Inside the NFL's broadcast boot camp: players tackle new field

Roland Williams stands near the corner of a green room at the NFL Films headquarters in Mount Laurel, NJ.

Players listened to tips and instruction and drilled the country's top network executives and producers with questions on how to control emotions when on-air, how to criticize a player (a hot issue because often the player is a friend or former teammate), and how to get a foot in the door without having a "household" name.RecoveryBy Melody K. HoffmanWilliams and 19 other football players, current and recently retired, took part in the NFL's first-ever Broadcast Boot Camp. During the three-day "training camp," players who want to become sports broadcasters after their playing career were exposed to extensive training in radio and television, including reporting, hosting, studio work and game analysis."People are talking football now 12 months a year, so I think there's a lot of opportunities in the media. It's about players taking advantage of those opportunities and making sure they're prepared when those opportunities arise," Katz stresses.The 6-foot-5 tight end comfortably dressed in a suit and tie whispers into a ballpoint pen, stammers, and then shakes his head. Williams is not learning a new play for the upcoming season, but instead, a 30-second script he wrote for a mock studio session.On Day Two of camp, the players viewed the segments they taped the previous day. Producers critiqued their tapes and provided feedback. This session wasn't easy for San Diego Chargers' Roman Oben.First DownPre-Game HuddleVaughn Bryant, the manager of the NFL's Player Development, conceived the idea and curriculum for the Boot Camp in December, 2005. The camp was advertised at the Super Bowl this year in Miami and more than 30 players applied for the crash course by sending a resume and a personal essay. "The point of an application for us in player development is to make sure we simulate what a real-life experience is going to be," says Bryant, a former player and CNN intern."I've been a fan of broadcasting ever since I've watched Howard Cosell," says Williams, who is making his transition to a second career after eight years in the NFL. "It's just something that I've always wanted to do, so this is a tremendous opportunity to learn about the inner workings of the best networks in the world. It's exciting, it's fun, I'm learning so much."Brown, known as "JB," encouraged the men and assured them to work through their mistakes.Giants' Bob Whitfield, who concluded he wants to be behind the scenes as a TV producer or in radio-("let somebody else be pretty on the camera") -said he wouldn't mind putting in the long hours needed to get the job done. "When we're playing football, we spend nine, 10 hours a day at work. We go in early in the morning, whether it's lifting weights or watching film, and practicing and treatment, we're there 10 hours a day ... I'm used to having just one day off a week. So going to a new job and not putting in the hours, I never gave it that thought."X's and O'sWith the growing trend of ex-football players joining the ranks of sports journalism-most recently NY Giants' Tiki Barber working as a correspondent for NBC's "Today" and receiver Keyshawn Johnson as an analyst for ESPN-the NFL sought to prepare players who want to get into this field. "It's about trends. If you look at the number of former players who are working in media, it's grown exponentially. I think this [Boot Camp] is a response to that," notes Howard Katz, the NFL Senior VP of Broadcasting & Media Operations and COO of NFL Films."They've got to be mindful that they're going to make those mistakes in a new environment, but display the same drive, passion, determination, work ethic that has defined their success on the football field and apply the same assets in the broadcast environment."He and many of the other players look up to Brown as a role model and hope to have a "fraction of his talent." Brown, who confessed that he's not an expert at the game, encouraged the guys to pursue jobs in this industry.The Boot Camp was hosted by TV veteran James Brown of "CBS Sports," with several other well-known producers, anchors and reporters. Divided into four groups and rotated through four 45-minute sessions during Day One, the players learned how to prepare for a show, how to articulate thoughts and interpret game film for fans, study tape and breakdown plays, the basics of radio and the importance of editing plays in illustrating a viewpoint.Many analysts and producers watch hours and hours of game tape or film, an aspect many of the campers admitted that they did not know.JET MAGAZINE"It was a humbling experience," said Buffalo Bills' Mario Haggan. "We think it's easy; we look at the guys on TV and think they just walked into the studio and do it, but everything is under such a structure and time management that you have to prepare for and be excellent at what you do. I take my hat off to those guys; it is definitely something you have to work at.""I was impressed with these guys. They are so accustomed to being leaders and fearless and the intimidator and the whole nine yards that they didn't want to show their nerves, but I know they were feeling it on the inside," he says."I've been exposed to so many guys who are doing such good things that I'm not really surprised to see the cream rising to the top in terms of what these guys are doing," says Brown. "The same requisite skills and determination that they brought to the table to be successful in football will absolutely be the same, if not more so, to determine how successful they are in this post-career pursuit."Ray Smaltz, a panelist at one of the workshops who has produced football games at FOX for 10 years, has seen the rocky transition players make into television and believes the Boot Camp will help make it smoother."I'm glad the NFL did it because I think a lot of these guys need it. It's very difficult just to go in cold and say, 'Hire me because I used to play,'" Smaltz says."I think it was hard. Imagine listening to yourself on an answering machine; everyone hates to hear his voice, so it's 10 times as bad watching yourself on television. You take in all the stuff that they say and you try to dwell on it and practice honing in on your skills, because you want to get better, you want to take this business seriously," Oben says.

