Film: Rushes

AS THE hard-edged lawyer Ling in the television series Ally McBeal, Lucy Liu is more devil than angel. But this hasn't stopped her from going after the role of the third angel in the movie version of Charlie's Angels, a refreshingly different part for an oriental actress. Likely? She does fit the producers' desires for someone to represent a multi-cultural America (she is New York-born with Chinese parents). Unfortunately, the schedules of American sitcoms rarely allow for the time needed to make a movie.

In a reversal of fortune, Keifer Sutherland is going from the movies to television, having landed the role of the detective in a television version of the movie L.A. Confidential.

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Warner Bros. has itself committed to developing a Latino-themed comedy and drama series for network and cable television. The production company heading up the project is run by executives who are not Latino and reportedly don't even speak Spanish. The National Hispanic Media Coalition is not happy. Especially as this move is in part a response to a protest by Latinos, and other minority groups earlier this year about the lack of diversity in the networks' fall programming.

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Meanwhile, the rights to Mario Puzo's last book have been bought by Miramax Films. It envisions Puzo's Omerta as a potential franchise for film and television.

The New York-born author, who died in July aged 78, won two Oscars for co-scripting with Francis Ford Coppola The Godfather and The Godfather Part II.