Danny DeVito is set to direct the pilot for a new family comedy from the pen of "Simpsons" scribes Bill Oakley and Josh Weinstein, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

The show deals with an extended family of a grandfather, father, mother, uncle, children aged 17, 16, 10, and a baby. The report described the family as eccentric and governed by "old-fashioned family values."

The show is being targeted for the fall 2002 TV season, The Hollywood Reporter said.

TORONTO -- Danny DeVito is here. Again!

The star of Heist -- a new David Mamet film being shown in the Toronto film festival -- is back in Toronto after having spent weeks here already this year filming Death To Smoochy. The man is almost a citizen. We wish.

DeVito, who gets to tear through some wonderful Mamet dialogue in the Heist, plays a fence who forces a complex job on a group of professional thieves. They are played by Gene Hackman, Delroy Lindo and Ricky Jay. Heist is smart, dark and funny, and will open here in theatres in a few weeks.

DeVito's role seems to have been written specifically for him.

"I knew I had a good part," said the actor yesterday. "I don't know if he wrote for me. David's language is wonderful to say. It's challenging, but you can always rely on it. When you first read it, it seems very cryptic, but once you get it, and it sinks in, it's very clear and it all makes sense."

An actor, writer, producer and director, DeVito seems singularly unaffected by his own success. Yesterday, doing interviews for Heist, he happily munched a chocolate bar, talked about his children, even fixed the couch cushions to make everyone comfortable.

But let's be real. Between the movie career, the TV career, the famous wife and all the rest of it, is there anywhere this man can go on the planet where he is not recognized?

"No."

After a moment he amended that. "Oh. I went to Africa about a month ago. We went to places in Kenya, a little fishing village on Lake Victoria, a Masai village, and nobody knew me."

The whole DeVito family -- he and Rhea Perlman have three teenaged children -- went on Safari. Yes, said DeVito, it was great to be somewhere that fantastic and not have to worry about the work side of his life or the fame thing.

"But I didn't really have the release of that, because there was too much else going on. It was spectacular. It was a once-in-a-lifetime thing. But I was a little nervous. There were just the five of us and a guide, and life and death are all around you all the time when you're there."

He said, "You're in the middle of nowhere. And I'm not like Indiana Jones. I'm just a guy from Jersey -- in the middle of the jungle. I thought, 'What am I doing here?' "

Here is his accurate summary of some of the dangers:

"If you're not a hippo, a rhino, an elephant or a water buffalo, then you're either a cat, or cat food."

DeVito cheerfully told of living in tents and hearing the animals at night. The guards had spears.

He said, "It's unlike anything I've ever done before."

We say: Come back soon.

Danny DeVito is in talks to star as a Barney-like children's star in "Death To Smoochie," according to The Hollywood Reporter.

The report says DeVito would star as "Smoochie," a lovable blue rhinoceros who becomes a target of assassination in the film, which spoofs the ruthless world of children's television.

The film is to begin shooting in the fall from a screenplay by "Lucky Numbers" author Adam Resnick, produced by Andrew Lazar, who recently produced the Clint Eastwood film "Space Cowboys."

-- JAM! Movies

George Clooney and Danny De Vito, the star and producer of "Out Of Sight," have a new project in their sights.

Variety reports the duo will team up on "Revelation," with De Vito directing Clooney as an internal affairs police officer wounded during an assassination attempt on a cardinal. His search for the killer takes on the significance of a spiritual journey.

"Revelation" will be De Vito's first turn in the director's chair since "Matilda" four years ago.

Shooting on "Revelation" is to begin in September, which means Clooney would likely complete that project before he begins work on his much-talked-about remake of "Ocean's Eleven," which will be helmed by "Out Of Sight" director Steven Soderbergh.

-- JAM! Movies

Universal Pictures is planning to kick this summer off with a good laugh.

"Screwed," starring Danny DeVito and Norm Macdonald was bumped up from August 25 to May 12, Variety reports.

The comedy, which has gone through several title changes lately including "Ballbusted," "Pittsburgh," and "Foolproof" is about a chauffeur who kidnaps a dog.

"Head Over Heels," a romantic comedy from Universal, has also changed release dates. The film, starring Monica Potter and Freddie Prinze, Jr., was moved from early summer to later in August.

-- JAM! Movies

HOLLYWOOD -- Andy Kaufman remains as elusive, enigmatic and controversial in death as he did in life.

