PEOPLE

Wesley Snipes isn’t afraid to laugh at himself

8/6/2014

Wesley Snipes

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LONDON — Action star Wesley Snipes is back on the big screen for the first time since his release from prison as he joins Sylvester Stallone and the cast of The Expendables 3.

Speaking ahead of the movie’s world premiere Monday, Snipes joked that Stallone had him in mind for the first Expendables movie but he was “just a little occupied at the time.”

“They reserved a spot for me and when the opportunity came along he reached out again and said come join us, we would like you to be a part of this.”

Snipes was sentenced to three years in prison in 2008 after failing to file income tax returns. He began his jail term in December, 2010.

The movie makes reference to Snipes’ time behind bars with a tax-evasion joke in the opening scenes.

“Whether I do something really funny or really stupid, it is okay with me,” Snipes said. “I think that is what life is about. You can’t take life itself too seriously.

“At the end of the day, nobody really cares. You’re going to be forgotten anyway. The issues and problems that you think are like mountains that you have to deal with now, after time goes by, nobody cares. Might as well have a good time with it.”

The 52-year-old actor is currently looking for new action projects, with a return to the blood-soaked universe of vampire Blade at the top of his list.

“A lot of people are calling for it and I would like to do it,” he says.

 

Author protects fans’ favorite line

NEW YORK — When she first saw raw scenes from the TV adaption of her Outlander book, Diana Gabaldon caught something. It was a line of dialogue she says her “fans consider iconic,” one they would miss.

The line, from 18th-century Scotsman Jamie Fraser to protagonist Claire Randall: “Ye need not be scairt of me. ... Nor of anyone here, so long as I’m with ye.”

Gabaldon says she told producers, “No, you have to say that.” And they did.

The author of the 1991 bestselling romance novel about a time-travelling nurse says it was an example of the collaboration between her and Ronald D. Moore, executive producer of the series that premieres on Starz at 9 p.m. Saturday. He was the first person, Gabaldon says, to show her a screen adaptation of the book “that didn’t make me turn white or burst into flame.”

 

Lasse Hallstrom realises his dream

LOS ANGELES — Steven Spielberg asked Lasse Hallstrom to work with him more than a dozen years ago, but the Swedish filmmaker only recently accepted the invitation.

Hallstrom said he experienced “traumatic suffering” when he had to decline the chance to direct 2002’s Catch Me If You Can, which Spielberg went on to direct himself.

The trauma was finally resolved, Hallstrom said, when the two filmmakers joined forces on The Hundred-Foot Journey, which Hallstrom directed and Spielberg produced, along with Oprah Winfrey and TED Talks producer Juliet Blake.