Don’t get excited just yet. I have been told by a very good source that Prospect Park Productions has contacted Susan Lucci, aka Erica Kane, about a revival of “All My Children” online and maybe on cable. There have been reports in the last couple of days that Prospect Park, whose license with ABC on “All My Children” and “One Life to Live,” is trying to re-activate the much-missed soap operas. A friend of Lucci told me yesterday: “There have been some talks, but the word wasn’t supposed to get out yet.” Hmmmm….

Prospect Park — run by controversial manager Jeff Kwatinetz, late of the Firm, and Rich Frank, late of Disney–had gotten a license from ABC to put the canceled shows online. At the 11th hour, however, everything fell apart. If the deals had gone through, Prospect Park would have had the shows up and running last January 2012. “OLTL” went off the air then, and some of its characters, its executive producer and head writer, transferred to ABC’s “General Hospital.”

Lucci was at a loss by then. There had been talks with Prospect Park in 2011 prior to the September conclusion of “All My Children,” but they mysteriously stopped, she told me. Lucci more than any other actor from either show would have to be included or it simply wouldn’t be worth it. She and “OLTL” star Erika Slezak are linchpins of their respective shows.

Another key “OLTL” player, Robert S. Woods, told me yesterday that he’d heard rumblings about Prospect Park’s renewed interest, but that he had not been contacted yet. “They may not know how to find me,” said Woods, who’s been kicking back in upstate New York after 30 something years of service to “OLTL” as leading hero Bo Buchanan.

There have been reports, though, that Prospect Park has finally made deals with SAG-AFTRA and may be closing deals with the other guilds.

Reviving the shows could be done, but it’s tricky. Pieces of  “OLTL” live in “General Hospital,” which is having a ratings surge. For “All My Children,” it’s harder. Lucci has made other deals since “AMC’ ended. Plus, that show was in tatters thanks to ABC’s mismanagement of it for years. In either case, creator-writer Agnes Nixon would have to be brought back as well, since she has the secret sauce recipe that made the shows a success.

And then again, it’s possible Prospect Park is just faking it to extend their license arrangement. ABC might like the shows back now considering their alternative programming has failed. “General Hospital” is booming. And really, the only thing network execs know is success. Soaps, which they trashed for years, are looking good again. If Procter and Gamble were smart, they’d look to a revival of their own shows, “As the World Turns” and “Guiding Light.”

We’ll wait and see if this is just another cliffhanger with no pay off…

The times, they are a changing. Remember when the best directors were Robert Altman. Alan Pakula, Hal Ashby, Francis Ford Coppola, Sidney Lumet, and Sydney Pollack? Now the vets are Woody Allen, Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, and George Lucas. But it’s the new generation that’s taken over. This year’s crop of Best Directors, aside from Spielberg, are all recent Oscar winners or nominees.

Tom Hooper just won Best Director two years ago with The King’s Speech,” and comes with his masterful version of “Les Miseables.” David O. Russell–whose “Three Kings” is a oft-forgotten gem–made his mark with “The Fighter.” Now he’s got “Silver Linings Playbook” lined up for victory. Kathryn Bigelow was the first female Oscar winning director with “The Hurt Locker.” Her “Zero Dark Thirty” is powerful and controversial. Ben Affleck won accolades for “The Town” and “Gone Baby Gone.” Now “Argo” is  name on everyone’s lists. Paul Thomas Anderson has “The Master” after “There Will Be Blood” put him on the map for good.

Quentin Tarantino? He’s a young old timer, dating back to 1992 with “Reservoir Dogs.” He and the Coen Brothers, Spike Lee, make the bridge from the vets to the newcomers.

These are the new generation of directors who will take us into the next episode of the Oscars. We still have Woody, Marty, Steven. But this new group is formidable.

Hooper is really the upstart. He first won major Emmys for landmark HBO series “John Adams” and “Elizabeth I.” A Brit, Hooper sometimes seems aloof. He’s not. He’s just tired. Hooper delivered a wet print of “Les Miz” to New York on Friday, November 23rd and never looked back. He’s criss crossed the US without sleep several times. This week he’s in Australia helping Hugh Jackman and Russell Crowe launch the film in their country. He may spend the holidays in the UK with his family. For a minute. Then back to the US for awards season.

And “Les Miz” hasn’t even opened yet. And Hooper, who looks 30, has only just–finally– turned 40.

It’s a lot of pressure. “Les Miz” has only been seen in the industry so far. We’re still a few days off from its exposure to audiences who are chomping at the bit.

I do think Hooper has done the impossible–he’s taken a three-dimensional stage experience and reinvented it as a film, a piece of cinema that humanizes history and focuses very specifically on the main characters. He turns them all –from Jean Valjean to Cossette to little Gavroche– into guides through a mesmerizing experience. I think even Robert Altman would be impressed how he’s woven it all together!

