
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, March 6, 1990                   TAG: 9003061982
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: B7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: The New York Times
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

`MISS DAISY' IS A DOOZY OF A SLEEPER

When Lili and Richard Zanuck and their partner tried to sell the major Hollywood studios on investing in a movie about an elderly Jewish widow and her black chauffeur, the response was an enthusiastic no.

The script was brilliant, they were told, but in terms of appeal to a wide audience, it wasn't exactly "Batman."

Desperate, the partners finally persuaded Warner Brothers to back the film, "Driving Miss Daisy," by agreeing to slash its production budget by almost half.

Now, two years later, the movie, which cost $7.5 million to make, has become the unexpected hit of the season, taking in $60.6 million in its first 82 days.

Warner, which is distributing the film in North America and Britain, expects to gross at least $75 million - and possibly $10 million more if, as expected, it fares well on March 26 in the Academy Awards, for which "Daisy" received nine nominations.

Among the studios rejecting a deal, Zanuck said, were Walt Disney, 20th Century Fox, Columbia, Universal and Paramount.

As Terry Semel, president of Warner Brothers, explained it, the movie was particularly risky because "you could not describe it in a single phrase and it did not have a star like Tom Cruise."

by CNB