JET MAGAZINE

'British successes like The Queen are freaks'

For somebody so revered in Hollywood, there is something rather deliciously, grottily British about Stephen Frears. A remarkably prolific director for both television and cinema, in the last four years alone he has managed to produce three films that have all scooped major prizes: Dirty Pretty Things, Mrs Henderson Presents and The Queen.

'I don't know anything, ' Roberto wails at one stage, frustrated by a particular scene.I can't explain how. His direction has been subtle, almost imperceptible, but it has definitely been there. Mendez agrees that it is 'difficult to explain in words' the impact Frears's presence in the editing room is having. 'Perhaps, ' he wonders, simply, 'I am learning what I need to learn.' For all that I am impressed by Mendez -- who is clearly gifted -- I can't help feeling just the tiniest bit aggrieved on behalf of Britain's own young directorial talent. Surely there were local film-makers Frears could have bestowed his eagle eye and golden advice upon? 'I was offered a list of possible protégés, a couple of them English', he later explains over another street-corner cigarette. 'But I didn't think there was any point in choosing someone who wouldn't be likely to actually get a film made over the next couple of years.' Ah -- so that ruled out the English lot, then. On the woeful state of the British film industry, where it is becoming nighimpossible for films to get financed except by a very few people, Stephen Frears, our shining light, our toast of Tinseltown, is grimly realistic.'Yes. The government certainly haven't got the balance right. Last year was a good year for British film, but successes like The Queen, they're freaks. Given the lack of support, for everyone, they're just flukes.' With a last drag on his cigarette before he heads upstairs to sprinkle a little more fairy dust on one lucky Peruvian, Frears, possibly our greatest and least fluky director, shrugs again. 'At the end of the day, it's hard to build an industry on a series of accidents.''Now, the system doesn't create those opportunities for young people. It creates different opportunities, there are more of them, somehow, but they're less valuable.Today, then, he is giving back. Before Mendez even started filming Gods, a strikingly shot probe into the life of Lima's idle rich and their spoilt, beautiful children, Frears was on a plane out to Peru to discuss various aspects of the script with the young director, flagging up potential beartraps he might fall into. 'Of course, he still had to make those mistakes, ' he smiles. 'You have to learn the hard way.' Back in the booth, Mendez and his editor Roberto are discovering the hard way that the editing process is about control of information; about the million tiny decisions you can make about how you feed the audience; about how you change infinitesimally what you want it to know, to see, to understand -- or indeed, not understand.The two directors, so many miles apart both geographically and professionally, were brought together as part of the Rolex Mentor-Protégé initiative, which seeks to pair up six blessed young creative artists with a luminary from the same field every two years. It's not hard to see what Mendez gets out of this extraordinary opportunity -- he describes it, almost breathless with his good fortune, as 'a once-in-a-lifetime dream!' -- but I wonder why Frears himself deigned to take part in the scheme, especially as he has just told me that you only learn to make films by making films.'That's what they said at Belsen, ' Frears deadpans. 'You've taken ten minutes to make this point, ' he goes on. 'Is there a quicker way?' By the end of the session, the rough cut that I watch is markedly better than the one I saw first thing in the morning.Although he himself 'learnt on the job', becoming an apprentice at the BBC after taking a law degree at Cambridge, he also admits that he would not be the director he is now without the 'wonderful teachers' he had in the likes of Lindsay Anderson.It's erratic and tough. The government cut funding for the third year of film school, which is basically when students were making films and learning how to do it.' In any case, I point out, if there's no hope of getting their films made once they're out, they're essentially being trained for unemployment. He snorts.He has directed six women to Best Actress Oscars, himself been nominated for Best Director twice, and has won or been nominated for a further 65 international awards. But here he is, standing on a street corner in Soho dressed in a scruffy T-shirt and trousers, puffing on a roll-up and grumbling about the UK's newly imposed smoking ban.'This is where you can really teach something, ' Frears tells me, apparently relishing their anguish. 'Here in the edit. This is where there are so many possibilities, this precise moment; this is where the decisions are to be made, where the patterns you're not even aware of emerge. It can be maddening, but this is where the film is to become what it is.' True to his philosophy, the 66-year-old veteran is not here to give the youngsters any easy answers. When all the information is there in front of them, he reminds them, when every angle, every sequence is there as a seductive possibility, the next stage -- how to balance that information -- is ultimately up to them. He will suggest, he will drop hints, he will show where their thinking has been good or bad, but he certainly will not dictate.Does he see an inherent value in such a collaboration? 'I suppose so, ' he shrugs.'We both learn something. I'm just not quite sure what it is.' I suspect Frears, with his grudging charm, is being disingenuous. He holds the David Lean chair in fiction direction at the National Film and Television School in Beaconsfield and has said elsewhere that he loves to watch young film-makers in action.'There's a strong case for the argument that we actually have no industry here, ' he says. 'It's a very different world from the one I grew up in. When we were at the BBC, me, Ken, Mike' -- I assume he means Loach and Leigh -- 'you know, we made two or three films a year. They weren't big budgets of course, but we had stability and continuity, which is what you need in this business.And yet -- upstairs. Frears is back in the editing suite today not to work on a film of his own, but to oversee the completion of Gods, the second feature by a 31-year-old Peruvian film-maker called Josué Mendez.

