WEBVTT - Episode 3: Planet Haileywood 0:00:03.480 --> 0:00:15.160 This is an I heart original. It's and Tom Blanchard 0:00:15.240 --> 0:00:17.360 is sitting down with his wife to eat at a 0:00:17.400 --> 0:00:21.840 new restaurant in the sleepy town of Hailey, Idaho. Hailey 0:00:21.960 --> 0:00:24.599 is a part of the Wood River Valley where Tom 0:00:24.680 --> 0:00:27.720 is a county commissioner, and he's eager to check out 0:00:27.760 --> 0:00:31.200 a big attraction in one of the area's smallest towns. 0:00:34.000 --> 0:00:39.000 It's packed, and everywhere Tom looks he sees something extravagant, 0:00:40.640 --> 0:00:46.120 amazing expensive hardwood furniture tables that have African daisies and 0:00:46.200 --> 0:00:52.000 tiger lilies erupting from vases, hand painted ostrojegs that line shelves. 0:00:52.840 --> 0:00:59.760 There are even palm trees. In Idaho. Grand openings of anything, 0:01:00.080 --> 0:01:04.080 especially a two story restaurant slash bar, are few and 0:01:04.200 --> 0:01:08.920 far between. And Haley, it's a former mining community with 0:01:09.040 --> 0:01:12.800 the kind of straightforward, no frills attitude that comes along 0:01:12.840 --> 0:01:15.920 with it. Some people in Haley aren't even sure a 0:01:16.000 --> 0:01:19.640 restaurant this nice belongs here. It's not that they don't 0:01:19.720 --> 0:01:24.399 like it, it's just that it's fancy. Locals don't have 0:01:24.480 --> 0:01:29.600 a lot of use for fancy. Tom's like that fancy 0:01:29.760 --> 0:01:32.560 is okay, but he can do without it. And he's 0:01:32.600 --> 0:01:36.039 not phased by much, but even he's surprised by what 0:01:36.160 --> 0:01:39.199 happens when he looks up from his menu to see 0:01:39.240 --> 0:01:43.960 who's looking back at him. The server is Bruce Willis. 0:01:46.640 --> 0:01:51.240 He was our server. Um My wife and I ate 0:01:51.280 --> 0:01:53.480 at the mint one night and he was our server 0:01:54.040 --> 0:01:56.480 because he he would go down there and he would 0:01:56.560 --> 0:01:59.000 end up waiting on tables and you know, talking to 0:01:59.080 --> 0:02:04.360 people or you know, serving at the bar. Bruce Willis 0:02:04.360 --> 0:02:07.760 smiles as he jots down their order. Well, if you've 0:02:07.760 --> 0:02:10.600 seen his movies, you know he doesn't smile so much 0:02:10.639 --> 0:02:14.240 as he smirks. That's part of the Bruce Willis image. 0:02:14.639 --> 0:02:18.280 Never a complete smile, more of a half grin without 0:02:18.360 --> 0:02:22.280 showing many teeth, something that says, you know, I'm charming. 0:02:22.600 --> 0:02:25.880 I know I'm charming, and we're both pretty amused by it. 0:02:26.520 --> 0:02:29.680 The smirk that's made hundreds of millions of dollars at 0:02:29.720 --> 0:02:33.359 the box office in films like Die Hard, Twelve Monkeys, 0:02:33.440 --> 0:02:37.560 and Pulp Fiction. He even made that talking baby movie 0:02:37.680 --> 0:02:42.440 Look Who's Talking, a success that spawned two sequels, though 0:02:42.480 --> 0:02:46.120 Willis sat out the third movie when the dog started talking. 0:02:47.400 --> 0:02:51.960 Willis was the voice of Mikey the Baby, a constantly 0:02:52.040 --> 0:03:04.320 smirking baby. The point being Bruce Willis in was one 0:03:04.360 --> 0:03:08.000 of the biggest movie stars on the planet, an action 0:03:08.120 --> 0:03:13.160 hero whose everyman qualities helped balance out these superhuman characters 0:03:13.160 --> 0:03:17.840 played by Bazooka tootors like Schwarzenegger and Stallone. An actor 0:03:17.919 --> 0:03:21.400 who was highly respected for dramatic turns in movies like 0:03:21.480 --> 0:03:25.600 as a tortured Vietnam veteran in In Country and opposite 0:03:25.600 --> 0:03:30.480 Paul Newman in Nobody's Fool. A mega watt star, making 0:03:30.560 --> 0:03:34.239 tens of millions of dollars almost every time he appeared 0:03:34.280 --> 0:03:39.200 on screen. And yet here he is in Haley, serving 0:03:39.240 --> 0:03:44.280 Tom Blanchard and several other tables their appetizers. And it's 0:03:44.280 --> 0:03:48.240 not because Bruce Willis had fallen on hard times. It's 0:03:48.240 --> 0:03:51.800 because Bruce Willis owns the restaurant known as The Mint. 0:03:52.640 --> 0:03:57.040 