The Wiz Of Show Biz

COURTESY OF WARNER BROTHERS
THE BAR IS CLOSED Clooney, with Gould, Pitt and Cheadle, above, played practical jokes on cast members

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The downside to putting on passion projects is that they rarely make any money. Section Eight has made 23 film and television projects in the past four years, but none besides Ocean's Eleven has made a profit. "Steven and I are massively in the hole for Section Eight. Massively. We figured the other day that we are each $850,000 in the hole," Clooney says of the partnership, in which they have agreed to finance any project the other feels strongly about. Nevertheless, it's a relationship that he believes more star-director combos should attempt. "I think it's really irresponsible to make really crappy movies for the up-front money," he says. "If you need a job or are just coming up, by all means take the job. I was in Return of the Killer Tomatoes. But if you have the ability to green-light a script, I think it's wrong."

Clooney and Soderbergh don't get much in acting and directing fees, owing to their willingness to swap cash for creative control. "I got paid more on K Street as a union camera operator than as a producer," Clooney says of the political-drama series they did for HBO. But on Ocean's Eleven, Clooney the actor made such a phenomenal amount on his percentage of the gross that he's still living off it. "We're basically living Ocean's to Ocean's," he says.

Although it's the company's only profit source, Clooney says the Ocean's franchise is finished, partly because corralling all the actors and stringing together the intricate plotline are too hard on Soderbergh and partly because capers, Clooney learned firsthand, are trickier than they look. During shooting, his Lake Como house was broken into four times by the same guys, who were after a safe. "The second time they came, they put Jergens lotion all over the hardwood floor to slide it out. At least I hope that's all they were using the lotion for," he says.

In addition to the Murrow movie, Section Eight has eight projects awaiting release, including an improvised sitcom about actors, premiering on Jan. 9 on HBO, and is developing a mini-series for FX comprising 10 short dramas based on the Ten Commandments, as well as 12 more films. Both partners are heavily involved in all of them. "They each put in several years of work on The Jacket," says Mandalay Pictures CEO Peter Guber about a small-budget thriller he's making with Soderbergh and Clooney, starring Adrien Brody and Keira Knightley. "They really get into the details of the business. They come to meetings and are involved in everything, even approving one sheets [movie posters]." Maybe because that's where the star sees his future. "You can't be an actor for too long," Clooney says. "If you're 60, you don't want to be hoping a casting agent likes you."

Or that you like the director. Though he's proud of Three Kings, Clooney says he will never again work with David O. Russell. "I don't know if he's bipolar. But he is crazy. I can't stand him," says Clooney, who reportedly came to blows with Russell because he felt the director was bullying an extra. "David tries to sell the idea of screaming and yelling and hitting as a way to get a performance out of people. But when he's screaming at a cameraman, then it's just that he's not in control." Russell, through a spokesman, declined to comment except to say that their clash was over a long time ago. But Clooney's decision to stand up to him illustrates another trait. He is one of the few leading men who come off as adults. He's 43, but unlike most other actors he often plays older.