'Yes. The government certainly haven't got the balance right. Last year was a good year for British film, but successes like The Queen, they're freaks. Given the lack of support, for everyone, they're just flukes.' With a last drag on his cigarette before he heads upstairs to sprinkle a little more fairy dust on one lucky Peruvian, Frears, possibly our greatest and least fluky director, shrugs again. 'At the end of the day, it's hard to build an industry on a series of accidents.'

BJ's Restaurants, Inc. Opens in McAllen, Texas

HUNTINGTON BEACH, Calif. -- BJ's Restaurants, Inc. (NASDAQ:BJRI) today announced the opening of its 63rd restaurant in McAllen, Texas, on August 13, 2007. The new BJ's Restaurant & Brewhouse is located on a free standing pad at the corner of Highway 83 and Ware Road in the front of the new Palms Crossing Shopping Center. The restaurant is approximately 8,500 square feet, contains seating for 270 guests and features BJ's extensive menu that includes BJ's signature deep-dish pizza, award winning handcrafted beer and our famous Pizookie[R] dessert. BJ's highly detailed, contemporary decor and unique video statement, including several high definition flat panel televisions, creates a high energy, fun and family-friendly dining environment for everyone to enjoy. Hours of operation are from 11:00 a.m. to 12:00 midnight Sunday through Thursday and 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 a.m. Friday and Saturday.

