Movie Sets

* March 31, 1993: Actor Brandon Lee was accidentally killed by a .44-caliber slug during the filming of "The Crow." The slug was fired from a prop gun that was supposed to be loaded with blanks. * Jan. 3, 1992: A worker was crushed to death between two lighting equipment cranes on the set of the Kevin Costner movie "The Bodyguard." * Aug.

PITTSBURGH - Most movie sets orbit around one key individual. Usually, it's the director or the star. Occasionally, it's a heavyweight producer. Seldom is it the writer of the movie's source material. But John Green is not just any writer. On a crisp day in early October as cameras rolled on Fox 2000's film adaptation of his 2012 novel "The Fault in Our Stars," a bestselling love story about two wry, cancer-stricken teenagers, the 36-year-old author was exerting a strong gravitational pull.

Bob Willoughby, who created iconic portraits of his muse, Audrey Hepburn, and dozens of other celebrities as one of the first still photographers assigned to capture life on Hollywood film sets, has died. He was 82. Willoughby died Friday of cancer at his home in Vence, France, said Claire Willoughby, a daughter-in-law. The rise of Life and Look magazines created a demand for more than routine photo stills from movie sets and led to a career for Willoughby that spanned three decades.

Rhode Island, pay attention: Your favorite film is apparently "Hachi: A Dog's Tale. " A map posted on Reddit earlier this week charts the most popular film set in each state, and some results are surprising, especially for the nation's smallest state. Based on a true story, "Hachi" debuted in 2009, starring Richard Gere and Joan Allen. It follows a college professor who adopts an abandoned dog with a penchant for waiting at train stations. The map was compiled using ratings on the Internet Movie Database and "Hachi " received an 8.2 out of 10. But it doesn't exactly have the same blockbuster status as “Dumb and Dumber,” which also takes place in Rhode Island.

Seeking to regulate what some contend is a police force within the police force, the Los Angeles Police Commission on Tuesday approved a plan that would allow Chief Daryl F. Gates to select the police retirees and off-duty officers who moonlight as guards on movie sets. The commission's unanimous vote represented the first tangible step in ending a controversy that has embroiled police administrators and the entertainment industry for more than a decade.

This is the unlikely story of how a public school finagled a movie-set house to make its dream library. The tale of the house from the film "Life as a House" is a sweet story of perseverance that bears some parallels to the plot line of the film. In the movie, terminally ill architect George Monroe, played by Kevin Kline, wants to build his dream house before he dies.

Hold the mayo. And the pastrami. Even--gasp--the cappuccino? Fearful of rumblings from the Los Angeles County health department, movie and TV production companies around town are thinking twice about putting out the traditional spread of finger foods and beverages for grazing by cast and crew members.

Buzz Gamble made his way down from the sawtooth mountains, across the wash and onto the dusty cattle path that ran from Big Bear down to the Morongo Basin. Dried out and craggy, Gamble's face wasn't so different from the desert around him. He had spent the last few months hiding out in the remote wilderness, tending a crop of high-grade marijuana. "Everything came off," he recalls. "Everything went well. And I had done my part . . . I had an old beat-up horse named Buck.

Public health officials have suspected for weeks that a hepatitis A outbreak among 19 workers on a San Marino movie set might be linked to lettuce that came from a prominent Northern California grower. But a contractor for the San Benito County company, Pride of San Juan, said this week that it had never been notified of the outbreak, let alone investigated as a possible source of tainted produce.

As director David O. Russell's now infamous "I (Heart) Huckabees" on-set freakout on Lily Tomlin, posted as a Web video, reaches the parody phase, his friends are coming forward to defend his shocking tirade -- and his colorful directing style. Sure, they say, he's "exacting" and doesn't suffer fools; to an outsider, they admit, his tantrum toward the film's costar captured on video might look like a madman's rant.

Nelson Mandela, who fought for decades to end racial oppression in South Africa, has died just weeks before the wide release of a movie telling the story of his life. The film, titled "Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom," chronicles its subject's early life, the quarter-century he spent in prison, and his rise to become the first-ever black president of South Africa. He has since remained a symbol of the long fight against the apartheid regime.  Mandela is played by the British actor Idris Elba in the film, which is set to debut in theaters across the U.S. on Christmas Day. The movie is being distributed by the Weinstein Co. and was directed by Justin Chadwick.  PHOTOS: Actors who've portrayed Nelson Mandela on screen It has already built some momentum during its limited release.

