The Lethbridge Herald
Midler’s For the Boys made to entertain audiences, says star
January 2, 1992 By Tte Canadian Press
Bette Midler says the idea behind her latest film For the Boys is to entertain audiences as many ways as possible.
“1 want them to have had a real entertainment experience,” she said in a recent Toronto interview. “Because entertainment is supposed to be everything – it’s not supposed to be just one thing. .. You’re supposed to laugh and
be able to get emotionally involved. You’re supposed to cry, to be bowled over by the costumes and the music.”
Midler burst on to the musical scene in the early 1970s and went on to win almost every major entertainment award, including four Grammys and a Tony. But the Oscar has eluded her, although she did receive an Academy Award nomination in 1S79 for The Rose.
For the Boys shows off her formidable acting talents as she ages 50 years. The movie follows the lives of USO performers Dixie Leonard and Eddie Sparks, played by Midler and James Caan, as they entertain American troops over
three wars.
Both Midler, who helped develop the film, and Caan had worked with For the Boys director Mark Rydell before – Midler in The Rose and Caan in Cinderella Liberty and Harry and Walter Go to New York. So when it came to directing Caan as a song-and-dance man, Rydell didn’t do much explaining.
“Mark described it this way,” Caan jokes, ‘”You remember Cinderella Liberty? Well, it’s not like that. You remember Harry and Walter Go to New York? Well it’s not like that either.