Certain statements in the preceding paragraphs and all other statements that are not purely historical constitute "forward-looking statements" for purposes of the Securities Act of 1933 and the Securities and Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, and are intended to be covered by the safe harbors created thereby. These forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause actual results to be materially different from those projected or anticipated. Factors that might cause such differences include, but are not limited to: (i) our ability to manage an increasing number of new restaurant openings, (ii) construction delays, (iii) labor shortages, (iv) minimum wage increases, (v) food quality and health concerns, (vi) factors that impact California, where 36 of our current 63 restaurants are located, (vii) restaurant and brewery industry competition, (viii) impact of certain brewery business considerations, including without limitation, dependence upon suppliers and related hazards, (ix) consumer trends, (x) potential uninsured losses and liabilities, (xi) fluctuating commodity costs including food and energy, (xii) trademark and servicemark risks, (xiii) government regulations, (xiv) licensing costs, (xv) beer and liquor regulations, (xvi) loss of key personnel, (xvii) inability to secure acceptable sites, (xviii) limitations on insurance coverage, (xix) legal proceedings, (xx) other general economic and regulatory conditions and requirements and (xxi) numerous other matters discussed in the Company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. BJ's Restaurants, Inc. undertakes no obligation to update or alter its forward-looking statements whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.For further information, please contact Greg Levin of BJ's Restaurants, Inc. (714) 500-2400.BJ's Restaurants, Inc. currently owns and operates 63 casual dining restaurants under the BJ's Restaurant & Brewery, BJ's Restaurant & Brewhouse or BJ's Pizza & Grill brand names. BJ's restaurants offer an innovative and broad menu featuring award winning, signature deep-dish pizza complemented with generously portioned salads, sandwiches, soups, pastas, entrees and desserts. Quality, flavor, value, moderate prices and sincere service and hospitality remain distinct attributes of the BJ's experience. The Company operates several microbreweries which produce and distribute BJ's critically acclaimed, handcrafted beers throughout the chain. The Company's restaurants are located in California (36), Texas (9), Arizona (4), Colorado (3), Oregon (3), Nevada (2), Florida (3), Ohio (1) and Oklahoma (2). The Company also has a licensing interest in a BJ's restaurant in Lahaina, Maui. Visit BJ's Restaurants, Inc. on the web at www.bjsrestaurants.com.

For further information, please contact Greg Levin of BJ's Restaurants, Inc. (714) 500-2400.

Stoping at 'Nightmare on 13th' might be lucky

Standing in line, waiting to get into Nightmare on 13th Street, you can while away the time watching two big-screen TVs. Each is showing a different video, taped inside the Nightmare haunted house in previous years.

Sometimes the crowd starts laughing even before the light goes on or the knife-wielder appears. They laugh because the girls in the videos begin to cower from the moment they walk into view. They cower before there is anything to be afraid of. Most of the girls in the videos hide under each other's arms or behind a boyfriend's back.E-MAIL: susan@desnews.comWhen Rocky Point Haunted House closed last year, Nightmare on 13th became the undisputed most-visited haunted house in the state, Barber said. He expects at least 50,000 visitors this season.Web: www.nightmareon13th.comIf you go ...She seemed to think watching someone else get scared was one of the reasons he came to the haunted house.Phone: 467-8100Sometimes one boy can be seen trying to shelter two or three girls under his arms as they make their way through the haunted house. These boys tend to look exceptionally calm. They seem proud to be surrounded by a bevy of fearful females.As you stand in line watching the videos, you can also eavesdrop on the conversations of those who are about to be scared. Most people act brave, even as the televisions prove to them that their boldness might be hard to maintain for much longer.This year, Barber says, Nightmare on 13th was able to expand its operations because he has more space. Barber has hired about 10 additional employees, for a total of 75 or 80 ghouls and weirdos who work each night.What: Nightmare on 13th StreetHis proof that people enjoy scaring each other? Every year, Barber says, he has about twice as many job applicants as he can hire.On one television, patrons are shown as they walk around a corner and are frightened by a sudden noise and blinding light. On the other, the camera was set high in the wall of a bedroom. As various groups walk through the bedroom, a demented-looking woman in a bathrobe plunges out of the closet waving a knife.The people standing in line laugh uproariously as they watch last year's patrons -- mostly teens like themselves -- jumping and squealing and running in terror.As for the videos of last year's scariness, well, they are not a new attraction. Last year the big screens were stationed at the exit. This year they are at the entrance.Where: 300 W. 1300 SouthOne recent night a mom held the hands of some small boys and said to the older kids who were also with her, "Do you guys want to go ahead without us?" And one of the older boys said, "No, I want to go with the little kids."Troy Barber, the owner of Nightmare on 13th, says there is something fun about watching people get scared. He thinks the folks standing in line experience some of the same emotions his employees do.Nightmare on 13th boasts a new ticketing area, complete with a castle. There's a new automated headless horseman riding over the outdoor entryway. And at least half of the scary scenes inside the house are also new.How much: $15-$25Then the mom realized why he wanted to stick with his siblings and she forbade it, saying, "I know you are just going to try to scare them to death."