 Not even one of his biggest and most famous fans can settle the argument. Nor the movie he just made about Kaufman.

 The fan is Danny DeVito. The movie is DeVito's labour-of-love Man On The Moon, one of the early favourites for Oscar nominations next month, currently in theatres.

 DeVito loved Andy Kaufman and remains fascinated with his experience with him -- yet he never calls his late friend a genius. Influential, yes. Remembered, yes. A genius, no!

 "I thought I was working with a performance artist," DeVito now says of his co-star for five years on the TV show Taxi.

 "But 'genius' is a word that everybody bandies about so let's put it this way: I loved Andy; I liked the five years we worked together immensely; he was whimsical and edgy and surprising and puzzling; and I thought (he was) a great addition to a show that I loved, Taxi."

 As always, DeVito is struggling to put Kaufman in context. The struggle is what led DeVito to launch Man On The Moon in the first place. Kaufman, played by Canadian comedian Jim Carrey, died of a rare cancer in 1984. He has been the subject of several recent books as well as the film, yet still defies analysis. Man On The Moon has been criticized because it doesn't tell enough about Kaufman's inner life.

 "Everything about the movie is really true," DeVito says of what is on screen, which he thinks is enough.

 "All the little details that Scott and Larry (screenwriters Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski) were able to put into the script -- through massive amounts of research -- were all true."

 DeVito originated the project five years ago in a conversation with director Milos Forman over drinks, and between puffs on their stogies, at a New York party hosted by their mutual friend Michael Douglas. DeVito and Forman have been pals since DeVito co-starred in the director's classic, One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, pre-Taxi.

 As head of his own production company, Jersey Films, DeVito ended up co-producing Man On The Moon and then playing Kaufman's long-suffering but loyal manager, George Shapiro (who was involved in the movie as one of the executive producers and advisors). Shapiro, who managed Jerry Seinfeld, is a Hollywood legend.

 The only thing DeVito doesn't do is play himself in scenes showing the Taxi cast at work. Because he had to play Shapiro in those scenes, DeVito refused to do double duty.

 "All that split-screen stuff is too expensive," he says, only half-joking, "and I'm a cheap producer."

 What did cost extra money was dealing with the antics of Carrey, who stayed in character -- whether as Kaufman or his abusive alter-ego Tony Clifton -- through the four months of shooting. DeVito shrugs it off.

 "I had only a great, great experience working on the movie," he says emphatically. Carrey's antics were due to his dedication to the role, not a star's self-indulgence, he says.

 DeVito fondly remembers doing the same thing when he shot Cuckoo's Nest with Jack Nicholson 25 years ago.

 "We were allowed to roam around those halls in that mental institution. We had the whole floor. We could dress in those costumes. We played 'foosball' and Pong, which was big at that time, and the only time we really came out of character was when Nicholson wanted to watch a ball game (his beloved Los Angeles Lakers). That kind of stuff is a joy."

NEW YORK -- "He's both sexy and charming," producer Michael Shamberg says of his boss.

Hmm, Danny DeVito must pay Michael Shamberg a lot of money.

To be fair, the producer is talking about his boss's role in the upcoming Living Out Loud, an edgy, decidedly unconventional love story that stars DeVito and Holly Hunter as the romantic leads.

But romantic lead and Danny DeVito are not words destined for a long relationship. There may be women out there who would say of the diminutive star, "adorable" - the same women who look forward to Dennis Franz's nude scenes on NYPD Blue, perhaps - but this cannot be a large number.

"Funny guy, that Danny DeVito'' would come up a lot. That's obvious. Try to nail down the essence of his appeal and it's simpler than you might think. He's just likable.

DeVito strolled into a posh hotel room high above Central Park early one Saturday morning recently, and everyone smiled. Everyone was a group of jaded reporters so this is saying something. DeVito has this effect on people. You may not go for his taste in comedy - which is dark, judging by Throw Momma From the Train and Matilda, two of the films he has directed - and you may still want your $8 back for Jack the Bear, but how can you not like this grinning 53-year-old father of three sometimes known as Mr. Rhea Perlman?

Comfortably decked out in a checkerboard shirt, cardigan and smiling behind dark shades, the tiny, perfect movie star/film mogul settles in obviously well-versed with the old maxim that you get more from the press with honey than with vinegar.

DeVito, like an old-style movie star, turns on the charm and even suggests that there is insight in the questions he is fielding. A few jokes, some self-deprecating humour and everyone is thinking, 'Wow, what a nice guy.'