In fact, he now owns several businesses along Haley's main street, 0:03:57.320 --> 0:04:00.200 in addition to a private residence just on the edge 0:04:00.240 --> 0:04:05.560 of town. That's why residents started calling their home something 0:04:05.600 --> 0:04:12.040 besides Haley. They started referring to it as Haleywood. But 0:04:12.200 --> 0:04:15.200 some people couldn't shake the feeling Willis didn't want a 0:04:15.320 --> 0:04:19.080 town so much as a movie set, one where Willis 0:04:19.120 --> 0:04:22.159 was the director. And if Haley was a movie set 0:04:22.240 --> 0:04:26.880 and Willis was the director and the star, didn't that 0:04:26.960 --> 0:04:36.799 make the locals well? Extras for I Heart Radio This 0:04:37.000 --> 0:04:41.120 is Haleywood, and I heart original podcast, I'm Your Host 0:04:41.279 --> 0:04:45.760 Danis Schwartz, and this is Episode three Planet Haley Wood. 0:04:53.400 --> 0:04:57.600 In the nineties, Bruce Willis wasn't just a movie star. 0:04:58.160 --> 0:05:01.560 He was also a businessman involved in one of the 0:05:01.600 --> 0:05:05.440 trendiest business moves an actor could pull off, becoming the 0:05:05.520 --> 0:05:11.479 face of a slightly corny theme restaurant. It's easy to 0:05:11.520 --> 0:05:16.400 see the appeal. Kenny Rogers Roasters, a chicken spot, Michael 0:05:16.440 --> 0:05:21.719 Jordan's steakhouse eminem recently opened to storefronts in Detroit named 0:05:22.200 --> 0:05:28.800 Mom Spaghetti. And there's Mark Wahlberg's Wallburgers, which he operates 0:05:28.800 --> 0:05:33.120 with his brothers. These are kind of self aware in 0:05:33.160 --> 0:05:38.760 their kitchen appeal, sometimes earnest, sometimes bombastic. But during the 0:05:38.920 --> 0:05:44.359 nineties heyday, the theme restaurant was serious business, and no 0:05:44.560 --> 0:05:50.400 theme restaurant was bigger than Planet Hollywood in tourist friendly 0:05:50.440 --> 0:05:54.640 cities like New York, Los Angeles at Disney World, even 0:05:54.720 --> 0:05:58.360 all the way to Moscow. These monuments to Hollywood glamour 0:05:58.480 --> 0:06:03.040 and stardom popped up and enticed patrons with an aesthetic 0:06:03.120 --> 0:06:10.840 that worshiped the movies. Picture a t g I Fridays 0:06:10.880 --> 0:06:18.520 with movie memorabilia, with movie flair, a place to eat 0:06:18.600 --> 0:06:23.000 fried chicken coated and capt'n crunch cereal while seated underneath 0:06:23.080 --> 0:06:30.160 Rocky balboas boxing trunks or John mcclean's dirty undershirt. Movies 0:06:30.440 --> 0:06:34.960 and movie stars hadn't been shrunk down to streaming services yet. 0:06:35.600 --> 0:06:39.000 Movies were still an event, and eating a burger while 0:06:39.160 --> 0:06:42.600 staring at a glass case with Jason Vorhees hockey mask 0:06:42.720 --> 0:06:48.160 staring down at customers was a draw. But the real 0:06:48.320 --> 0:06:52.719 secret sauce was the endorsement from major movie stars who 0:06:52.760 --> 0:06:56.080 came out for Planet Hollywood grand openings like they were 0:06:56.120 --> 0:07:01.800 movie premiers. Why simple, Plan It Hollywood was a turnkey 0:07:01.839 --> 0:07:06.080 operation for celebrities who wanted to flex their business acumen 0:07:06.720 --> 0:07:10.720 in exchange for publicity. Stars would get shares in the company, 0:07:11.240 --> 0:07:14.080 and the more they promoted, the more money they'd make. 0:07:17.040 --> 0:07:21.920 That was the idea anyway. Planet Hollywood was the brainchild 0:07:22.000 --> 0:07:26.280 of Brian Kessner and Keith Barrish to film producers who 0:07:26.360 --> 0:07:29.640 decided to take the template of hard Rock Cafe and 0:07:29.680 --> 0:07:38.280 apply it to movies. They teamed with Robert Earle, who 0:07:38.360 --> 0:07:41.880 was then CEO of Hard Rock International and who knew 0:07:41.920 --> 0:07:46.360 the novelty eatery business well. They thought about calling it 0:07:46.560 --> 0:07:51.800 Cafe Hollywood before settling on Planet Hollywood, and because they 0:07:51.840 --> 0:07:55.600 wanted it to be an international brand, they needed actors 0:07:55.600 --> 0:08:00.440 who had international appeal. The first two names on a list, 0:08:00.880 --> 0:08:06.559 Arnold Schwartzenegger and Bruce Willis Demi Moore joined in, making 0:08:06.600 --> 0:08:10.200 Willis and More the power couple of the theme restaurant industry. 