E-MAIL: susan@desnews.com

Late strike Ast to stand, claims a furious Collins

Byline: By JAMES HUNTER

DANNY COLLINS is convinced referee Steve Bennett got it wrong at the weekend - and cost Sunderland two vital points as a result.Collins said: "I am very angry. I don't get too many goals - I think my last was against Villa two seasons ago and I thought I had done it again."Danny Higginbotham was with me, but I don't think anyone was too near the goalkeeper.Collins got up to head home Grant Leadbitter's corner in the dying seconds.Next up for Sunderland is a trip to Reading this weekend, and Collins hopes the Black Cats can complete their first league double of the season."Derby might drop away a bit, but there are six or seven teams who are going to be getting out of it and then coming back down again like we have.""To see it chalked off in the last minute is very disappointing, to say the least. I cannot see why he has disallowed it."It was a good ball in by Grant and I got a good run in.Bennett provoked a storm of controversy when he disallowed Collins' injury-time winner against Aston Villa, meaning the Black Cats had to settle for a 1-1 draw.DAN AN ANGRY MAN: Danny CollinsFellow strugglers Wigan and Middlesbrough both won, however - and Collins predicts the battle for survival will be tight.He added: "We have moved up a place, but another two points on top of that would have catapulted us up a few more places. to be tight throughout the season down there."It is a big one for us and we are looking forward to it."Orpington official Bennett, however, claimed the defender had fouled Villa's England keeper Scott Carson - although TV replays showed there little contact between the pair and Carson was never favourite to win the ball.As it was, the draw saw them leapfrog Fulham to climb out of the bottom three, and Newcastle's win at Craven Cottage two hours later meant the Wearsiders remain a point clear of the drop zone."He was perhaps thinking he was going to get a comfortable catch, but I got in front of him and nudged it in.He said: "We beat them here 2-1 the other week, but they will be looking to get one back over us down there."We have been robbed of two points, and goalkeepers are too protected in situations like that."CAPTION(S):Sunderland were furious at being denied victory, which could have lifted them two points and two places clear of the drop zone.

