Written and directed by McKay Daines, "Heber Holiday" was filmed last winter in and around Provo. According to its Web site, the movie's story line goes like this: "The partying lifestyle of 'high-maintenance' L.A. actress Sierra has spun out of control and her notorious on-set temper tantrums jeopardize her career. After an intervention led by her tough director Mac, she is whisked away to a clinic in the gorgeous Wasatch mountains of Utah, far from the urban jungle where her every whim is catered to."
Sound familiar? Talk about life imitating art.
"There are some uncanny similarities," says Daines, whose script may be the first in history inspired by Audrey Hepburn's "Roman Holiday" and Mary-Kate Olsen's Utah rehab stay in 2004.
The rest of the movie's plot has Sierra escaping the clinic with the help of a fellow patient (noted thespian Thurl Bailey) and wandering into Heber, where she meets a handsome young Utahn, joins the local playhouse's cast of "Taming of the Shrew" and learns some important life lessons.
If only Lohan's stay in Utah would follow that script. Can you imagine? I can see the headlines now: LOHAN FINDS RELIGION, FORSAKES HOLLYWOOD FOR UTAH. ACTRESS TO STAR IN "HERBIE 5: FULLY SOBER."
"Heber Holiday" premieres next month at the Temecula International Film Festival in California, where Daines expects the Lohan parallels will attract publicity. In fact, the filmmaker would have loved to have cast Lindsay in the lead role, "but she was $10 to $15 million more than we could afford."
"I think she would have enjoyed it," Daines says. "She could have made fun of herself."
It's a Disney 'tween world - we're just living in it: On the heels of the inexplicable ''High School Musical 2'' frenzy comes the news that the Oct. 27 Miley Cyrus/''Hannah Montana'' concert at Salt Lake City's EnergySolutions Arena sold out in 40 minutes. Forty minutes! For who, exactly? Even the Rolling Stones couldn't fill that place last time. Someone on StubHub already is selling floor seats for $1,250 apiece.
griggs@sltrib.com