"Such a good time," he says of the experience making Living Out Loud, which is the directorial debut of Oscar-nominated screenwriter Richard LaGravenese, and is produced by DeVito's own Jersey Films.

The film features a dialled-down DeVito starring as a down-on-his-luck doorman at a posh Manhattan apartment who begins an unlikely relationship with a depressed divorcee played by Hunter.

LaGravenese, whose first original screenplay for The Fisher King earned him an Oscar nomination and more recently adapted the novels The Horse Whisperer and Beloved for the big screen, insists that he wrote the part of Pat the doorman with DeVito in mind. The film is intended as a meditation on loneliness and offers the hopeful message that strangers can connect, even in our anonymous urban landscape.

For an actor who performed Chekhov in school, the "rare opportunity to play drama" was welcomed.

"I like being presented with opportunities to reveal new personas on screen," DeVito said, of his heretofore unrevealed romantic side. "Richard writes with authority and these characters are people we have all known in our lives."

Living Out Loud, opening Nov. 6, is a challenging, ambitious film that, despite Shamberg's contention that it is aimed at the lonely person in all of us, may work best for a more adventurous repertory-house crowd. But it is consistent with the risky approach of Jersey Films, which DeVito established in 1992.

He is an unlikely movie mogul, and maybe he is a new romantic lead only because he happens to be a mogul. But Jersey Films' approach is to be admired, and DeVito's clout as an actor and producer is likely widely envied in Hollywood. Jersey's first film was the DeVito-directed Hoffa and the company's impressive catalogue now includes that treatise on twentysomething angst, Reality Bites, the Oscar-winner Pulp Fiction, a big hit in Get Shorty and last summer's criminally neglected Out of Sight. Currently, the company is behind Man on the Moon, the Andy Kaufman film bio starring Jim Carrey in the title role and featuring DeVito as Kaufman's manager and virtually the remainder of the Taxi sitcom cast as themselves.

DeVito says it would "be cool'' if he could reunite with John Travolta and Gene Hackman for a Get Shorty sequel and mentions that his buddy Michael Douglas is developing a sequel to their hits, Romancing the Stone and Jewel of the Nile.

You may disagree with Shamberg's assessment of the boss's appeal, but just about everyone will admit success couldn't have happened to a nicer guy.

NEW YORK (AP) -- Danny DeVito has found IT.

In his new film, Living Out Loud, the actor-director-producer plays an elevator operator in search of a central meaningful thing to guide his life by, the indefinable IT.

"I know that guys go through that, and some of them are never going to find IT, whatever IT is, that ephemeral, elusive thing just out of your grasp," DeVito says in Sunday's Daily News.

In his case, DeVito found IT at Saturday matinees as a boy growing in Asbury Park, N.J.

"I always thought I could do it as a kid," DeVito says. "I went to the movies all the time. It was like a thing I always thought about."

IT started for real when he left a job in his sister's beauty shop and went to study drama in the Big Apple.

"It was kind of a leap, but I had this wanderlust," DeVito says. "I wanted to come to New York."

Study led to stage work, which led to a supporting role in One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, which led to his star-making role as surly cab dispatcher Louie DePalma on Taxi.

He's gone on to work in films including Tin Men, Hoffa, Get Shorty and L.A. Confidential. He also makes films through his company Jersey Productions, which made Pulp Fiction and other films, including Living Out Loud, which co-stars Holly Hunter.

Actor-producer Danny DeVito, who was attending the recent Gotham Film Awards, says everything is fine with Jim Carrey and Man On the Moon. That would be the movie featuring crazy comic Carrey profiling crazy comic Andy Kaufman, who was DeVito's buddy from TV's Taxi.

Carrey was injured recently by wrestler Jerry "The King" Lawler, the very same wrestler who put Kaufman in the hospital more than 15 years ago.

DeVito, who plays Kaufman's manager, denies that the alleged Carrey injury was a Kaufman-style hoax.

"That would be silly," says a smiling DeVito.

Meanwhile, he is optimistic that Carrey is "nailing" the Kaufman portrayal.

"But I don't want to get too excited about the project," says DeVito. "It must be the Italian in me."

Man In The Moon should be finished by late November, reports DeVito. Look for it next May -- maybe.

NEW YORK -- Just a bit of full-moon fever, man, if you know what I'm saying.