0:08:11.560 --> 0:08:15.880 Soon Sylvester Stallone joined them. For Stallone, it was an 0:08:15.960 --> 0:08:22.000 interesting foreshadowing of movies imitating life. The sixth installment of 0:08:22.040 --> 0:08:26.240 the Rocky franchise in two thousand and six featured Stallone's 0:08:26.320 --> 0:08:31.200 character opening a restaurant called Adrian's. In the film, Rocky 0:08:31.320 --> 0:08:34.679 used his celebrity to draw business, just as Stallone and 0:08:34.760 --> 0:08:37.840 the others had done I R L. Back in the nineties. 0:08:42.240 --> 0:08:47.440 The first Planet Hollywood opened in Manhattan in serving up, 0:08:47.600 --> 0:08:52.880 among other things, mixed drinks named die Harder's. It had 0:08:52.920 --> 0:08:57.000 palm trees and plenty of star power, all of the 0:08:57.040 --> 0:09:02.320 other franchise openings did too. George Looney, Wesley Snipes, Luke Perry, 0:09:02.520 --> 0:09:07.080 Eddie Murphy, a who's who of nineties faces were usually there. 0:09:08.880 --> 0:09:13.000 Willis and the others regularly attended, drawing thousands of adoring 0:09:13.080 --> 0:09:17.280 fans and tons of media. In some of the high 0:09:17.360 --> 0:09:21.360 profile locations, like in Los Angeles, there seemed to be 0:09:21.400 --> 0:09:24.760 a vague notion that any regular Joe might walk into 0:09:24.760 --> 0:09:29.000 the restaurant and see Arnold or Bruce or Demi sipping 0:09:29.000 --> 0:09:33.880 a drink. This rarely happened, but it was part of 0:09:33.920 --> 0:09:38.439 the appeal. Willis had to say in the franchises liquor selection, 0:09:38.920 --> 0:09:41.880 using his expertise from his bartending days in New York, 0:09:42.440 --> 0:09:52.720 while Arnold contributed his mother's strutal recipe Burger's nachos, blaring 0:09:52.800 --> 0:09:56.640 music quote before they were stars, high school photos on 0:09:56.679 --> 0:10:00.200 the place mats. It was a perfect restaurant for the 0:10:00.559 --> 0:10:04.920 celebrity obsessed tabloid culture of the nineties. If a patron 0:10:04.960 --> 0:10:08.320 ponied up for a Planet Hollywood Express card, they could 0:10:08.320 --> 0:10:11.480 even get some of that special treatment usually afforded to 0:10:11.480 --> 0:10:14.880 the Hollywood elite, jumping the lines to be seated more 0:10:15.000 --> 0:10:19.920 quickly and those lines could get pretty long. The chain 0:10:20.040 --> 0:10:23.959 was serving up seven hundred and fifty thousand people every 0:10:24.040 --> 0:10:30.040 year at restaurants in thirty one countries. Planet Hollywood became 0:10:30.080 --> 0:10:34.480 a brand advertised in movie theaters. Going to a Planet 0:10:34.480 --> 0:10:38.960 Hollywood became a right of vacationers everywhere, a stop you 0:10:39.000 --> 0:10:42.480 needed to make to bring home a souvenir for family members, 0:10:42.920 --> 0:10:46.760 a denim shirt, a polo shirt, a fossil watch. It 0:10:46.880 --> 0:10:52.280 even had a tie in board game. The Bomber Jackets 0:10:52.320 --> 0:10:56.040 with the Planet Hollywood logo sported by Willis and the others, 0:10:56.480 --> 0:10:58.960 were a kind of uniform, like they were part of 0:10:58.960 --> 0:11:02.080 a winning varsity team in the sport of making money. 0:11:02.679 --> 0:11:06.160 Customers could buy them too, for three d and twenty 0:11:06.240 --> 0:11:14.080 five dollars. But at openings, Willis could contribute something the 0:11:14.120 --> 0:11:19.520 others couldn't, a stage presence. Civilians weren't allowed inside the 0:11:19.679 --> 0:11:23.520 star studded v I P gatherings, of course, so Willis 0:11:23.559 --> 0:11:28.680 would bring the party outside where fans were standing expectantly. Opening. 0:11:28.720 --> 0:11:33.360 After opening, Willis and his band the Accelerators would jam, 0:11:33.400 --> 0:11:37.559 giving audiences a full course of his charisma. Arnold and 0:11:37.640 --> 0:11:43.920 Sly could merely wave and smile Willis's most memorable opening 0:11:44.120 --> 0:11:47.400 came at the debut of A Planet Hollywood in San Diego. 