The AP’s Chris Jenkins wrote film dir RON HOWARD, who is “working on a motorsports-themed movie -- ‘RUSH,’ the story of the 1970s rivalry” between former F1 drivers JAMES HUNT and NIKI LAUDA, visited Indianapolis Motor Speedway last weekend during NASCAR’s annual stop at the track to get a “close look at what a driver experiences in a top racing series.” Howard said, “We’re done filming, but there’s still a lot to be done in the editing and sound work and visual effects. I’ve still got my director’s hat on, I’m not just promoting.” The film is “expected to be released in the fall of 2013” (AP, 8/1).
TYSON SHOW ‘HAM-HANDED’: In N.Y., Neil Genzlinger reviews the one-man show, “MIKE TYSON: UNDISPUTED TRUTH,” which opened Thursday for a run through Aug. 12. Genzlinger writes the show is “among the odder spectacles Broadway has seen in a while.” Boxing HOFer MIKE TYSON “is doing little more than relating his well-publicized life story, and, under SPIKE LEE’s direction, he’s doing so with a clumsiness startling to see on a Broadway stage (and at a ticket price that tops out at $199).” The “incongruous, almost childlike Tyson charm pokes through occasionally and makes you momentarily forget how ham-handed and manipulative the show is” (N.Y. TIMES, 8/3)….The N.Y. TIMES' Mike Hale reviews Showtime’s “THE FRANCHISE” and writes while the Marlins have “floundered, stumbling to a losing record and trading away key members of its ‘family’ in a wait-till-next-year fire sale, ‘The Franchise’ has benefited.” In the show’s second season, “bad baseball has made for better television” and the show has “provided what looks like a surprisingly honest view of a team in crisis” (N.Y. TIMES, 8/3).
NAMES: The National Center for Spectator Sports Safety & Security named MLB Senior VP/Investigations DAN MULLIN the recipient of the organization’s Distinguished Leadership Award (MLB)….Michigan Int’l Speedway named KID ROCK Grand Marshal for the Aug. 19 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Pure Michigan 400 (MIS)….Mavericks Owner MARK CUBAN has “invested an undisclosed amount” in Calgary-based eThor, “a software company that has developed technology to connect any local business's point of sale system to a website or mobile app” (CALGARY HERALD, 8/1)....Pittsburgh Ice Arena LP, a group that includes former NHLer ALAIN LEMIEUX, is buying the Valley Sports Complex in New Kensington, Pa. (PITTSBURGH POST-GAZETTE, 8/3).
IN MEMORY: CARL STEPHENS, a former host of the Auburn Football Review and the voice at Jordan-Hare Stadium for 27 years, passed away Wednesday at the age of 77 (AL.com, 8/1).