That's Danny DeVito's way of telling everyone that everything is fine on the set of Man on the Moon, the Andy Kaufman biopic starring Jim Carrey as the late comic. Everyone includes Carrey, who was injured on the set during the shooting of a wrestling scene last week.

DeVito, who co-starred with Kaufman on the sitcom Taxi from 1978-83, is currently producing Man on the Moon through his own company, Jersey Films, and is also appearing in the movie as Kaufman's manager and not, strangely enough, as himself.

Playing themselves in Man on the Moon, which is about two-thirds of the way through its shoot in New York city, are former Taxi regulars Judd Hirsch (who starred as Alex Rieger); Jeff Conaway (Bobby Wheeler); Christopher Lloyd (Reverend Jim) and Marilu Henner (Elaine Nardo). Tony Danza, who played Tony Banta, is currently starring on Broadway in A View From the Bridge, and was unable to take part in the production.

DeVito built a new Sunshine Cab set, familiar to millions of TV viewers as the home of Taxi, and the combination of seeing his old professional stomping grounds re-created, along with reuniting with his old mates and Carrey's portrayal of Kaufman, was almost too much.

"It was eerie - you hit the nail on the head,'' DeVito says. "It was just eerie to walk on that set. Jim is so dead on.''

Carrey's audition tape for Man on the Moon is something of a legend in Hollywood for the actor's uncanny take on Kaufman. DeVito says the Canadian-born Carrey refuses to be addressed on the set as anything other than "Andy'' or, if he is playing Kaufman's Taxi character, as "Latka.'' When Carrey plays Kaufman's notorious lounge singer character, Tony Clifton, you better remember that is "Tony.''

"Some of the people who were close to Andy feel like they get to spend time with him again,'' says DeVito's Jersey Films colleague, producer Stacey Sher, who describes the film directed by Milos Forman as "a bittersweet'' depiction of Kaufman's life. Kaufman died of lung cancer in 1984 at the age of 36.

DeVito recalled that studio chief Ron Meyer visited the Man on the Moon set on the day that "Tony'' was in the house. When he is "Tony,'' Carrey ignores both personal hygiene and everyday courtesies. Not taken with the studio suit, DeVito said that "Tony'' complained about the size of his trailer and rubbed Limburger cheese all over the befuddled executive.

DeVito just shrugs his shoulder and laughs.

"He comes to work as Tony,'' the producer says of Carrey.

Last week it was reported that Carrey, as "Andy,'' was injured on the Man on the Moon set while scuffling with wrestler Jerry (the King) Lawler. "Andy'' spit in Lawler's face the way Kaufman did nearly 20 years ago during a match in Memphis. And, like Kaufman, "Andy'' suffered the consequences.

DeVito admitted the wrestling scene got a little out of hand, but added that "Andy'' was recovering nicely.

DeVito's portrayal of Taxi's obnoxious dispatcher, Louie De Palma, won him an Emmy, made him famous and launched him on a career as one of Hollywood's most successful hyphenates - that would be actor, director and producer.

This summer Jersey Films was responsible for the slyly funny Out of Sight, an unfortunate failure at the box office, and previously produced the Oscar-winning Pulp Fiction.

DeVito will next be seen in the drama Living Out Loud, opening Nov. 6.

Man on the Moon is tentatively set for a fall release next year.

HOLLYWOOD -- Danny DeVito is looking forward to another round of romance.

Romancing the Stone, that is.

DeVito confirms that 20th Century Fox has approached Michael Douglas about a third Stone movie that would reunite him, DeVito and Kathleen Turner.

"We're definitely talking and I feel terrific about the prospect of the three of us out there on the road again for another adventure," says DeVito.

"I'm sure Michael will figure out some truly god-awful place to send us.

"We spent the first movie slogging through the jungles of Mexico during the height of the the rainy season.

"Then he sent us off to the Sahara Desert where we could only work between 1 a.m and 6 a.m. because of the sweltering heat."

DeVito is currently starring as a sleazy celebrity reporter in L.A. Confidential, and will be seen as an ambulance-chasing lawyer in Francis Coppola's The Rainmaker.

He is also the producer of the Ethan Hawke sci-fi thriller Gattaca.

HOLLYWOOD -- Matilda is a demented children's tale designed to scare the willies out of kids, according to Danny DeVito, the man who made it.

Yet the movie is very much a family affair. Make that a very healthy family affair, he says.

