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NEWS > ENTERTAINMENT > UNIVERSAL FIRE ACCIDENTAL, NEW MUMMY MOVIE DELIBERATE
UNIVERSAL FIRE ACCIDENTAL, NEW MUMMY MOVIE DELIBERATE
June 4 2008
Hollywood, CA – The devastating fire that ravaged the storied Universal lot on the weekend appears to have been started by accident, initial reports from the Los Angeles County Fire department. The blaze was sparked by the heat of a blowtorch used to apply asphalt shingles to a roof. Burning through historic sets and the parts of the Universal studios tour, the blaze appears to have caused damage in the tens of millions of dollars, even without calculating the lost revenue from lost film and tv productions.
The company has pledged to rebuild the lost and damaged sets, as well as the iconic King Kong attraction from the studio tour.
"We're very grateful there was no loss of life, and no serious injury," NBC Universal spokesperson Cindy Gardner said. "It was tragic and iconic, but it can be replaced and it can be rebuilt."
The company also went on to say that no films in their current slate of production have been disrupted. Those productions, including “The Incredible Hulk”, “Hellboy 2”, “Mamma Mia”, and “The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor”, are all complete and very near completion and will be released on schedule.
“When you see a tragedy you always try to see the bright side,” said Los Angeles Times film critic Kenneth Turan. “When I first heard about the fire that was the first thing that had popped into my mind; maybe the Mummy movie was burned in the fire. Unfortunately though that didn’t happen and I’m going to be forced to sit through another two hours of Brendan Fraser.”
This echoed the collective groan of critics and movie fans alike when the new Mummy film, the fourth in the series, was announced for this summer.
Harry Knowles of Aint it Cool News echoed Turan’s sentiment. “It’s too bad. I mean it’s good that nothing was lost permanently, but if you’re going to have a fire that destroys the “Back to the Future” set, you might as well take meaningless things with it. I can’t really think of anything more meaningless than a new Mummy movie or Brendan Fraser’s career. The Universe, or Universal, does seem to have a sense of humour after all.”
For Fraser, whose career has been steadily going down in flames since the release of the first Mummy movie in 1999, the news came as a great relief. “I am very happy that “The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor will be released on schedule August 1. I have also spoken to the other stars of the film including Jet Li, Maria Bello, and Michelle Yeoh, and they are equally as ecstatic. I’m sure audiences will be extremely pleased come August 1.”
Fraser is currently shooting the new "G.I. Joe" movie for his Mummy part one director Stephen Sommers. He is also currently in negations to star in the upcoming Monkeybone 2 for Twentieth-Century Fox.
Samantha Dryden, Entertainment Correspondent
NEWS > ENTERTAINMENT > UNIVERSAL FIRE ACCIDENTAL, NEW MUMMY MOVIE DELIBERATE
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