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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Adults Only Mgm Granted Permission To Make ‘Showgirls’ Knowing It Would Be Rated Nc-17

John Horn Associated Press

Two big theater chains won’t show it, a few newspapers won’t advertise it and the Christian right won’t like it. “Showgirls” almost has it made.

The explicit account of Las Vegas strippers is the first studio film since 1990’s “Henry & June” to carry the adults-only NC-17 rating. With its constant nudity, rough language, soft-core sex and occasional violence, “Showgirls” was assumed to be an impossible sale - too hot to handle.

The conventional wisdom held that you couldn’t find films like this at the local mall multiplex: You had to mingle with the raincoat crowd at the Pussycat to sneak a peek.

Yet less than three weeks before the movie’s Sept. 22 premiere, MGM has secured nearly 1,000 theaters nationwide for the film’s debut weekend, far more than showed “Henry & June.” The studio also has not struggled to purchase “Showgirls” advertising, buying a flood of national TV and print spots. And starting Monday, video stores will give away 250,000 promotional videocassettes of a “Showgirls” trailer to promote the movie’s theatrical release. The video is rated NC-17.

“Showgirls” may be the biggest test yet for the NC-17 taboo, but the taboo so far is losing badly.

“The whole myth that you couldn’t release an NC-17 film widely was just that - a myth,” says Gerry Rich, MGM’s executive vice president of worldwide marketing.

Less than three years ago, MGM (under different management) canceled a planned NC-17 release of Madonna’s “Body of Evidence.” The studio said then that theater owners and newspapers would shun the film unless it came out with the less-restrictive R rating.

The adult-oriented films “Damage,” “Natural Born Killers,” “Sliver” and “Basic Instinct,” among several others, similarly were re-edited to avoid the NC-17 mark - often with sufficient publicity to drum up prurient interest for the truncated, R-rated version.

MGM feels that “Showgirls” is the perfect film to test the NC-17 rating and did not appeal or re-edit the film when the Motion Picture Association of America gave “Showgirls” an NC-17 rating in July.

The MPAA created the rating, which bars patrons under age 17, to replace the X mark five years ago. The new rating was intended to distinguish high-minded fare for mature viewers from low-rent sex films, but the rating was promptly appropriated by the makers of the skin flicks “Blonde Emmanuelle in 3-D” and “The Secret Sex Lives of Romeo and Juliet.”

Legitimate film companies often said they would release an NC-17 film but always backed off at the last minute and either released the movie unrated or cut it for an R.

MGM didn’t. Under the new leadership of studio chairman Frank Mancuso, director Paul Verhoeven (“Basic Instinct”) asked for and received permission to make an NC-17 film. Knowing well before the $40 million film was finished that it would be given the adults-only mark, MGM started wooing theater owners in February, showing them clips and, more recently, the finished film and advertising materials.

MGM said this week it had locked at least 700 and as many as 1,000 theaters for the film’s opening weekend. “It’s not like we’re going to be skipping any markets,” says Larry Gleason, MGM’s president of worldwide theatrical distribution. “We’ll be in every market in America.”

The ad campaign is so broad, MGM says, it could be for any mainstream R-rated film. Still, the message is that this movie is for adults and adults only; theater owners are being told by MGM to check driver’s licenses and make sure ushers are not 16.

Two large theater chains with Southern hubs - Texas’ Cinemark chain and Georgia’s Carmike circuit - will not show the film, saying company policy prohibits NC-17 releases. General Cinema will not run “Showgirls” in some markets, Gleason said.

The Daily Oklahoman in Oklahoma City and the Fort Worth Star Telegram in Fort Worth, Texas, have both declined to run “Showgirls” advertisements, MGM says.

“It’s reflective of our readers - very conservative, very religious,” says Phil Record, the ombudsman for the 350,000 Sunday circulation Texas paper. “We’re in the Bible Belt.”

Theater owners running the film are mixed about the commercial prospects of “Showgirls.” Some say it could be a mild success, but others say the story about a talented dancer trying to make it is weak, that the acting by Elizabeth Berkley, Gina Gershon and Kyle MacLachlan is poor.

Some theater owners also say the NC-17 mark - not the movie itself - is the film’s best marketing hook.

The American Family Association, the Rev. Donald Wildmon’s Christian right organization, already has criticized ABC and NBC for running ads for “Showgirls.” The organization, which has not been shown the movie, calls it a “hard-core porn movie” and probably will condemn “Showgirls” again.

When the film debuts on home video, it may not be carried by Blockbuster, the nation’s largest video chain with nearly 4,000 outlets. Store policy forbids NC-17 titles.

MGM already says its bold NC-17 gamble has paid off. Says Gleason: “Based on the experience that we’ve had this time, we would not hesitate using the NC-17 rating again in the right place.”

If “Showgirls” actually connects at the box office, expect other Hollywood studios to jump on the NC-17 wagon.