A ‘Peak’ Moment Most Of Wallace Revels In Filming Of ‘Dante’s Peak’

A camera panned over Wallace’s Sixth Street as actor Pierce Brosnan drove down the street.

Curious locals watched from the lunch counter at the Silver Corner Bar and Grill.

“Where’s the flames? Where’s the explosions?” asked one guy, dribbling Tabasco sauce on his grilled ham and cheese. “Come on. Blow something up, for God’s sake.”

Filming on Universal Pictures’ $95 million adventure film, Dante’s Peak, began Tuesday, with 1,000 extras crowding downtown streets and gawkers angling for a peek at stars Brosnan and Linda Hamilton.

“Perfect weather - this is exactly what we wanted,” said movie publicist Peter Haas, perched on a rooftop. Below him, a downtown intersection was filled with actors and extras, part of a “Pioneer Days” celebration in the fictional Washington town of Dante’s Peak.

The movie’s changed the landscape of the town. At the end of the street, crews set up a Ferris wheel and carnival. And flaggers keep having problems with drivers determined to use a very real-looking fake freeway on-ramp next to City Hall.

In the film, Brosnan, who most recently starred as James Bond in “Goldeneye,” plays a volcanologist. He and the small town’s mayor, Hamilton, discover that a nearby volcano is about to erupt.

Extras include 51 members of Coeur d’Alene High School’s marching band, which was recruited to play a slow march for the Pioneer Days parade.

“They wanted a slower tempo to set kind of an eerie mood for this thing,” said music director John Terris. The band’s putting in a two-day stint, with members sprinkled throughout the crowd scenes to add realism. In exchange, Universal’s donating $8,000 to the school for new band uniforms and instruments.

Although most of Wallace’s businesses - even those in the filming areas - remain open, many now have fictional signs out front.

The Brooks Hotel has become “Breck’s Restaurant.” Across the street is the fictional “Levine’s Art Gallery,” presumably named after movie production manager Ken Levine.

Even the Shoshone Funeral Services chapel has a new identity. It’s become a body shop - an auto body shop.

Some of the storefronts have even fooled cast members.

“Pierce Brosnan came in Monday wanting some paint brushes, which we didn’t have,” said Mary Rae Faraca, working at the Historic Wallace Arts Center Monday. The movie set sign claims the building is “Abbot’s Art Supplies.”

Parking’s tight, Faraca said, but otherwise things are going smoothly.

“You have your usual number of people who complain about anything,” she said. “But I think it’s exciting. We live a humdrum life.”

Over at Tabor’s Modern Drug, 18-year-old clerk Rena Berkey was shocked Monday when Brosnan showed up. She wants an autograph.

“He came to get a prescription and I didn’t have a pen. Real calm, real nice,” she said. “We were all peeking at the pharmacy.”

She bought a “I Survived Dante’s Peak” T-shirt and a purple magic marker.

“Next time, I’m gonna’ catch him,” she vowed.

Not everyone had as good an experience with the movie crews. Photographers from a local weekly paper, the Idaho News Observer, were shooting the production from the roof of their building when a Wallace police officer showed up and told them they couldn’t be there.

Editor Paul Friend was furious.

“If they can restrain my photographer from taking a photograph, they can restrain what I write. That’s not going to happen in my town,” he vowed. He later said movie officials had contacted him, promising to help get him whatever shots he needs.

Wallace Police Chief Scott Tenyck said the officer, although in uniform, was off-duty and working for the movie’s security company.

“I watched one of their security officers stop one of my city councilmen from taking pictures,” said the chief.

The legal reasoning, he said, is unclear. “This is kind of a once-in-a-lifetime deal,” the chief said. “You’re going to get a lot of people that want to take pictures.”

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: 2 color photos