ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, November 16, 1996 TAG: 9611190037
SECTION: SPECTATOR PAGE: S-1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: LOS ANGELES
SOURCE: BOB THOMAS ASSOCIATED PRESS
What can a miniseries tell you about the Titanic disaster that hasn't been told before?
``That was my question exactly,'' says George C. Scott, who had been asked to come aboard as skipper of the doomed luxury liner in the CBS movie ``Titanic.''
``I had seen two, three or four wonderful movies, particularly my favorite, the British `A Night to Remember.' Laurence Naismith played my part, Captain Smith. I thought, `Gee, how can you do any better than that?'''
``But these [production] people have gone to a great deal of effort. They built an entire ship in a warehouse in Vancouver, with an 18-degree tilting deck, pneumatically operated. It was a remarkable piece of staging. It was a titanic task.''
The result can be seen Sunday and Tuesday on CBS, when Scott stars in ``Titanic'' along with Peter Gallagher, Eva Marie Saint, Catherine Zeta Jones, Tim Curry and Marilu Henner.
Scott, the last of the great curmudgeons, seemed surprisingly mellow during a visit to his Malibu house, a mile up a rustic canyon from the Pacific. It is a spacious, Spanish-style house with towering trees and an elaborate swimming pool. Charles Bronson lives across the street.
``Ah, Malibu,'' the actor mused at poolside with his familiar rasping irony. ``We have earthquakes, fires and mudslides.
``Heavy rains are due next month or so - unfortunately, not at the same time as the Santa Anas,'' Scott said of the hot northeast winds that have sent firestorms raging through Malibu's canyons almost every year.
Only a warm, westerly wind blew along the coast, but an ominous white cloud appeared to the north, over a mountaintop - brush fire.
Scott mentioned casually that the fire department had notified him to be on an evacuation alert.
In the Malibu fire of 1993 that destroyed 350 homes, Scott had to evacuate, but a force of 300 firefighters helped save his area from burning. The latest Malibu fire, a 13,000-acre blaze that destroyed eight homes and injured 11 people on Oct. 21-22, didn't reach his house.
Occasionally eying the cloud's movement, Scott continued with the interview.
Does this latest miniseries disclose anything new about the tragedy?
``I figure there must be a thousand Titanic stories, minimum,'' Scott said. ``The writers have picked out a few that we haven't seen before. The essence of the ship striking the berg and going down is irrefutable. But the people are different from the ones before.''
The Titanic legend lives on with efforts to rescue its treasures and raise the hull, as well as television documentaries and books offering new information and theories. Scott has his own analysis of the public's fascination:
``I think the reason, aside from the 1,500 lives lost unnecessarily, is that it could have been avoided except for little tiny mistakes, little tiny minutia, oversights. Not enough lifeboats. Going too fast through an ice floe, after being warned repeatedly by other vessels saying, `Take it easy.'
``The captain bears some blame. He was not on the bridge at the time; the first officer was, and he did all the wrong things. He reversed the engines immediately, swung to the starboard and caught a large ice spur underwater. This spur ripped a gash in her starboard side 300 feet long, flooding the compartments.
``The captain said, `If you had gone straight ahead and hit the berg straight-on, only one compartment would have collapsed.'''
``Titanic'' was a difficult experience for Scott for physical reasons.
``I had two serious operations, cataract removals and lens implants,'' he said. ``I have 20-20 vision for the first time in over 50 years. It's like being born again. The doctor said, `You'll have 20-20 vision for the rest of your life.'
``I had one done before I worked on `Titanic.' The doctor said, `I don't want you up there where I can't get a hold of you.' So I waited until I finished that show, and I came back down and had the left eye done.
``It's a bloody miracle. Since I was 16 years old, I've been nearsighted. Now I just turned 69. I get up every morning and come out here and look at the flowers. It's a cliche joke, but that's what I do. I just sit, have a smoke, bring the dog out and admire the damn flowers.''
Scott was alone at the Malibu house while his wife, Trish Van Devere, visited family in the East.
``Trish and I have been married 25 years,'' he said wonderingly. ``For five marriages, that's the longest I ever had. We've had our ups and downs; all married people do. But it's certainly been the best marriage I've had. At least the most enduring.''
Then he laughed that raspy laugh.
``Titanic'' airs Sunday (Part 1) and Tuesday (Part 2) at 9 p.m. on WDBJ-Channel 7.
LENGTH: Medium: 92 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: 1. (headshot) Scott. color. 2. Marilu Henner (fromby CNBleft), Eva Marie Saint and Catherine Zeta Jones star as passengers
in the two-part CBS mini-series ``Titanic.''