0:11:49.880 --> 0:11:53.040 On stage with his band, he was joined by Anna 0:11:53.120 --> 0:11:56.280 Nicole Smith, the pin up of the moment thanks to 0:11:56.320 --> 0:12:01.320 our appearances in Playboy and as a model for guests jeans. 0:12:01.320 --> 0:12:04.880 Smith was looking to shock the crowd, and she did 0:12:05.400 --> 0:12:08.440 by taking out one of her breasts and waving it 0:12:08.480 --> 0:12:13.559 around without any prompting or provocation from Willis. She then 0:12:13.760 --> 0:12:18.640 unbuttoned his shirt and either licked his chest or pretended 0:12:18.679 --> 0:12:21.680 to lick his chest, depending on which version you'd like 0:12:21.760 --> 0:12:26.640 to believe. But here's the problem with being trendy. Trends, 0:12:26.800 --> 0:12:31.240 by their nature, don't last very long. While the openings 0:12:31.280 --> 0:12:35.959 were splashy and exciting, pretty soon people realized that Arnold 0:12:36.080 --> 0:12:38.520 wasn't going to just show up and offered to split 0:12:38.520 --> 0:12:43.480 a milkshake. The food was no different than your average Applebee's, 0:12:43.480 --> 0:12:47.800 and the struggling aspiring actors working as waiters weren't worth 0:12:47.840 --> 0:12:55.680 repeated trips. Planet Hollywood went public in and tried to 0:12:55.760 --> 0:13:00.320 keep growing, but the public's appetite for cereal encrusted chicken 0:13:00.360 --> 0:13:05.120 fingers and terminator jackets mounted on walls had reached its peak, 0:13:09.280 --> 0:13:15.120 celebrities began moving away from the premiers. Locations closed, two 0:13:15.320 --> 0:13:21.440 bankruptcies followed. There are still some Planet Hollywood's in business today, 0:13:21.960 --> 0:13:26.840 but few movie stars celebrating their grand openings. It was 0:13:26.880 --> 0:13:30.840 fun while it lasted, and the experience was invaluable for 0:13:30.880 --> 0:13:34.199 Willis and more. It showed them how they could monetize 0:13:34.240 --> 0:13:38.680 their celebrity in the service industry. But opening a Planet 0:13:38.720 --> 0:13:43.920 Hollywood franchise in Haley was out of the question. It 0:13:44.040 --> 0:13:49.440 was too big, too well to Hollywood Haley. It was 0:13:49.440 --> 0:13:54.040 supposed to be the escape from all that. As Planet 0:13:54.040 --> 0:13:57.880 Hollywood was starting to spin out of orbit, Willis decided 0:13:57.960 --> 0:14:01.480 to do his own version of a theme restaurant in Haley. 0:14:02.600 --> 0:14:06.840 But it wouldn't be restricted to just one building. It 0:14:06.880 --> 0:14:11.080 would be places where, yeah, maybe you would see Bruce 0:14:11.120 --> 0:14:26.920 Willis hanging out. Bruce Willis's arrival in Haley solved a 0:14:27.080 --> 0:14:30.520 very big problem facing the catch him Sun Valley Chamber 0:14:30.560 --> 0:14:34.840 of Commerce. Here's Wendy Jake what I was a director 0:14:34.880 --> 0:14:37.680 of the Sun Valley Catching Chamber of Commerce. At that time. 0:14:38.120 --> 0:14:42.360 The town was pretty sleepy, storefronts boarded up just in 0:14:42.440 --> 0:14:47.640 the main area. Older buildings the hospital was converted to 0:14:47.760 --> 0:14:51.280 a city hall and a library. The County building is 0:14:51.320 --> 0:14:55.400 a block over. It's an old, wonderful brick building from 0:14:55.440 --> 0:14:58.720 the late eighteen hundreds. When the silver mining boom was 0:14:58.760 --> 0:15:03.920 taking place, the host mistress and the mayor and other 0:15:03.960 --> 0:15:07.640 people and Haley were talking about doing a video to 0:15:07.760 --> 0:15:12.720 promote downtown Haley because things had kind of gone awry, 0:15:12.920 --> 0:15:16.560 wasn't it wasn't really very much of a viable town 0:15:16.640 --> 0:15:18.880 that we're empty storefronts. And then all of a sudden 0:15:18.880 --> 0:15:22.640 we got Bruce Willis of redevelopment, and we didn't really 0:15:22.720 --> 0:15:34.640 need a video after that. Suddenly there was another boom, 0:15:34.680 --> 0:15:38.640 not a silver mining boom, a Bruce Willis boom. There 0:15:38.640 --> 0:15:42.520 were jackhammers and forklifts and rubble, the good kind of 0:15:42.600 --> 0:15:46.080 rubble that told you something was changing, Something was being 0:15:46.120 --> 0:15:49.120 torn down so something better could go up in its place. 