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

Hollywood’s Biggest Phenomenon Travolta Continues To Ride The Comeback Wave Straight Into The Hears Of His Many Fans

Matthew Gilbert The Boston Globe

Lodged beneath the true-blue eyes and the wide, pink mouth, it sits, the dimple, The Dimple, so cavernous it’s nearly a caricature of itself. It’s a Disneyized dimple, a dimple to rival that of Kirk Douglas, the king of all dimple holders, and today, even with a chin fuzzy from a few days’ growth, it’s a dent that dominates. This dimple, it is forever.

And now it would be time to say that John Travolta himself, the resurrected son of American pop culture, is also forever, ever since Quentin Tarantino and “Pulp Fiction” returned him to his pedestal in 1994. Except that “Welcome Back, John” stories have become as stale as “Robin Williams Is Loony” articles, and even Travolta can’t help but quip, “You know, now it’s becoming kind of a long comeback.” Suffice to say Travolta is back, he’s back enough to ask $21 million per picture, he’s been back for so many movies - “Get Shorty,” “White Man’s Burden,” “Broken Arrow” and now “Phenomenon,” which opened Wednesday - that, if anything, he may be facing a case of comeback overexposure. Travolta is back, way back, and his famous dimple has not lost a smidgen of its depth.

One note about the actor who did the hustle on the grave of the 1960s, and later did an ironic twist with Uma Thurman: He’s not very cool. Or hip. In person, there’s something old-fashioned about John Travolta, a stillness that’s almost fretful as he pads around his hotel room seeking water for a guest. He speaks in a soft, wary, Montgomery-Clift-meets-Marlon-Brando voice, and he likes to ask his interviewer the occasional personal question, which can range from “What descent are you?” to “Did your mom dote on you?” The “vibrating physical sensitivity” that Pauline Kael praised back in her 1981 review of “Blow Out” is there, except the vibrations are more like a series of gentle taps on the shoulder.

Another note about the actor whose tight, gyrating body was iconized by the camera in “Saturday Night Fever” in 1977: He is no longer lithe. This fact was available to anyone who saw the topless Travolta being hosed down in “Pulp Fiction,” and it’s plain as he sits before a tape recorder with his hands across his belly. Travolta is no schlep, but his mien is now easily fitted with a gentlemanly cigar, as it was on the cover of the June Esquire. He’s projecting “man of the world” vibes these days, and street descriptors like “fevered” and “greased” could apply only to a different person. Indeed, Travolta, in his elder statesmanship at the age of 42, has become a bit of a philosopher, well versed on thorny topics like fame, Hollywood and the press.

And now, allow me to convey the considered advice of philosopher John Travolta directly to you, the reader of articles about John Travolta: “I feel that the impression you get of me is directly reflective of the writer. Really, it’s his or her impression of me. And it varies, you know, and it’s interesting. Because no one is completely right and no one is completely wrong, and some moments are spot on. And I get very entertained by the illusions that are created about me. … I’m as complex as the next guy and may give various impressions of who I am at different times. If you went to dinner with my best friend and myself, that would be one impression. Then my wife and myself, another impression. Me at a table with the Rothschilds in Maine at a formal dinner, another impression.

“And me at an interview is another impression.”

Such are the seasoned observations of a celebrity who has been washed in the tides of adoration and backlash ever since he charmed audiences as Vinnie Barbarino on “Welcome Back, Kotter” in 1975. Travolta has endured a hundred career lives in his 42 years, and he knows too well how fickle the press and the public can be. And yet he clings to calm detachment and feels strongly that bitterness is baloney:

“I don’t feel cynical and I don’t live my life in the cynical perspective,” he says, annoyed at the suggestion of such a negative trip. “It’s a waste of time. Where does cynicism get you? It’s a circuit, you come round to the same point.

“You don’t resolve anything through cynicism. You can natter and complain and wish the world were different, but you do the best you can with the most integrity that’s possible. That’s what you do.”

