By the afternoon of March 26, the rains that had soaked Los Angeles earlier in the day had tapered off, and the sun was shining over the Paramount Studios lot. Bungalow windows opened wide, inviting spring, and production assistants pedaled their bikes among the soundstages and stucco buildings. Business as usual, except for the hoarse shouts of producer Robert Evans that came thundering out his office window.
The 62-year-old producer had plenty of cause to yowl. Over the last year, he had gambled his comeback from personal and professional ruin on Sliver -- the very expensive ($33 million and rising), very erotic thriller that, only two months before its May 21 opening, appeared to be in serious trouble. The stakes were just as high for the other creative principals involved. As a Manhattan book editor seduced into a world of voyeurism and murder, neo-femme fatale Sharon Stone was eager to prove herself worthy of the hype that has swirled around her since she showed the world her skirt's deepest secrets in last year's Basic Instinct. For her costar, William Baldwin, who plays her young seducer, Sliver represented a chance to rival big brother Alec as the family's hottest star. And for Sherry Lansing, the recently installed chairman and CEO of Paramount who had made Sliver her pet project, the film was destined either to give her studio an early lead in the summer box office race, or drop it back into the yearlong slump that preceded Indecent Proposal.
When Sliver went into production last fall, it certainly seemed like a sure bet: Hollywood's most sought-after leading lady combined with a sexy you-like-to-watch-don't-you plot. The movie finished photography at the end of February, but as early as March 26 it seemed the players were about to lose big-time. The director, Phillip Noyce, was a prisoner in his own editing room, struggling to make, he claims, 110 changes in order to avoid the box office poison of an NC-17 rating, and disagreements with the Motion Picture Association of America's ratings board had degenerated into daily shouting matches by telephone between Noyce and Paramount.
Not that the production of Sliver had ever been a day in Malibu. During production, Baldwin and Stone had quickly cooled to each other (''Thin lips, okay breath,'' he quipped to a crew member when he finished one love scene). And during reshoots, costar Tom Berenger (who plays Stone's neighbor) had blasted the director for ''sneaking around and manipulating'' the cast. Rumor had it that the budget had ballooned to $50 million. And when the film was finally complete, a test screening in early March had elicited no reaction during -- gasp! -- the sex scenes, and left audiences bewildered over Basic Instinct screenwriter Joe Eszterhas' original ending, in which the killer got the girl.
Evans' voice, as soothing as a jeep on gravel, carried far outside his office as he ranted about Sliver's latest battle with the ratings board. ''F--- 'em!'' he growled to a roomful of Paramount executives. ''Let's just go for the NC-17!''
Then Evans' famous nasal rasp went suddenly silent. He clutched his chest, his tan fading to white for the first time in decades. The next morning, he awoke in a private room at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.
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