DAN AN ANGRY MAN: Danny Collins

ARTISTS TO WATCH

OUR PICKS FOR TODAY'S RISING STARS

KARIN JURICKA former student of watercolor artist Carlton Plummer, Oriet is also a signature member of the Montana Watercolor Society. Her paintings have been included in the CM. Russell Art Auction in Great Falls, MT; the Buffalo Bill Art Show & Sale in Cody, WY; and the Coors Western Art Exhibit & Sale in Denver, CO. Oriet is represented by Simpson Gallagher Gallery, Cody, WY; J Moore Gallery, Bigfork, MT; and PinonHer figures stare at paintings, stand in line for coffee, and settle into comfortable corners to read the newspaper. If you ask Georgia-based painter Karin Jurick where her inspiration comes from for such imagery, it's no surprise when she replies, "everyday life."Inspired by the West and television heroes from his childhood like the Lone Ranger and Roy Rogers, Texas artist Chuck Middlekauff has painted cowboys and their boots since 1992. But Middlekauff also has a long-standing romance with the open road and has added nostalgic Americana icons such as diners, neon motel signs, Coke machines, and beat-up pickup trucks to his creations.Middlekauff's works are on view March 20-23 at Legacy Contemporary Gallery in Scottsdale, AZ. He is also represented by Montana Trails Gallery, Bozeman, MT; Romicks Home Collection, Steamboat Springs, CO; and Stanfield Fine Art, Aspen, CO, and Park City, UT.CHUCK MIDDLEKAUFFFor the artist, the main concern is to cause viewers to smile. "I want people to see the old things anew, in a fresh and different way," he says. "I want to entertain and offer cheerfulness, because there are enough serious things in the world."Oriet is the first to admit, however, that she is drawn to a wide variety of subjects and terrain beyond Wyoming. She relishes traveling for inspiration, whether she journeys to Africa and Europe or closer to home to Texas, where she visits her good friend, sculptor T.D. Kelsey, and captures the colors of the West Texas landscape.When Julie Oriet was growing up in Montana, she enjoyed riding, fishing, and backpacking in Yellowstone National Park. Today she remains fascinated with life in the wild, only these days she lives in Wyoming and her artistic vision turns heavenward. "We have beautiful skies here and I can't help but look at them," Oriet says. "The clouds are constantly changing. And change is what catches my eye."Jurick is fond of shooting hundreds of photographs as reference materialimages she pores over on a regular basis for inspiration. "I'm comfortable exploring the world and painting what I want," she says. "Every day I wake up in the morning and I have no plans about what I am going to paint."Using a trompe l'oeil technique, he paints in surfboards, candy wrappers, and toys.A self-taught artist, she attributes her talent and exposure to art to her mother, Lee, who sold her works at traveling art shows. Several years ago Jurick began studying and painting seriouslyobserving works, she says, by favorite artists such as Wayne Thiebaud, Lucian Freud, Burton Silverman, and Ken Auster. "I am an avid fan of realism, but I strive to paint with loose, expressive brush strokes and use daring, vivid colors to achieve paintings with life and spontaneity."Jurick is represented by Howard/ Mandville Gallery, Kirkland, WA; 16 Patton Gallery, Asheville, NC; and Cohen Rese Gallery, San Francisco, CA.Or he might include an actual vinyl record by the Beach Boys or the Beatles into the composition. "As with my cowboys and Coke machines, you wouldn't necessarily see these objects together in the real world, but I like to think of them together," Middlekauff says.Fine Art, Littleton, CO. "The clouds are constantly changing. And change is what catches my eye." - JULIE ORIET

Fine Art, Littleton, CO. "The clouds are constantly changing. And change is what catches my eye." - JULIE ORIET

Today on TV

The Closer (7 p.m., TNT): A financier who is under investigation for ripping off investors is kidnapped.

Dateline (9 p.m., Ch. 5): Remember when this used to be a newsmagazine? Now it's just a tabloid crime show. Tonight's installment patrols dark corners of Las Vegas.Kathy Griffin: My Life on the D-List (11 p.m., Bravo): All of Kathy's campaigning pays off -- her comedy album is nominated for a Grammy! And she travels to Canada to meet Lily Tomlin.Jon & Kate Plus 8 (10 p.m., TLC): The guys from Orange County Chopper come by and plan the design for Jon's custom chopper.Greek (9 p.m., ABC Family): Dale and Calvin each make a "purity pledge."Raising the Bar (8 and 10 p.m., TNT): Michelle falls for a cop who may have lied on the stand.Nurse Jackie (11:30 p.m., Showtime): The hospital administrator drinks Jackie's spiked coffee.Here Come the Newlyweds (9:02 p.m., Ch. 4): Utahns Jed and Sarin Hinkins are still in the running on this goofy reality/game show. Tonight, the couples have to create a carnival game for the neighborhood kids to play.

Nurse Jackie (11:30 p.m., Showtime): The hospital administrator drinks Jackie's spiked coffee.