During nine years of movie and stage work, Jennifer Beals says she always had been leery of staying in one place long enough to do a television series. ”Nor had I found a character I wanted to live with for several years,”
she says.
Yet Beals, the former Chicagoan who whirled into prominence with the 1983 hit ”Flashdance,” has taken up residence at ”2000 Malibu Road,” CBS` new summer series that makes its debut with a two-hour movie Sunday, Aug. 23. That will be followed by four hourlong episodes on Wednesdays, the first on Aug. 26.
The Aaron Spelling youth show focuses on four women who share a spectacular beach house: a lawyer (Beals), a retired prostitute (Lisa Hartman), a young actress (Drew Barrymore), and the actress` manager (Tuesday Knight).
Working with Spelling on the series is ”L.A. Law” co-creator Terry Louise Fisher and Joel Schumacher, who has directed such youth-oriented films as ”St. Elmo`s Fire,” ”Flatliners,” ”Dying Young” and ”Lost Boys.”
Why did Beals finally submit to series television?
”I like the character,” she says. ”I liked the fact that Joel Schumacher was producing and directing the first six episodes. That made it more attractive.”
A hallmark of a Spelling show-his current offerings are ”Beverly Hills, 90210” and ”Melrose Place”-is the exposure of lots of flesh and of secrets each character hides.
”My character is Perry Quinn, the attorney with the drinking problem,”
Beals says. ”What I like about her is that on the outside she is very together, very motivated. She can be quite cynical, quite dry. It`s all a cover. I wouldn`t be interested in a character who was smooth and perfect. No one`s like that. Everyone has her secret and Achilles` heel. I feel she comes to Malibu seeking a sanctuary from all her problems.”
The actress, who is married to director-writer Alexandre Rockwell, said one of the first questions she asked Schumacher was, ”What if I get pregnant?”
”He said, `Then the character will get pregnant.` I wouldn`t mind being a single mother on television,” she said. ”I`d be proud to try to deal with that. You can`t always have a complete family unit. I know my mother for the most part raised me by herself.”
Beals will be seen in two films this fall: the USA Network murder mystery ”Indecency” and the theatrical release ”In the Soup,” which was written and directed by her husband. The movie was judged best at the 1992 Sundance Film Festival and has been entered in the Venice Film Festival.
”It`s a comedy, but also a coming of age for an artist,” she said. ”My husband and I put a lot of our own money into it, which breaks the cardinal rule. My mother gave her teacher`s pension.”
Her husband also directed her in ”Sons,” a movie widely distributed in Europe but not in the U.S.
”He`s a lot of fun to work with,” Beals said. ”He loves actors, he loves the whole process. We met through a mutual friend and have been married more than six years. We were married before I saw any of his films.”
Although she is committed to ”2000 Malibu Road” for the time being, Beals continues her interest in film projects.
”What I want to do now is film work with directors who have a strong point of view and a particular vision,” she says.
Beals grew up in Chicago, but now considers New York her home, even if the Hollywood-produced ”Malibu Road” stays in production for six years.
She studied at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago, then studied acting for several years in New York. She got her degree from Yale University, where she studied American literature and Italian.
She had just started the fall term at Yale when she got the role in
”Flashdance,” delaying her entrance until January. She had to promise her schoolteacher mother she would complete college.
”I love the theater,” she says. ”You never know what`s going to happen. I had my costume fall off on stage while playing a Latin American version of `Macbeth` in a sarong. Another night my light went out during the sleepwalking scene. But I`ve never had a prop fall into the orchestra pit. I`ve come close.”
