October 22

You magazine interview excerpt with Marion Cottilard

October 22, 2006

'Russell is very attractive, a good kisser and a very nice, simple guy. He's not macho in real life at all,' insists Marion. 'You should see him with his wife, Danielle: I think he couldn't be macho with his wife, because she is a strong character, very smart and straight. He's a real man, you know, he has that Man Thing,' she adds laughing,' but he has a very good balance between the emotion and the strength. That's why he's an amazing actor and a great guy.'

And despite the short fused New Zealander's reputation for not being entirely safe around hotel phones....Marion saw a very different side to Russell during the filming. 'I remember we were shooting during the night and we were behind schedule; people were tired and wanting to go home, because it was three in the morning. So he brought red wine along for everyone; it was kind of magic. He was funny and we were all happy, because he really took care of the crew. That's the kind of man he is'.

EXCLUSIVE: DADDYATOR

October 22, 2006

Hollywood Wildman Russell Crowe tells how family life has tamed him

By John Millar

GLADIATOR star Russell Crowe has revealed how he's stopped raising hell since having kids. The 42-year-old Oscar winner's explosive temper had him hitting the headlines after a series of late-night rows. But the New Zealand-born star says he'd now rather play with his kids than party with the A-list.

He and actress wife Danielle Spencer have two sons - Charles Spencer, who will be three in December, and Tennyson Spencer, born in July.

When we met at London's Dorchester Hotel, Crowe - looking relaxed and fit - said family, not films, is his priority.

He went on: "Every decision I make now goes through what's right for my wife and my kids. The jobs I'm choosing don't come with a 30-week schedule like the films I've done in the last few years."

The star of award-winning epics such as Gladiator, A Beautiful Mind, Master And Commander and Cinderella Man says he's determined to see more of his family.

Russell added: "Life is balanced but daddy's still got to go out and earn the milk, mate."

He appears in a series of big movies in the months ahead.

First, there is romantic comedy A Good Year. He has just finished crime thriller, American Gangster with Denzel Washington and detective drama Tenderness. And he is starting work on a remake of classic western 3.10 To Yuma.

But Crowe points out the schedule for all those films was carefully arranged around his roles as husband and father.

Crowe dotes on his sons and is chuffed when I congratulate him on the latest addition to the family. "What do you think of the name?" he asks about baby Tennyson. "We put Spencer in the middle again to give Charlie and him something in common."

Crowe has also delivered another surprise after switching from his trademark heavyweight dramas to the frothy romantic comedy A Good Year.

He said: "If somebody is familiar with all the films that I've done, then they know there's a gay, football-playing plumber in The Sum Of Us and there's the ice-skating sheriff in Mystery Alaska. Comedy is not a place that I haven't been to - it's probably a full third of all the films that I've done."

In this comedy - which reunites him with Gladiator director Sir Ridley Scott - Crowe plays a super-confident City whizzkid who inherits a vineyard in Provence, left to him by an uncle, played by Albert Finney.

His intention is to make a killing "by selling for a big profit but he falls in love with the country side and, in particular, a French waitress who works in the village. There's a scene in which Crowe become a waiter to impress the girl that he's fallen for and he confesses that he has done many things in real life in an attempt to impress wife Danielle.

"We met in 1989, got married in 2003 and I did so much over that time to try to impress her," he says, laughing.

The most spectacular stunt the star pulled as he wooed Danielle was when he hired a boat in Sydney harbour as the setting for a romantic date.

He recalls: "The only boat I could get sat 150 people. But I wanted a kitchen because I wanted to cook for her. So this thing arrived and I thought, 'Oh my God'. It was just massive.

"I had all this fresh scampi and I was in the kitchen but it was almost a three-minute walk to get from the galley to where she was sitting on the deck. It could be a comedy in itself. She thought it was way over the top."

Apart from his romantic side, Crowe has other things in common with the character he plays in A Good Year. For instance they both appreciate fine wine... Crowe has thousands of carefully selected bottles stored at his Aussie ranch. The star attributes his taste for good wine to his father Alex, who ran a pub while Crowe was growing up.

The consequence is that Crowe has become an expert on wine and is confident enough to fight his corner when he reckons that a bottle of wine is off. He recalls an incident when he had just started filming Gladiator. Crowe and co-star Connie Nielsen went for a meal at a top London restaurant and he decided to splash out on a bottle of outrageously expensive wine that happened to share its vintage with the year the two were born.

Russell said: "This particular wine was Australian and, when it was opened and brought to the table, you could smell from two feet away that it was corked."

He told the wine waiter the bottle was bad and the waiter argued that the actor was very wrong. "That conversation lasted 45 minutes," he said.

From the world of fine wine, Crowe moves on to where the local tipple is a shot of cheap red-eye when he saddles up for the western 3.10 To Yuma.

This is a remake of the 1957 golden oldie that starred Glenn Ford as an outlaw leader who is held by rancher Van Heflin as they wait for the train that'll take the baddie to court in Yuma.

"I'm doing the Glenn Ford part and Christian Bale plays the Van Heflin role," says Crowe.

And when they weren't remaking this wild-west romp, Crowe and Bale - who has an 18-month-old girl - could swap stories about changing nappies. 9 A Good Year is released on Friday.

coveringflorida.blogspot

by Kay B. Day

October 22, 2007

Russell Crowe booked for third-quarter cameo on Monday Night Football Jags-Colts game; January rugby event dubbed "Australia Day Challenge"

The Detroit Free Press reported on Thursday Russell Crowe will be featured in the third quarter cameo on Monday Night Football Oct. 22 when the Jacksonville Jaguars face the Indianapolis Colts here in Jacksonville. Thanks to Jacksonville Axemen coach Daryl Spinner Howland for pointing this story out to us.

I haven't been able to determine whether Crowe will actually be at the football game. A source has, however, confirmed he'll be in Jacksonville.

Crowe is already a favorite celeb here in the First Coast City, since his South Sydney Rabbitohs will play the Leeds Rhinos January 26, 2008. The date is important to Aussies-that's Australia Day. So the event is dubbed the "Australia Day Challenge." The Jacksonville Axemen site reports the Rhinos won the Grand Final Game in the Superleague Competition in the United Kingdom-that's like winning the Superbowl here in the U.S.

I've bought a bunch of tickets for my family and some friends-we're planning a big day here in Jax.

I'm also working on a couple of articles about this event. A friend asked me a few days ago, "What's Russell Crowe like in person?"

"Absolutely charming," I told her. Crowe is one of the most gracious artists or personalities I have ever met, and that includes brilliant poets, musicians, Pulitzer winning fiction writers, a governor and a slew of other politicians, and an Academy Award nominee whose name I am deliberately withholding. Crowe's passion for rugby league and his team is contagious. He also comes across as a family man. If he weren't an Aussie, I'd swear he was Southern, and I mean that as the highest compliment I could pay a man. (I can hear groans from some quarters as I write this, but I'm Southern and very proud of it. Political correctness is something I've outgrown.)