's Quest for the Best" - It's "The Apprentice" at
35,000 feet. Fox is preparing a new reality series centering on Richard
Branson, global adventurer and founder/chairman of the Virgin Group of
Companies. In the series, Branson, who formed Virgin Atlantic Airways in
1984, will test young entrepreneurs to see if they have the right stuff to
follow in his footsteps. The series is currently casting and is tentatively
scheduled to debut later this year.

Why this sudden fascination with aviation, airports and airlines?

"They're great stories," said Nancy Dubuc, vice president of documentary
programming for A&E Network. "First and foremost, it's incredibly
entertaining. The fact that people can relate to these entertaining moments
makes it all the more appealing."

Anyone who has experienced airline travel has an amusing or traumatic story,
Dubuc said. "Everyone has had these moments. It's travel, and the stories
behind travel."

And there's even more travel on the way. Already "Soul Plane," a comedy
about an African American-owned airline, has flown into theaters. Come
December, Martin Scorsese will land his long-awaited "The Aviator," a
Leonardo DiCaprio flick about aviation pioneer Howard Hughes.

Dubuc said the small screen will probably conjure other airport
travel-related shows. The trend is, after all, up, up and away.

"I'm sure there will be other programs that will jump off from that," Dubuc
said. "TV is a great imitator of itself."


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