, centered on the romantic tangles among a group of six friends in their twenties in Seattle. The film starred Bridget Fonda as a coffee-bar waitress fawning over an aspiring musician (Matt Dillon) and Kyra Sedgwick and Campbell Scott as a couple wavering on whether to commit to each other. Music forms an integral backbone for the script, and the soundtrack became a best-seller three months before the release of the film.
Much of this was due to the fact that the film kept getting scuttled while studio executives debated how to market it. successfully rode on the heels of Seattle's grunge music boom. During production, bands like Nirvana were not yet national stars, but by the time the soundtrack was released, their song "Smells Like Teen Spirit" had to be cut because it was too costly to buy the rights.
Also, before they got big, Crowe signed members of Pearl Jam to portray Dillon's fictional band Citizen Dick, and other area mainstays like Mic Neumann, who put in uncredited cameos as well. Crowe also appeared in this project, appropriately, as a rock journalist at a club. Tim Appelo wrote in Entertainment Weekly, "With .
.. an ambling, naturalistic style, Crowe captures the eccentric appeal of a town where espresso carts sprout on every corner and kids in ratty flannel shirts can cut records that make them millionaires.
" sports agent who quits his fast-paced yet uncaring career to begin his own firm. Tom Cruise played the title role and Cuba Gooding, Jr. shone as Rod Tidwell, the up-and-coming football player whose catchphrase, "Show me the money!
" became ubiquitous for a time. Renée Zellweger also appeared as the bookkeeper who leaves her job to follow Maguire into new territory in both work and love. Crowe's earlier efforts brought him recognition, but this would send him soaring onto the A-list.
Gooding won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his role, and the film was also nominated for best picture, best screenplay, best editing, and best actor (for Cruise). Patrick Fugit in In 2000, Crowe tapped his rock-writer roots to write and direct , about the experiences of a teenage music journalist who goes on the road with an emerging band in the early 1970s. Newcomer Patrick Fugit starred as William Miller, the baby-faced writer who finds himself immersed in the hard-knock world of sex, drugs, and rock-and-roll, and Kate Hudson co-starred as Penny Lane, a prominent groupie, or, as the film refers to her, a "Band-Aid.
" She is based on a real person, also known as Pennie Lane (sometimes Pennie Trumble), who headed a group of young female music fans known as the Flying Garter Girls. Digging into his most personal memories, Crowe used a composite of the bands he had known to come up with Stillwater, the emerging act that welcomes the young journalist into its sphere, then becomes wary of his intentions. Seventies rocker Peter Frampton served as a technical consultant on the film.
Crowe's mother figured prominently in the film as well (often admonishing, "Don't take drugs!"), and she even showed up at the film sets to keep an eye on him while he worked. Though he asked her not to bother Frances McDormand, who played her character, the two ended up getting along well.
Also in the film he showed his sister rebelling and leaving home, and in real life, his mother and sister Cindy did not talk for a decade and were still estranged to a degree when he finished the film. The family reunited when the project was complete. In addition, Crowe took a copy of the film to London for a special screening with Led Zeppelin members Jimmy Page and Robert Plant, who provided much of the inspiration for the feuding bandmates.
They then granted Crowe the right to use one of their songs on the soundtrack—the first time they had ever consented to this since allowing Crowe to use "Kashmir" in —and also gave him rights to four of their other songs in the movie itself, although they did not grant him the rights to "Stairway to Heaven" for an intended scene. Crowe and his wife, musician Nancy Wilson of Heart, co-wrote three of the five Stillwater songs in the film, and Frampton wrote the other two. Considered an unjaded, original, and funny look at the crazy world of rock music, managed to be a feel-good film without sap or self-consciousness.
Reviews were almost universally positive, and it was nominated for and won a host of film awards. Unfortunately, box office returns were disappointing. , centered on the romantic tangles among a group of six friends in their twenties in Seattle.
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