David Chase is basking in the glow right now of his first ever feature film, “Not Fade Away.” The coming of age story about a young New Jersey musician in the 1960s is his labor love. If you dig music from the British Invasion, from the Beatles to the Rolling Stones (Paramount really ponied up for the soundtrack) then “Not Fade Away” is going to reel you in.

But I asked Chase last night about his future plans at the “Not Fade Away” after party at Brasserie 8 1/2. What about a “Sopranos” movie, I asked. “No, unh uh,” he said, shaking his head, and his wife even agreed. I did try to slip in–‘those people are dead’–but Chase refuses to say what happened to Tony, Carmella, Meadow and AJ.

He did tell me that there’s been talk at HBO of a “Sopranos” prequel. “It would be with Tony’s father, and Uncle Junior, and Livia–Tony’s mother long before any of the other characters we know now.” Great idea. But Chase has some other ideas. He has a series in mind with HBO about the silent film era. He also would like to make a psychological thriller. At 67, Chase is a newcomer to films, but a welcome one.

The “Not Fade Away” premiere boasted at least one former Soprano–“Paulie Walnuts” aka Tony Sirico, who just came as a guest. But James Gandolfini who stars in the film was there, too, along with the very gifted Molly Price, who plays Gandolfini’s hilarious wife and the mother of an aspiring rock star. Bobby Cannavale stopped by after getting off work on Broadway in “Glengarry Glen Ross.” And I was thrilled to see the beautiful as ever Annabella Sciorra.  She and Cannavale may reprise their roles in “The Mother-f- with the Hat’ in Los Angeles this winter, she told me.

Meantime, “Not Fade Away” boasts a talented young cast who will get launched from here including John Magaro, Bella Heathcote, Dominique McElligot, Meg Guzulescu, and the always stunning Jack Huston–nephew of Anjelica, but quite a success already and expecting his first child in three months. Another Huston for the Hollywood dynasty!

And the “Not Fade Away” music: soundtrack meticulously curated by Steve van Zandt, who included the Rascals, ‘natch. Steve is producing the Rascals don’t miss reunion shows this weekend in Port Chester, New York at the Capitol Theater. http://www.showbiz411.com/2012/12/14/the-rascals-reunite-triumphantly-after-40-years-of-feuding

Just in time for the holidays, two stars of about to be released Oscar movies–Anne Hathaway (“Les Miz”) and Samuel L. Jackson (“Django Unchained”) duke it out over which movie is “saddest” for the season. Very amusing. “Nothing says Christmas like slaves and hoes.” Indeed. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hs_FPlu_cg8

Tom Cruise really owes one to David Letterman. On last night’s show, Cruise appeared in three segments to promote “Jack Reacher.” This what was discussed: almost nothing. Indeed, Letterman was forced to talk at length about his young son, Harry, to make a connection with Cruise. Tom chatted for most of the show about his son, Connor, who’s 17, a deejay and an “actor.” (There’s never a mention about graduating from high school or going to college.)

There was a discussion of muscle cars, and a short clip from the movie showing a car chase. No talk of the movie’s actual content, premieres being cancelled, Cruise’s other children, his life, or anything beyond some tremendous guffawing. In fact it was the most guffawing since the days of Ed McMahon.

Tom used the word ‘analog’ twice–once to describe Jack Reacher, the other to describe the car chase. Even though it was all digital. ‘Analog’ is the word of the week. If he’d been on with Groucho Marx, there would have been a prize.

Hey: maybe they don’t need much publicity. “Jack Reacher” is at 80% this morning on rottentomatoes.com. Cruise hits Jimmy Fallon tonight for more laughs. And then “Jack Reacher” is in the hands of the gods.

The stats are in the big tours for 2012. Bruce Springsteen played for the most people, but finished second money wise. That’s because he charged less money per ticket than Madonna, who finished first in box office take but was second to Bruce in numbers of people she entertained. Yes, it’s a fine line between greed and good. This year, Madonna also had the album that dropped the most from number 1 in the history of the charts– her “MDNA,” which was DOA thanks to a wonky system of including CDs and download with ticket sales. “MDNA” got no Grammy nominations. Bruce’s “Wrecking Ball” held up better, and merited a couple of good Grammy nods after all. Springsteen also probably beat Madonna in amount of time spent singing live on stage and not lip-synching. Madonna beat Bruce for number of times she infuriated an international government, offended a local audience, or started her show late.

Roger Waters, Michael Jackson/Cirque du Soleil, Lady Gaga, Coldplay, and Van Halen were the other big grossers of the year.  LiveNation’s Arthur Fogel was voted by this column as hardest working concert producer for 2012. He may still be touring with U2 somewhere near Neptune.

