Thursday, March 22, 2007

Laverne & Shirley Reuniting?

In an odd bit of news, Penny Marshall and Cindy Williams of "Laverne & Shirley" fame are reportedly reuniting for a scripted series that will air on TVLand. Marshall is easily one of the most successful female film directors of all time, with smash hits "Big" and "Awakenings" and "A League Of Their Own" to her credit. But after that run of movies in 1988, 1990 and 1992, she fell on hard times. "Renaissance Man" in 1994 only hit $25 mil, but did introduce Mark Wahlberg to acting. "The Preacher's Wife" in 1996 hit $50 mil, which had to be solid numbers for that project. And "Riding In Cars With Boys" five years later hit only $30 mil. But again, the budget couldn't have been that big since it was a small-scale female-centric story. But Marshall has done nothing for the past six years and doesn't even seem to have anything in the works as a director. Did she lose interest, waste time on projects that didn't come to fruition or get squeezed out after a few modest missteps?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Here's the link to the blog that broke the Laverne & Shirley story. http://blogs.tvweek.com/?cat=14

Anonymous said...

At Mohegan Sun last summer, Cindy Williams appared in the free rooftop "Hot Summer Fun" festival signing 8x10s for fans. Has she been doing that at the Beverly Garland Hotel on the West Coast?