0:15:50.320 --> 0:15:59.600 A transformation was underway. It was a Tuesday hours on 0:15:59.760 --> 0:16:03.400 dead line. I was in a big hurry getting the 0:16:03.400 --> 0:16:08.040 paper finished. Wayne and Dair, editor of the Wood River Journal, 0:16:08.280 --> 0:16:13.480 and somebody came into my office, you know, to get 0:16:13.520 --> 0:16:16.280 your camera and go out into the alley, and Bruce 0:16:16.320 --> 0:16:19.160 Willis has carried two by fours over his shoulder. That 0:16:19.360 --> 0:16:26.160 to helped the construction workers and h he said, yeah, 0:16:26.280 --> 0:16:28.280 you could probably sell a picture like that to the 0:16:28.400 --> 0:16:32.480 National Enquirer for our fifty dollars. I mean, I would 0:16:32.520 --> 0:16:34.880 like to have fifty dollars as much as anybody. But 0:16:35.600 --> 0:16:39.760 becoming a paparazzi was not, uh, in my wheelhouse at all. 0:16:40.760 --> 0:16:43.640 But that's sounded exactly like something he would do, just literally, 0:16:43.840 --> 0:16:46.360 you know, pitching in and helping to get the job 0:16:46.400 --> 0:16:53.760 done and being pretty comfortable doing it. Willis was busy 0:16:53.840 --> 0:16:58.000 renovating the Mint as a bar in a former mining town. 0:16:58.200 --> 0:17:04.640 It was dilapidated, dark. He tore down an little bar 0:17:05.600 --> 0:17:09.640 and built what he called them in and he spent 0:17:09.680 --> 0:17:12.119 a couple of million bucks at least on renovating it. 0:17:12.560 --> 0:17:15.480 Did a beautiful job, made it into a bar and 0:17:16.000 --> 0:17:21.040 at a stage that's former Hailey resident and attorney leash Lender. 0:17:21.600 --> 0:17:25.400 Of course it was. I mean, it's it's stuck out 0:17:25.440 --> 0:17:27.840 like a sore thumb, because it's the kind of thing 0:17:27.880 --> 0:17:33.320 you would see in a major city. Everything else is uh, 0:17:33.520 --> 0:17:37.680 you know, almost tie up your horse outside. So it 0:17:37.760 --> 0:17:41.000 was it was different, that's for sure, but it was 0:17:41.040 --> 0:17:49.720 beautifully done, the dark corners were gone, The surly drinkers 0:17:49.800 --> 0:17:54.560 were effectively evicted, forced to find another watering hole to Bruton. 0:17:55.520 --> 0:17:59.240 Lunch wasn't of the liquid variety, but freshly caught Idaho 0:17:59.280 --> 0:18:03.560 trout were burghers. It was affordable to a lunch bill 0:18:03.640 --> 0:18:07.439 for two might come to about twenty dollars. Suddenly the 0:18:07.480 --> 0:18:11.560 Mint was a shiny new establishment where the slenders and 0:18:11.720 --> 0:18:14.840 other locals were sitting down to grab a meal. And 0:18:14.960 --> 0:18:18.280 while there wouldn't be memorabilia that was very much a 0:18:18.400 --> 0:18:23.000 Planet Hollywood approach, patrons would still know who was bankrolling 0:18:23.040 --> 0:18:26.840 the venture. Above the dining area was a giant photo 0:18:27.080 --> 0:18:30.920 of Bruce Willis as a baby, not the look Who's 0:18:30.960 --> 0:18:36.400 talking baby, his actual baby photo. I think that the 0:18:36.400 --> 0:18:39.760 major impression of everybody was that's going to be a 0:18:39.800 --> 0:18:44.919 real addition to our little main street, and we welcome 0:18:44.960 --> 0:18:47.800 the money. You see when you leave Haley, you go 0:18:47.920 --> 0:18:50.800 ten miles north, you get in to catch him in 0:18:50.880 --> 0:18:53.800 sun Valley, and it's a working man's town. When you 0:18:53.880 --> 0:18:58.280 come south and leave catch him. Hayley was not the 0:18:58.359 --> 0:19:01.800 place where the people that had money of it was 0:19:01.920 --> 0:19:06.159 purely a working class, working class people. In fact, I 0:19:06.200 --> 0:19:09.600 think Bruce was probably one of the first ones of 0:19:09.640 --> 0:19:17.320 that type of society that actually built Dollar. There was more, 0:19:17.680 --> 0:19:20.800 much more to the Mint, not just a place to eat, 0:19:20.960 --> 0:19:23.840 but a place for Bruce Willis to be Bruce Willis 0:19:24.200 --> 0:19:27.360 in a way that felt comfortable to him, and we'll 0:19:27.359 --> 0:19:30.080 get to that. But he wasn't done with Main Street. 0:19:31.400 --> 0:19:35.720 Next came the E. G. Willis Building, named after Willis's grandfather. 