According to Billboard:

1

Madonna

Total Gross: $228,406,085     Number of Shows: 72
Total Attendance: 1,635,176   Number of Sell-Outs: 72

2
Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band

Total Gross: $199,371,791     Number of Shows: 72
Total Attendance: 2,165,925  Number of Sell-Outs: 54

I know we’re all obsessed with our 2012 Oscar films. But one movie is done and ready but won’t be seen officially for some time. I’m told Joel and Ethan Coen screened their pretty much finished “Inside Llewyn Davis” film for family and friends in the last few days. The film is set around 1960 in Greenwich Village, and stars Oscar Isaac as a stand in for real life folk musician Dave von Ronk.

Featured in the film are Carey Mulligan and Justin Timberlake as a couple– but Mulligan’s character is romantically linked to Isaac’s. Timberlake is said to be an old fashioned folkie, a la the Lettermen.

“He’s very clean cut in the movie, and square,” says a viewer. John Goodman plays a druggie. Garrett Hedlund, fresh from “On the Road”–set in the same period–is described as his “valet.”

The film got raves from those who saw it, but it’s also said to be unlike most Coen brothers movies– no violence, no sex, no weird irony.”It made me cry,” says one viewer.

“Inside Llewyn Davis” could possibly go to Cannes next May, where it would screen to get a U.S. distributor. From the sound of things, the film will be in next year’s Oscar mix–just in case you’re wondering, along with “August: Osage County” and a bunch of newcomers. Wow–really– the 2014 Oscar race? I am not ready for that at all!

PS On a separate note, Oscar Isaac is eligible for Best Song this for his own composition, called “Never Had.” It’s from the reunion movie “10 Years.”

The Tom Cruise movie “Jack Reacher” is opening on Friday, one way or another.It’s too late to turn back now, even though “Reacher” opens with a scene in which a sniper, training his gaze through a scope on a rifle, bloodily picks off five people in a mall. The timing couldn’t be worse.

“Reacher” in an unfortunate situation. Paramount postponed yesterday’s “premiere” in Pittsburgh, but rescheduled it to Wednesday sans a red carpet or glitz. (I’ll restrain myself from making a snarky comment here.) The Film Society of Lincoln Center cancelled tonight’s event, which was Cruise’s only public media moment in New York or L.A.– although it was underscored before the Newtown tragedy that the Film Society thing was “media not invited.” Anyway, Cruise did do Letterman today and will appear on Jimmy Fallon this week as well.

What can Paramount do? The theaters are booked, the ad money has been spent, everything is in place. The movie’s getting pretty good notices. I’ll tell you more about it after I see it on Wednesday at the all-media screening. If it’s good, none of this will matter.

Alicia Keys is a Girl in Trouble today. Earl Shuman, the co-songwriter (with the late Leon Carr) of “Hey There Lonely Girl,” has filed suit against her in Los Angeles for copyright infringement. Some of the suit is based on my reporting. Hopefully musicologists will be called in, etc., experts who can testify about Keys’s use of two lines from the chorus of “Hey There Lonely Girl” in “Girl on Fire.” (The Hollywood Reporter’s Eriq Gardner reported the suit as well, mentioning my inclusion. But for some reason people at that dreadful website don’t pick up the phone and call people they’re writing about.)

Anyway, anyone who listens to “Girl on Fire” can hear Alicia sing “she’s a lonely girl/in a lonely world” about her burning subject. Why Keys or someone with her didn’t just clear this sample is beyond me. Keys is a sampling queen, with loads of history in this department. What makes it disturbing is that if someone had done the same thing to Keys–like take her “If I Ain’t Got You” or her new song “Brand New Me”– and done the same thing, she’d be the Girl on Fire indeed.

http://www.showbiz411.com/2012/11/25/alicia-keys-girl-on-fire-also-a-lonely-girl-from-1970

http://www.showbiz411.com/2012/12/04/alicia-keys-hey-there-lonely-girl-writer-is-very-much-alive-and-wants-his-money

Hey There Lonely Girl:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=3lscp1GCjUQ#!

There are reports right now that Richard Engel, NBC’s star correspondent in Syria, is missing. First reports came from the Turkish press and were picked up John Cook of gawker.com. NBC News isn’t commenting. But reports are spreading on Twitter that Engel and a Turkisj journalist haven’t been seen since last Wednesday or Thursday. Engel’s last piece from Aleppo aired on December 13th: http://video.msnbc.msn.com/nightly-news/50192519#50192519. Here’s hoping he’s okay.

http://www.hurriyet.com.tr/planet/22171723.asp#

Keep refreshing…