'Whole Ten Yards' is about 9 yards short of a laugh

By Bill Muller
The Arizona Republic

THE WHOLE TEN YARDS (PG-13) No Stars (Very Poor) There's not a giggle to be found in this awkward sequel that combines ridiculous, overdrawn characters with abysmal dialogue and head-bonking slapstick. Notable as a career low point for several cast members, including Kevin Pollak, Matthew Perry and Bruce Willis. This would be Willis' worst movie, but he was in "Hudson Hawk." Directed by Howard Deutch, Warner Bros., 99 minutes.

The sequel to "The Whole Nine Yards" plays like an experiment to see how many painfully unfunny scenes can be packaged together before audience implosion.

This movie makes "8 Heads in a Duffel Bag" seems like high art. It doesn't belong on the bargain DVD table — it's the one you use to prop up a wobbly leg.

"The Whole Ten Yards" has hardly any story, which gives the false hope that the movie might come to a hasty conclusion. No such luck. Instead, we're forced to watch retired hit man Jimmy the Tulip (Bruce Willis) and his wannabe hit-woman wife, Jill (Amanda Peet) constantly threaten to shoot each other, while trying to rescue Oz's wife, Cynthia, (Natasha Henstridge), who used to be married to Jimmy.

Apparently, Cynthia has been kidnapped by the same mob Jimmy fled in the first movie. And of course only Jimmy and Jill can save her.

Wretched performances abound, but none is more grating than Kevin Pollak, under heavy makeup, playing an aged mobster as a demented cross between George Burns and Zsa Zsa Gabor. I suppose we're supposed to bust a gut at his hilarious name (Lazlo Gogolak) and countless mispronunciations, but this bit was old 20 years ago.

There's one good thing about "The Whole Ten Yards": It may curtail the movie career of Matthew Perry, whose entire repertoire consists of bobbing his head like a chicken and repeating his lines over and over, as if even he can't believe how bad the dialogue is.

Perry, as the paranoid Oz, also runs headlong into numerous objects, occasionally knocking himself unconscious, making the audience envious.

Added to the awful "Serving Sara," Perry has constructed an horrendous filmography. Good thing those "Friends" royalty checks will be rolling in until 3004.

Rated PG-13 for violence, profanity, sex.

Perry is at peace with being his own friend

Matthew Perry, who plays Chandler Bing on the NBC sitcom "Friends," says his life is "a fantasy coming true." Gannett News Service

Since wrapping his NBC series "Friends "in January, the clean and sober Perry has been playing lots of tennis. Reading books. Soaking up rays by his pool. Jogging and hitting the gym. Showing up at Hollywood events and awards shows. Tooling around in his convertible. And spending time with his girlfriend of one year, fashion student Rachel Dunn, 29.

"The biggest indulgence is truly in just knowing that I can do whatever I want tomorrow," says Perry, 34.

Perry, whose comedy sequel "The Whole Ten Yards" opens today, is at his personal and professional peak. His incredibly successful sitcom is over, leaving him open to pursue the dramatic roles he craves. He's in a stable relationship with a "really great girl." And perhaps most important, he has overcome years of drug and alcohol abuse to, finally, sparkle with obvious good health.

Despite his on-camera weight fluctuations, Perry today seems relaxed, serene and fit. He shows up exactly on time for this interview in Hollywood. The trim guy sipping coffee bears little resemblance to the bloated actor who spent several turns in rehab and was hospitalized in 2000 for pancreatitis before cleaning up in 2001.

His life is finally "a fantasy coming true," Perry says. "The wonderful thing is, I need to be patient, and I don't have to work. I don't have to show up in any silly movies anymore that I don't like."

But it's not all play and no work. He's reading scripts and producing "The Beginning of Wisdom," a Western starring his dad, John Bennett Perry.

"I don't feel like I can rest on any laurels. I'm busying myself to make sure the transition isn't too tough," he says.

That means getting out there and promoting "Ten Yards," featuring Perry as neurotic, uptight dentist Nick "Oz" Oseransky. It's the sequel to the modest 2000 hit "The Whole Nine Yards," which earned $57.3 million and also starred Bruce Willis and Amanda Peet.

Perry's box-office prowess remains to be seen. His last big-screen outing, the 2002 Elizabeth Hurley comedy "Serving Sara," was slammed by critics and earned a meager $16.9 million.

Still, he hopes "Ten Yards" will prime him for a viable film career, one that ultimately takes him from comedy to drama. Perry has guest-starred as a Republican adviser on NBC's "The West Wing," but the transition from giggles to gravity might be difficult, says film historian and Hollywood Reporter Online columnist Martin Grove.

"Perry is so well liked and well regarded for doing his 'Friends' role so well for so long, that it's hard to suddenly picture him in something dramatic," says Grove. "Comedy would be a more likely direction for him to go in because it's a fit."