Being the son of an obsessive filmmaker means your life already has a destiny, whether intended or not. That was certainly the case for Jonás Cuarón, the eldest son of Mexican filmmaker Alfonso Cuarón. Young Jonás spent weeks on his father's first feature, 1991's "Love in the Time of Hysteria. " He had a small role in his father's second film, 1995's "A Little Princess," and attended school on the Warner Bros. lot in Burbank. "He was so happy," remembered Alfonso. "He was the only boy surrounded by 20 girls.

Margaret Pellegrini, one of the last of the 124 little people who played Munchkins in the 1939 film "The Wizard of Oz," died Wednesday at her Glendale, Ariz., home. She was 89. The 4-foot-tall Pellegrini, a frequent guest of honor at "Oz" festivals around the U.S., had been in declining health since a stroke in March, said Colleen Zimmer, an organizer of the annual Oz-Stravaganza festival in Chittenango, N.Y., birthplace of "Oz" author L. Frank Baum. Illness kept Pellegrini from serving as grand marshal at this year's event.

School's out, your parents are annoying and suburban Ohio is totally boring. For the three teenage protagonists in "The Kings of Summer," there's only one antidote: Build a house in the woods. For the CBS Films coming-of-age comedy, which premieres in Los Angeles and New York on Friday and will roll out across the U.S this summer, director Jordan Vogt-Campbell envisioned a scrap-pile sanctuary -- one that young people could have realistically built on a bare-bones budget. The result is a charming, patchwork example of ingenuity and craftiness.

Angry Birds will be flying into movie theaters in July 2016 with Sony announcing Wednesday that it has acquired the worldwide rights to the ubiquitous game franchise. The 3-D CG-animated movie will be developed and financed by Rovio Entertainment, the Finnish gaming company that created "Angry Birds. " John Cohen, who most recently produced Illumination Entertainment/Universal Pictures' "Despicable Me," will produce.  Since its debut in December 2009, the "Angry Birds" game and its offshoots have been downloaded more than 1.7 billion times.

You know the Hugh Jackman rumor: The married, muscled actor is supposedly gay, according to - well, according to your friend who has a friend who is certain he's gay. Jackman sang a different tune to the Hollywood Reporter in an article published Wednesday that goes into detail about the actor's life, weight, work, friends and more. It also mentions the gay rumors. Turns out the person most upset by the rumors is Jackman's wife of 16 years, Deborra-Lee Furness. "Just recently, it bugs her," he told the mag, explaining that she uses the Internet more than he does.

You know the Hugh Jackman rumor: The married, muscled actor is supposedly gay, according to - well, according to your friend who has a friend who is certain he's gay. Jackman sang a different tune to the Hollywood Reporter in an article published Wednesday that goes into detail about the actor's life, weight, work, friends and more. It also mentions the gay rumors. Turns out the person most upset by the rumors is Jackman's wife of 16 years, Deborra-Lee Furness. "Just recently, it bugs her," he told the mag, explaining that she uses the Internet more than he does.

The scene unfolds before a film crew shooting footage from a balcony overlooking a street in Kabul, Afghanistan's dusty capital. Suddenly, gunfire rings out below. Women scream. Men duck and run. The camera jerks to take in a darkly clad gunman opening fire on two cars, and the grim aftermath: One dead body is sprawled in a pool of blood; another is slumped behind the steering wheel. "Where are the armed forces?" asks a shaken film crew member. "Where's the news? Where's CNN? I don't see them."

Many industry pundits underestimated the prospects of "Texas Chainsaw 3D," the horror tale that finally knocked "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" from the top spot at the box office. Expected to gross about $16 million in its debut, the Leatherface sequel fared much better than predicted , selling an estimated $23 million of tickets. The film's commercial appeal wasn't the only part of "Texas Chainsaw" that people sold short. Producer Christa Campbell, a former pin-up girl and B-movie actress, said that Hollywood executives also assumed someone best known for her body couldn't have any moviemaking brains.

Voters told public health officials to begin monitoring the filming of sex scenes in pornographic movies. On Wednesday, the county was trying to figure out how. The new law requires porn actors to wear condoms and establishes a permitting system similar in some ways to how Los Angeles County inspects restaurants. Porn producers are required to purchase health permits from the county, which will do spot inspections on porn sets to make sure condoms are being used. The inspectors can close production if the filmmakers don't comply with the rules.