It’s a healthy view, especially for a man who, after appearing on the cover of Time magazine (“Travolta Fever!”) and getting an Oscar nomination in the late 1970s, was dubbed John Revolta by the anti-disco faction and spent the 1980s in the virtual hinterlands.

It’s also a healthy view for a man who in the last two years has played a druggie-hitman, a loan shark, a kidnapper and a nuclear terrorist. Indeed, around Hollywood, Travolta is considered Mr. Nice Guy, and the overwhelming sentiment is to cheer him on.

“There has been such a celebration of my success,” Travolta says, “it would be hard for me to really believe people wanted to see me not do well. But that could be naive, I don’t know. I just know that when I do press and when I’m involved with my fellow actors in the industry, I feel a warmth and a care from them more than I do an envy.”

“He’s a wonderful, special man,” says “Phenomenon” co-star Kyra Sedgwick, who also manages to slip in massive asides like “He has contributed to my love for human beings” and “He gives me faith.”

She supplies stories of Travolta’s playfulness and accessibility on the set of “Phenomenon,” which is a fantasy about a mechanic who becomes a genius overnight - a sort of “Gump for Algernon” story. Travolta’s infamous gags have included a Barbara Stanwyck imitation on the set of “Get Shorty” and a tango for “Phenomenon.” “On the set of a movie, I’m playful, giddy and fun-loving, because I can create from that better than from a grave solidity,” he says.

“If I had to cry in a scene, or die, I could more easily do it from a playful perspective than I could from spending the whole day in a cemetery. It gives me more of a neutral position, and then I can go into any gear.”

Travolta’s financial situation has certainly gone from neutral to fifth gear since his “Pulp” moment. For his work in “Phenomenon,” Travolta received $8 million. For his work in “The Double,” a Roman Polanski project he has since abandoned, he was set to earn $17 million; now the studio is negotiating with Travolta and Polanski may be out.

Reports have his salary for Nora Ephron’s “Michael” at $21 million. With such fellow actors as Jim Carrey, Harrison Ford and Sylvester Stallone, he has led a major charge for sky-high actors’ fees.

“It’s more of a Hollywood creation than an actor’s creation,” he says, diligently avoiding the first person. “For the most part, actors know that it’s the quality of work that matters and without that you don’t get the next job. … You know that it’s all a quick fix and has nothing to do with long-term survival.” He says that, contrary to myth, his 1980s lean years were artistic, not financial. “It’s never been that bad, it’s not that dramatic. I get back end - ‘Look Who’s Talking,’ I get the back end on that, I get paid residuals. I’m not trying to make this less dramatic, I just don’t want to lie about ‘I was in Atlanta with a light bulb over my head.’ It was never that.

“I was in Paris with my jet!”

Jets are Travolta’s famous pastime. The man owns three flying machines - a Learjet 24B, a Gulfstream II and a Canadair Tebuan CL-41 - and he has one full-time and one part-time copilot. He says that flying is “technically risky, you are doing something unusual, you’re fighting the elements,” and that it gives him a distinctly different high from acting: “Flying is very extroverted and focused and A-to-B-ish. Whereas there’s a kind of euphoria about acting, when you’re in a zone that is very creative and you become another character.”

Another passion of Travolta’s: Maine. He owns a 20-room home on an island in Penobscot Bay that can accommodate some 50 guests, and it has become a favorite holiday retreat.

“There’s something quite dashing about it,” he says. “Very dramatic, really, with crashing waves and sailboats.” He says he chose Maine after visiting close friend and “Look Who’s Talking” co-star Kirstie Alley at her Down East digs.

“Kirstie and her husband said ‘You need to buy a home here,’ and I said, ‘Well, look, it would be fun, I’ve always wanted to.’ And I found a house that was huge, but that was a good price that I could afford. So I bought it, and I winterized it because it was a summer cottage that belonged to the Drexel family at the turn of the century. And that was the simplicity of it.” He says his wife, actress Kelly Preston, is also a Maine fan. “Oh my God, she adores it.”