0:19:37.359 --> 0:19:41.040 It was a combination retail and office space with a 0:19:41.119 --> 0:19:45.840 variety of specialty shops like jewelers and furniture stores. We 0:19:45.880 --> 0:19:49.240 mentioned this before in relation to Willis's dust up with 0:19:49.320 --> 0:19:52.199 the Wood River Journal, but there was more to it. 0:19:53.560 --> 0:19:56.080 On the street level of the E. G. Willis Building 0:19:56.320 --> 0:19:59.760 was Shorties, a Bruce Willis project that paid homage to 0:19:59.840 --> 0:20:03.840 the diners of the nineteen fifties. Willis had named the 0:20:03.920 --> 0:20:10.280 joint after his dog, red leather booths, shiny chrome tabletop jukeboxes. 0:20:11.520 --> 0:20:15.160 Haley already had a breakfast hang out that the locals liked, 0:20:15.359 --> 0:20:19.600 but well, it wasn't exactly what Bruce Willis wanted. It 0:20:19.720 --> 0:20:23.639 wasn't open late enough, so he built something he liked better, 0:20:24.080 --> 0:20:27.960 a place that served eggs but also served hummus anytime, 0:20:28.200 --> 0:20:31.680 day or night. That was kind of what Bruce Willis did. 0:20:32.160 --> 0:20:34.840 If he saw something in Haley that he felt could 0:20:34.840 --> 0:20:37.720 be approved upon, he'd do it. If he thought it 0:20:37.800 --> 0:20:41.240 was missing something, he'd built it. There was a pulse, 0:20:41.560 --> 0:20:47.080 a Bruce nous to Haley that was becoming palpable. Here's 0:20:47.080 --> 0:20:51.199 Wendy Jake Wet. I think people in Sun Valley and 0:20:51.320 --> 0:20:55.439 Catchen looked at this change in Haley as kind of 0:20:55.480 --> 0:20:57.600 an opportunity, kind of like a place where it would 0:20:57.600 --> 0:21:00.240 be a little bit more authentic. It wouldn't be they 0:21:00.280 --> 0:21:05.840 might perceive as as a glitsey resort seeing versus something 0:21:05.880 --> 0:21:07.920 that was more authentic. But look at this. It also 0:21:08.000 --> 0:21:13.800 had this Bruce Willis amenity to it. The Bruce Willis amenity. 0:21:14.080 --> 0:21:18.000 The mint and shorties had his aesthetic, his love of 0:21:18.040 --> 0:21:22.000 a bygone era resurrected in the form of pies, under 0:21:22.080 --> 0:21:27.000 glass and tabletop jukeboxes. He was having fun sculpting the town. 0:21:27.560 --> 0:21:30.840 The same ambition he had demonstrated pursuing an acting career 0:21:31.320 --> 0:21:39.479 was making things happen in Haley. Sometimes little things cropped up, 0:21:39.920 --> 0:21:43.439 little signs that Bruce might have been getting frustrated with 0:21:43.720 --> 0:21:48.960 small town bureaucracy, things like permits and zoning, things that 0:21:49.000 --> 0:21:51.880 he never had to deal with that planet Hollywood were 0:21:51.920 --> 0:21:55.919 proving to be a nuisance. After all, Haley was flourishing, 0:21:56.080 --> 0:21:59.080 and he was investing in it, and someone in that 0:21:59.119 --> 0:22:04.800 position might expect a little cooperation. Once Hailey took issue 0:22:04.840 --> 0:22:07.720 with the fact that Willis didn't have the required number 0:22:07.760 --> 0:22:11.000 of parking spaces for the E. G. Willis Building, he 0:22:11.160 --> 0:22:14.400 was ten spaces short. He could have paid a fee 0:22:14.440 --> 0:22:17.400 of twenty five thousand dollars to cover the infraction and 0:22:17.520 --> 0:22:22.280 kept doing business without the spaces. Instead, Demi Moore bought 0:22:22.320 --> 0:22:26.280 a shuttered drug store across the street. It was listed 0:22:26.440 --> 0:22:31.440 for six hundred and seventy five dollars. Willis got his parking. 0:22:32.240 --> 0:22:38.639 The building itself remained vacant. To some, the town began 0:22:38.760 --> 0:22:41.919 taking on the feel of a Hollywood back lot. You 0:22:41.960 --> 0:22:44.679 know about back lots. They are built by studios for 0:22:44.800 --> 0:22:49.040 shooting movies and have replica storefronts that sometimes lead nowhere. 