"My kids were with me every step of the way," says producer, director and star Danny DeVito.

DeVito also hired his actress wife, Rhea Perlman, to co-star as his wife in the movie, which opened across North America this weekend. The two real-life lovebirds play the twisted, selfish parents of the little heroine Matilda in the movie, which is an adaptation of the Roald Dahl book.

"It was great," enthuses Perlman about working with her husband. "Usually he's working on his thing and I'm working on my thing and then we have the house (to spend time together) and he brings his work home anyway. So do I, I guess. So this was a chance for us to actually go off to work together in the same car at the same time, spending some time together doing something we both love."

There was an awkward period of adjustment, especially for Perlman. "It was a little scary for me at first," she purrs. "Would he like what I'm doing? We hadn't really worked together in the directing/ acting capacity for a while (he directed her in episodes of the TV series Taxi). But once we got started and we were both in the same trench and I felt comfortable and he felt comfortable, it was just really fun!"

Before the shoot, Matilda was a genuine family collaboration. It was DeVito and Perlman's daughter Lucy who first brought home a copy of Matilda for her dad to read. That sparked a business interest, and DeVito tracked down the rights to Nicholas Kazan and Robin Swicord's screen adaptation, outbidding other production houses. Perlman and the kids -- Lucy is 13, Grace is 11 and Jake is eight -- encouraged him, offering advice, nagging, cajoling and congratulating.

"He uses me a lot," says Perlman, catching herself in the middle of the sentence, starting to laugh and turning it into a joke at her own expense. "Uses me? He uses me all the time! I'm all used up!" She giggles. "We talk about scripts a lot, especially before something gets started. In the development stages of a project, I get pretty involved, usually. But never visually. He's really in his own world in that sense. I don't `see' things before I see them."

The reactions of the children, meanwhile, were reminders to DeVito that Matilda would work wonders on little ones, even if there are fears that the story is too weird and too dangerous for some kids. Matilda, which hews pretty close to Dahl's original story, is the saga of a precocious little girl with horrible parents who discourage her lust for learning, reading and school. Mara Wilson of Mrs. Doubtfire plays the girl.

For discipline, the parents pack Matilda off to the hideous confines of Crunchem Hall, a prison-like school run by a psychotic named Agatha Trunchbull, a nasty number played with zeal by English actress Pam Ferris. Trunchbull thinks nothing of tossing naughty little boys out the window and locking up haughty little girls in a coffin-like dungeon.

"We found the book really empowering, really exciting," says DeVito. "Great parts for Rhea and me, these parents from hell! We could have a great time, stretch it out and explore all the darkness." Dark is putting it mildly. No problem, say both DeVito and Perlman. Dark is good for kids, they claim.

DeVito, whose penchant for weirdness is already well known in his other directorial efforts, Throw Momma From The Train and The War Of The Roses, delights in the dark side. "Years ago, I saw that witch giving that apple to Snow White. When she bit into it and she fell dead, it just crushed me, it killed me, it's warped." All of which is a good thing, he says, just like the traditional European blood and guts fairy tales.

"It's really important to explore the darkness to its fullest," he muses, "so that the brightness is even more victorious and more rewarding!" He also admits he finds it more interesting to direct a movie jammed with warped things. "A lot of that is there for me, because I kind of like that stuff!"

Perlman figures many parents try too hard to keep unusual stories away from their kids. "I think we're very over-protective of children, understandably trying to protect them from things they might find scary. But you forget that children really love to explore the dark side: the witch, the bad guy, the monster. The fact that a child can overcome a monster -- or three monsters in this movie -- makes it all the more powerful a message."

The message was already in Roald Dahl's extraordinary book, says Perlman, who has read most of Dahl's stories to her children at bedtime. In Matilda, Dahl's subversive saga still led to one conclusion -- that children should be encouraged to read books and learn everything they can.

"They're just extremely imaginative stories," Perlman says of Dahl's work. "And they don't talk down to children at all; they're just at the right level for kids -- and grown-ups, too."

At the same time, Perlman is fascinated that her husband has been attracted to such strange material. Reminded that people -- mothers, spouses, kids -- seem to die or at least be in dire danger in all of director DeVito's films, Perlman recoils in mock horror: "I think I'm going to move out!