Travolta married Preston in 1991, after appearing with her in a movie called “The Experts,” and they now have a 4-year-old son, Jett, about whom Travolta succinctly but feelingly says, “He owns my heart.” Preston is currently on a small hot streak of her own with roles in Tom Cruise’s “Jerry Maguire” and Tim Robbins’ “Nothing to Lose,” and Travolta says that in the next year or so the couple will start trying to have a second child.

Travolta and Preston are deeply involved in Scientology, a movement that Travolta has followed since 1975.

At this point, Travolta owns an apartment in the Scientology Celebrity Center in Los Angeles, and he’s producing a movie of Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard’s book “Battleship Earth: A Saga of the Year 3000.” He has credited Scientology with helping him through the cancer death of Diana Hyland, his lover in the mid-1970s, and with keeping him from following the self-destructive path of rise-and-fall icons like Marilyn Monroe and James Dean - the sort of figures he danced around in the “Pulp Fiction” restaurant.

He says he’s never felt compelled to defend Scientology, even though he and other celebrity believers - including Tom Cruise, Nicole Kidman and Priscilla Presley - have been criticized for their allegiance to what some consider a cult.

“There’s nothing to defend,” he says. “It’s done a great service for me and all the people I know, and it’s done a great service for some very important people on the planet, and lately, because three or four years ago it was made an official religion by the government, since then I’ve found much less question on it. And that’s been refreshing and great.

“How can you argue with it helping me? You can’t. You can’t!”

The Nick at Nite cable showcase recently aired reruns of “Welcome Back, Kotter,” a show that hasn’t aged with very much grace. Travolta says he’s watched the show on occasion, and it stirs up only one feeling: frustration.

“It bothers me that I can’t remember certain scenarios that I shot. Why don’t I remember that? I was clean. Am I going senile or something? I realize we just shot so many that it’s OK that I don’t remember some of them. I want to remember that day and what I did and who I spoke to.”

Travolta’s memory of the 1980s is more vivid. After a string of hot movies, including “Carrie,” “Saturday Night Fever,” “Grease,” “Urban Cowboy” and “Blow Out,” he began rejecting projects that might have improved his visibility, including “American Gigolo,” “An Officer and a Gentleman,” “Prince of the City,” “Arthur” and “Splash.” He says there are few films he regrets skipping, even if they were hits, but he does regret not working more in that period. “There’s false data in every profession,” he says, “lurking through, seeping through everywhere. Things that aren’t true. I probably could have worked more.

“I was thinking that I was being prestigious or classier or something like that by not working. And that was a lie.” He says that he benefited from the time off, however: “I was a young guy, too, sowing my oats. You can’t take that away from the whole scenario.”

Now, of course, the only danger he faces is overexposure, a Hollywood disease currently afflicting Travolta’s savior and biggest fan, Quentin Tarantino. Movie offers are pouring in, Travolta is accepting them (“Michael” is in post-production; he’s signed onto “Face-Off” with Nicolas Cage), and he’s promoting them. “You can’t be overexposed,” Travolta says.

“If George Clooney can be on a weekly series for an hour every week, for 22 weeks, and then go and do movies … ” He says he is committed to supporting his movies in the media: “As long as the integrity is there, you’re not on the cover of a magazine for your ego, or you’re not doing this for self-importance, as long as that’s in place, then there’s nothing wrong with a lot of press.” He notes that years ago actors like James Cagney and Clark Gable would make four or five pictures a year, and they never suffered.

Travolta has learned to manage his career in an adult manner, but he’s still got that boyish openness written all over his face - and it’s not just the dimple. Miraculously, over the years, Travolta seems to have avoided having to build himself a protective suit of armor.

“I come from a very loving family and I’ve always put my heart on the table,” he says. “And I’ve often misjudged who will treat it correctly. I have made mistakes, I’ve put my heart in the wrong hands a lot, and I’ve been hurt a lot.

“But I keep going back, because I believe and hope beyond that.”