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They had the hot car, the hot girls, and the hot threads. But mostly, the 1970s' coolest TV cops had each other. Along with corralling nine Ford Gran Torinos -- and that trademark belted sweater -- Starsky & Hutch director Todd Phillips made sure his big-screen update kept the series' tough-and-tender buddy relationship intact. Calling the interplay between Ben Stiller's Starsky and Owen Wilson's Hutch a ''romantic comedy between two straight men,'' Phillips notes that the film's sensitive moments take their cue from the show's frequent touchy-feely scenes. ''We never talked about pushing the homoeroticism further,'' says Phillips. ''You just take what's in the show, and we're making a comedy, so we're playing with that. But it wasn't a conscious decision.'' What was a conscious decision was one of the flick's funniest images: the chummy crime fighters sporting barely there towels and shoulder holsters. When Phillips saw a similar poster from the original series, he said, ''We have to make that a scene in the movie.'' Two straight macho softies with a thing for tiny towels -- you got a problem with that, punk?


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Posted Mar 12, 2004 | Published in issue #755 Mar 12, 2004 | Order Article Reprints