PORT TOWNSEND — Academy Award-winning actor Louis Gossett Jr. returns to Fort Worden State Park today to be filmed reminiscing about acting in the 1982 blockbuster film, “An Officer and a Gentleman.”
Gossett will arrive at the Fort Worden office at about 9 a.m., said Tim King, owner of King Media Services, based in Manhattan Beach, Calif., on Thursday.
Gossett will be interviewed and taped for bonus material on a 25th anniversary edition DVD which is expected to be released by Paramount Home Entertainment about March.
Gossett’s portrayal of the Marine drill Sgt. Emil Foley in the movie filmed in locations throughout Port Townsend won him an Oscar for best supporting actor in 1983.
King said Gossett will arrive in Port Townsend from Los Angeles early this morning and will stick around for only a few hours before leaving for home.
All ‘the good stuff’
“We’ll walk around and include all the good stuff,” King said Thursday.
That means the Fort Worden parade grounds where Richard Gere’s character, Zack Mayo, did push-ups while Gossett’s hard-cased character, Foley, shouted at him.
Another location will be the former blimp hangar, now the 1,200-seat McCurdy Pavilion at Fort Worden, the site of Mayo and Foley’s kick-boxing fight.
Other Port Townsend locations in “An Officer and a Gentleman,” which was filmed in May, June and July 1981, included The Tides Inn motel, Town Tavern (now the Water Street Brewery & Ale House), and the city pool at Mountainview Elementary School.
King said Gossett will reflect on the movie and talk about what it was like to work with Gere and Debra Winger.
Winger was guest of honor — along with her husband, director-actor Arliss Howard — at the 2005 Port Townsend Film Festival.
King has filmed documentaries with the other stars of the film in locations throughout the world for the DVD, he said.
Gossett is the only one who will be on the site where the film was shot.