"It sort of balances. If he didn't have that outlet (filmmaking) I think I'd be in very big trouble." As it is, things are healthy at home. DeVito and Perlman have one of those rare Hollywood marriages -- long-lasting and happy. The secret is in time spent with their children, who get so involved in the decisions that each parent makes about movies.

"The family thing is really important to both of us," says Perlman. "We spend a lot of time with our kids. It's a priority we just make time for, even though it's kind of hard to make time for each other."

On Matilda, though, everything just fell into place for the entire family. Now they want to share it with other families.

"I think every kid is different," says DeVito. "But I would say that, between the ages of six and 14, those kids are going to go ballistic over the picture. They'll love it!"

 HOLLYWOOD -- If there can be gentle giants, why not tyrannical short men?

It may be a stereotype but it's one Danny DeVito has turned into a gold mine.

The diminutive DeVito has been playing nasty characters for as long as he and Hollywood can remember.

"For some reason everybody from screenwriters to producers to audiences loves the idea of the greedy little tyrant and I give them Napoleon on steroids, so they love me," DeVito says.

"On a really good day, I'm five feet short. It's pretty difficult for me to play anything but the little guy. I don't play a good victim so I'm always the nasty little guy."

Rhea Perlman, DeVito's wife of 14 years, insists her husband is "a real pussycat off screen. He can be quite a taskmaster behind a camera, too, but when we get home, I give the directions."

By his own admission, DeVito, 51, is also a dedicated family man. He and Perlman, who is four years his junior and an inch taller, have three children: Lucy, 13, Gracie, 11, and Jake, 8.

"It's all about children really. As soon as you have them, they become your life. Or at least they should. It's about taking them to their baseball games, their dance classes and creating an environment to nurture them.

"Kids have lots of commitments. As a parent you spend a lot of time waiting for them. I figure I might as well produce, direct or act in a film to pass the time productively."

It's a philosophy which easily brings DeVito to his newest project. It's the film version of the Roald Dahl children's classic Matilda (opening Friday), the story of a young girl who tries desperately to escape her abusive home life.

"Just because Danny and Rhea dote over their children doesn't mean everyone does. It's a sad truth and one Dahl turned into a marvellous story," DeVito says.

"Poor Matilda has a horrible home life and when she goes to school she encounters Miss Trunchbull, the school principal of every child's worst nightmare."

DeVito first came across Matilda when his daughter Lucy brought the book home from school three years ago.

"Lucy said it was the best book she'd ever read. She wanted to share it with the rest of the family, so I read it aloud for us a chapter at a time," DeVito says.

"The director in me immediately went to work. I knew I had to turn this book into a movie. The actor in me knew that Rhea and I had to play these parents from hell."

DeVito's children became his script advisers.

"Any time I felt I should or had to change anything at all from the book, I had to have a conference with my children.

"One of the few concessions they allowed me was to give Trunchbull a riding crop instead of a bullwhip. The bullwhip proved a little too unwieldy."

The third hat DeVito wears on Matilda is that of producer. The film was financed and nurtured through Jersey Films, a production company DeVito formed in 1992.

Like DeVito, Jersey Films has become known as the little guy who could.

In just four years, Jersey Films has produced the blockbusters Pulp Fiction and Get Shorty, plus Reality Bites and Sunset Park.

"I knew the moment I read Pulp Fiction that I was on to something special. I was in bed reading the script, howling out loud. Rhea looked at me as if I was crazy.

"I told her either I'd found the funniest new script in ages or that I was one sick individual. Time proved millions of people share my twisted sense of humor."

Next to Perlman, with whom DeVito lived for 11 years before they married, DeVito's best friend is actor Michael Douglas.

"We met at the Eugene O'Neill (drama) Centre in Connecticut. When we graduated, we moved to New York and rented an apartment together.

"It was a great setup because Michael got his role in Streets of San Francisco and started living out there but kept paying his share of the rent."

DeVito ended up starring opposite Douglas's father, Kirk Douglas, in the New York production of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.

"Michael bought the film rights to Cuckoo's Nest and when he finally got the money together to produce it, he suggested it to (director) Milos Forman."

Cuckoo's Nest dominated the Academy Awards in 1975, so DeVito and Perlman moved to Los Angeles. He won the role of the eternally cranky Louie on Taxi and Perlman found herself tending bar on Cheers.

DeVito has just completed making the film noir thriller L.A. Confidential and stars as a gambler oblivious to the alien invasion in Tim Burton's Mars Attacks! Perlman has a new CBC TV series called Pearl.