0:22:49.600 --> 0:22:52.359 You just walk through a door and come out the 0:22:52.359 --> 0:22:57.960 other side of the unfinished face of the building. After 0:22:58.080 --> 0:23:01.879 the Mint Shorties and the G. Willis Building, there was 0:23:01.960 --> 0:23:06.200 more Willis zoned in on the one place any movie 0:23:06.240 --> 0:23:10.080 star rearranging a small hometown would need. A worn down 0:23:10.119 --> 0:23:15.200 building known as the Liberty Theater. It was a place 0:23:15.280 --> 0:23:19.479 that once proudly presented movies, not a multiplex, but a 0:23:19.600 --> 0:23:25.240 single screen theater open since it was old school, The 0:23:25.280 --> 0:23:28.800 original owner was a barber during the day and prospected 0:23:28.800 --> 0:23:32.760 for gold on the weekends. Like the Mint, the theater 0:23:32.880 --> 0:23:36.280 needed a lot of care, which the current owners couldn't provide. 0:23:36.800 --> 0:23:39.800 Willis bought it and restored it to its former Art 0:23:39.840 --> 0:23:43.680 Deco glory without stripping it of its small town charms. 0:23:44.119 --> 0:23:46.879 He put a lot of money into an old theater. 0:23:47.000 --> 0:23:50.840 They're got it out, putting in a new seeding the 0:23:50.840 --> 0:23:55.800 new stage. It was first class. Inside. The ornate lobby 0:23:56.000 --> 0:24:01.400 was full of gold accents. Bolivian rosewood panels lined the walls. 0:24:01.440 --> 0:24:06.159 A huge chandelier loomed overhead. The theater itself had beautiful 0:24:06.240 --> 0:24:10.400 gold curtains and brand new chairs that reclined. Even better, 0:24:10.720 --> 0:24:14.800 the balcony had love seats that reclined. Tickets were still 0:24:14.840 --> 0:24:19.040 four dollars four dollars, and beer was still served in 0:24:19.040 --> 0:24:24.600 the balcony. A blazing red marquee lit up Haley's night sky. 0:24:24.800 --> 0:24:29.720 Bulbs encircling the titles of the films now playing. For 0:24:29.800 --> 0:24:33.639 Willis and for Haley, it was the ideal amalgamation of 0:24:33.680 --> 0:24:37.320 the old and the new, a historical landmark in town, 0:24:37.480 --> 0:24:42.560 updated with care that preserved Haley's culture. Anyone stepping inside 0:24:42.600 --> 0:24:47.240 the Liberty had one word for it, beautiful. I think 0:24:47.280 --> 0:24:51.960 that was a huge hit and one of Bruce Willis's dreams. 0:24:52.200 --> 0:24:55.280 One he spoke aloud in a rare moment of candor 0:24:55.359 --> 0:24:58.399 with the press, was that he could one day host 0:24:58.440 --> 0:25:00.480 the premiere of one of his fail elms in a 0:25:00.560 --> 0:25:04.040 movie theater he owned. Even though Willis had left a 0:25:04.040 --> 0:25:07.320 lot of Planet Hollywood behind, it turned out he wanted 0:25:07.359 --> 0:25:11.639 to keep one more element, the sonic boom of a 0:25:11.760 --> 0:25:28.719 major celebrity event. In the same year Bruce Willis started 0:25:28.800 --> 0:25:32.840 reshaping Haley, he decided he could control just how much 0:25:32.880 --> 0:25:37.760 Hollywood he wanted in the town. Willis was set to 0:25:37.840 --> 0:25:41.919 star in Twelve Monkeys, a science fiction film directed by 0:25:42.080 --> 0:25:45.840 Terry Gilliam of Monty Python fame and co starring a 0:25:46.000 --> 0:25:51.520 rapidly ascending actor named Brad Pitt. It was a surreal 0:25:51.640 --> 0:25:55.280 story about a man named James Cole played by Willis. 0:25:55.640 --> 0:25:58.680 Who travels back in time to stop a deadly virus 0:25:58.760 --> 0:26:01.920 from taking the world by storm. When he arrives in 0:26:02.000 --> 0:26:05.000 our present or close to it, he sent to a 0:26:05.040 --> 0:26:09.040 mental institution. No one believes Cole is from the future 0:26:09.320 --> 0:26:12.879 or that he belongs there. He's an odd man out. 0:26:20.480 --> 0:26:23.680 Instead of traveling back to Los Angeles for a premiere, 0:26:24.200 --> 0:26:27.080 Willis saw no reason why he couldn't spend a lot 0:26:27.119 --> 0:26:30.040 of his money and a lot of the studios money, 0:26:30.640 --> 0:26:35.360 bringing the premiere to Haley. He flew his co stars 0:26:35.400 --> 0:26:38.400 into Haley on a private jet and then shuttled them 0:26:38.440 --> 0:26:42.720 to Main Street and limousines. Jean Claude van Dam was there, 0:26:43.000 --> 0:26:47.200 and so was hotel mogul Steve Wynn. It had all 0:26:47.240 --> 0:26:51.119 the trappings of the glitzy debuts you saw in Los Angeles. 