Hollywood Exclusive by Marilyn Beck & Stacy Jenel Smith

Lea Thompson took a major departure from the lighthearted fare for which she's best known in the upcoming "A Life Interrupted," playing real-life rape victim-turned-lobbyist Debbie Smith.

"What I love about her story is, it's a person having the courage to overcome her own heartache by helping other people. That's worked for me in my life," says Thompson, whose parents divorced when she was 6 and whose mother struggled with alcoholism. "When I'm feeling really bad, depressed or in despair, to reach out and help others makes me feel better. It's one of the great Christian principles to help others when you feel lowest. It kind of goes against survival instincts, but it is the way up," she believes. "I love that Debbie Smith's story illustrates that."

The "Caroline in the City" and "Back to the Future" star says she met Smith during production of the Lifetime original movie that debuts April 23. "It was the day we shot the scene where she speaks in front of Congress — I was saying her words from the transcript, and I really wanted to do it exactly the way she wrote it. It was a powerful day," says Thompson. A somewhat shy housewife prior to her sexual assault, Smith spent years advocating for an end to the enormous nationwide backlog of DNA testing that was preventing rape cases from being resolved. The team of legislators who took up her cause was led by Democrat Joe Biden and Republican Orrin Hatch.

With Lea and filmmaker husband Howard Deutch's daughters, now ages 16 and 12, the actress says, "I work all the time. It's just not always in the highest-profile projects." She recently made the indie comedy "Out of Omaha" with Dave Foley, Vicki Lewis and Patricia Richardson, for instance, and "I hope it comes out. It's just getting finished. I think I made $25 on it — you know those low-budget movies — but I really loved it. As long as I get to sink my teeth into a great character, I don't care."

GOING SOUTH: To the blogger who bet ABC would never actually make the pilot for a half-hour sitcom based on the Geico caveman commercials: shooting commences Monday (4/9).

The plotline has one of the three central cavemen of the show engaged to a rich, Southern society girl — and casting has recently been underway for actresses to play members of the United Daughters of the Confederacy. The show is set in Atlanta. Time will tell why; perhaps it has something to do with Ted Turner, who has been called a caveman himself a time or two. Or not. Anyway, we understand that John Heard is in the pilot.

AN INDUSTRY EYE-OPENER: Former "Sex and the City" regular Willie Garson says the big-screen indie film "The TV Set," opening today (04/06), with David Duchovny and Sigourney Weaver was truly "a labor of love. Jake Kasdan (son of renowned director Lawrence Kasdan) wrote and directed it, raised the money independently and basically just asked everyone, 'Do you want to be in this movie, and we all said yes."

The film is about a TV pilot being produced from beginning to end. "It's very funny, and I'm hoping the audience knows enough about the TV business, which I think they do, to go on that journey with us." He adds, "It's very inside, but we're not talking down to the audience like they're stupid and don't know what we do. We know that they get it, and know how ridiculous this business can be."

The actor, who's currently shooting David Milch's new HBO drama, "John from Cincinnati," says in "The TV Set" he plays "a hack director, which I sadly had enough to draw on." Duchovny plays the pilot producer and Sigourney Weaver, the network president. "She is absolutely astonishing … I didn't know she was so funny."

TUNED OUT: Lilliana "Lil" Lovell, founder of the famous Coyote Ugly Saloon that's the centerpiece of the CMT reality show "Ultimate Coyote Ugly Search" says that though she hopes everyone else is watching the show, she isn't. "I never watch it because why put that kind of pressure on myself? If I watch it, I'll be so consumed with, 'Oh, my hair doesn't look right. My face is … ' you know. I don't want to do that to myself. Besides, I already know what happens."

(With reports by Stephanie DuBois and Emily Feimster)

To find out more about Marilyn Beck and Stacy Jenel Smith and read their past columns, visit the Creators Syndicate web page at www.creators.com.

COPYRIGHT 2007 MARILYN BECK AND STACY JENEL SMITH

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