And in "Ten Yards," Perry is playing to his comedic strengths as Oz, who again gets entangled with a surly hit man (Willis) and his disgruntled assassin spouse (Peet).

"I learned at an early age that I could run, slam into a wall and fall down on the ground and not hurt myself, and it would make people laugh," he says. "That was my first high as a kid. That's what's fun to unleash in these movies. ..."

Friends' quips

Going for laughs is all in a day's work for the actor who became a superstar as Chandler Bing on "Friends," still the No. 1 comedy on TV. Chandler, who suffers from verbal diarrhea and myriad nervous habits, and wife Monica (Courteney Cox) are adopting a baby on the show, which ends its 10-year run May 6.

Lisa Kudrow, "Friends"' resident dingbat Phoebe, describes Perry as "the funniest man I've ever met."

Co-star and new dad Matt LeBlanc, Perry's closest pal off the show, will star in a spinoff, "Joey," slated to air this fall in the "Friends" time slot. So, will Perry put in a guest appearance?

"If he wants me to. If I can help him in any way, I will. He's one of the nicest guys in the world."

The feeling is mutual, LeBlanc says. While "Friends "was in production, he and Perry would eat lunch together and play video games. And LeBlanc says he's a fan of the new, mellow Perry, the guy no longer craving to be the center of attention.

"Now, he's a guy who is much more secure. He's not afraid to look in the mirror anymore. Underneath all the (stuff) that used to get in his way was a heart of gold. He's really a super-compassionate human being. He's so smart. He's always got good advice. I've gotten free therapy from him for years. He's very intuitive."

And, says David Schwimmer, who plays paleontologist Ross Geller, "a hell of a nice guy. He's not as insecure as Chandler or as inappropriate, but he does use humor to defuse an awkward situation."

Perry wasn't laughing much on Jan. 23, when "Friends" taped the second part of its final show. He had a headache for most of the night from squeezing back tears. "You almost start to cry for five hours and then you look over and Aniston is bawling her eyes out."

In fact, Jennifer Aniston (who plays Rachel in "Friends") and Kudrow were the most emotional that night. But once the final scene was shot, "I felt my feet on the ground for the first time in 10 years," he says.

Perry said goodbye in his own way: "I took my girlfriend's hand that night, and we just walked around the stage and the fake streets. We had a sweet moment. Everyone was in there partying, I was done, and I'd said my goodbyes."

He looks back on the past decade as a "job well done." Perry, who was 24 when he was cast, had few hopes that this show, his sixth, would actually succeed.

"Who knew?" he muses. "There's no complaining to do about the 'Friends' experience and what it did for me. There wasn't a jerk in the group. I can't remember a raised voice in 10 years."

His parting memento? A chunk of the fake sidewalk in front of the Central Perk coffee shop.

The day after the "Friends" juggernaut was over, he took it easy and took care of himself. "I played tennis, hung out with my friends. I started the workout thing. The stuff of life for me now is, literally, to perfect a backhand," Perry says.

One vice left

The actor can afford to kick back. He and his fellow "Friends "earned $1 million an episode during their final season on the show. His paychecks, says Perry, are an "insane lottery thing" that he won. And he enjoys the perks.

"I'll be like, 'Let's get a private jet and go to Vegas!' And it'll actually happen," he laughs. And he's the first to admit that "there are times when I giggle under my blanket about how lucky I've been."

Not that it has always been an easy ride. Perry has been open about his addictions, but he says that contrary to tabloid reports, he's absolutely on the straight and narrow. In fact, "Ten Yards" co-star Peet says Perry's "commitment to sobriety is really striking."

She describes the actor, who spent Thanksgiving with her family last year, as "very self-reflective. I think he was running away before, and I don't think he knew how spectacular he was. He had to learn to take himself seriously."

His remaining bad habit? Smoking. "It's the one vice I have left," says Perry, lighting up a cigarette. "Don't take it away from me."

LeBlanc says his pal "has had harder times than others, and I think it's something he's always going to battle. But he's doing great."

Now, adds Schwimmer, who's directing two NBC pilots, Perry's "become much more appreciative of the relationships he's got in his life."

Part of his new equanimity comes from no longer using humor as "a crutch. ... Now, it's just something I kind of have if I'm in the mood. I'm much more comfortable in silences."

Picture this ...

And while he's used to the attention he attracts whenever he stops at the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf in Los Angeles, he draws the line at certain transgressions. Perry was "angry at first" about a February National Enquirer tabloid story about his Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, complete with quotes from the meeting attributed to the actor and a photo of him and other AA attendees outside the gathering.

"It's truly one of the most disgusting things I have ever seen happen to anyone, much less myself," he says. "My anonymity is shot. I'm not going to have that anymore. But the person who's trying to save his life and is sitting next to me doesn't want to have his picture taken. It's just not fair."

He's still followed by photographers, but the actor who once loved the spotlight is learning to live life "under the radar" with Dunn. Perry has no marriage plans yet but says the relationship is "going great."