0:26:52.119 --> 0:26:56.879 At the premiere, Willis was ecstatic. He welcomed both locals 0:26:57.000 --> 0:27:00.760 and big stars at the door, ushering them in, screaming 0:27:00.760 --> 0:27:03.479 that all the candy was free, all the baby ruths 0:27:03.560 --> 0:27:06.680 you could eat at a Bruce Willis premiere. You didn't 0:27:06.720 --> 0:27:09.879 have to pay for concessions. But if the goal of 0:27:09.920 --> 0:27:13.359 a movie premiere is to draw attention to your film, 0:27:13.480 --> 0:27:18.720 why do it in Idaho, here's leash Slender. You're starting 0:27:18.720 --> 0:27:21.399 to get way west. By the time you get to 0:27:23.040 --> 0:27:28.639 uh You're not on the edges of Denver or another 0:27:28.720 --> 0:27:33.400 metropolitan area. So there wasn't a big area to draw from. 0:27:33.440 --> 0:27:37.919 If you put on a premiere or an act of 0:27:37.960 --> 0:27:42.080 a certain type, there's only so many people that are 0:27:42.080 --> 0:27:46.399 going to come because it's just that remote. Did a 0:27:46.400 --> 0:27:48.480 lot of people come from out of town? Do is it? No? 0:27:49.760 --> 0:27:52.760 Not at all. In fact, most people didn't even know 0:27:52.800 --> 0:27:58.240 whatever happened. And maybe that's just how Willis liked it. 0:27:58.240 --> 0:28:01.280 It was more like a private party. It was sort 0:28:01.280 --> 0:28:06.040 of Bruce saying, Okay, I'm here, this is me, this 0:28:06.119 --> 0:28:10.840 is where I'm from, this is my life, and I've 0:28:10.880 --> 0:28:12.720 got this movie. I want you to see about it 0:28:13.000 --> 0:28:15.200 because I do a good job in this and from 0:28:15.240 --> 0:28:17.200 what I have heard, I haven't seen one of his movies, 0:28:17.560 --> 0:28:19.960 but from what I hear, i'm the younger people. They 0:28:19.960 --> 0:28:25.680 think he's terrific. Of course, not every movie Bruce Willis 0:28:25.680 --> 0:28:29.360 premiered and Haley was a crowd pleaser. The next year, 0:28:29.480 --> 0:28:34.080 the gangster drama Last Man Standing got a similar Haley treatment, 0:28:34.680 --> 0:28:37.840 but it didn't strike a chord with critics or viewers. 0:28:38.480 --> 0:28:41.840 It was a lean, spare movie that shaved off most 0:28:41.880 --> 0:28:45.600 of Willis's wise guy charms, which was probably a mistake. 0:28:48.880 --> 0:28:52.120 The same year, Willis and Moore opened The Liberty for 0:28:52.160 --> 0:28:55.880 the premiere of Strip Tease, an erotic drama in which 0:28:55.920 --> 0:28:58.920 More started as a woman who begins stripping to earn 0:28:58.960 --> 0:29:03.120 money enough to regain custody of her young daughter. Then 0:29:03.200 --> 0:29:06.920 she gets embroiled in a political scandal, as strippers do. 0:29:08.480 --> 0:29:11.280 Hollywood saw the movie as having the potential to be 0:29:11.360 --> 0:29:16.840 another basic, instinct allured sexy thriller that pushes boundaries without 0:29:16.920 --> 0:29:21.360 crossing them. Entertainment Weekly said it would quote reveal more 0:29:21.440 --> 0:29:25.960 skin than a year's worth of Victoria's secret catalogs. The 0:29:26.040 --> 0:29:29.520 poster was singled out by the Motion Picture Association of 0:29:29.560 --> 0:29:33.720 America as being too revealing, with More naked in the 0:29:33.760 --> 0:29:39.240 shadow and cross lagged into suggestive oppose, but the role 0:29:39.320 --> 0:29:43.840 was important to More. Bruce and Demi's seven year old daughter, Rumor, 0:29:44.320 --> 0:29:47.200 even appeared in the film as more as on screen daughter, 0:29:47.840 --> 0:29:51.400 and the real headline, more than any erotic imagery, was 0:29:51.440 --> 0:29:54.880 that Demi earned a record twelve point five million dollar 0:29:55.000 --> 0:29:59.800 salary for an actress. No one, not Julia Roberts, not 0:30:00.000 --> 0:30:03.480 harrold Strape, not Sandra Bullock, had ever made as much. 0:30:04.720 --> 0:30:09.560 But while Willis and male actors were congratulated for big salaries, 0:30:10.240 --> 0:30:14.320 Moore was met with resentment. Some in the press dubbed 0:30:14.320 --> 0:30:20.040 her gimme Moore. It was a peculiar double standard. But 0:30:20.120 --> 0:30:23.920 aside from the premiere in Haley, Demi wasn't seen as 0:30:23.960 --> 0:30:28.240 often as Willis. She kept a much lower profile. She 0:30:28.280 --> 0:30:32.720