The movie adaptation of Love! Valour! Compassion!, Terrence McNally's Tony-winning 1994 play, will premiere at Utah's Sundance Film Festival in January 1997.

Festival organizers have not yet announced the movie's screening date at the festival (noncompeting), which runs January 16-26. According to Jennifer Wallace of Fine Line Pictures, L!V!C!'s distributor, the movie's theatrical release is tentatively set for May.

Director Joe Mantello has not yet delivered a final cut of the movie; Fine Line submitted a rough cut to festival organizers for inclusion in the Sundance programme.

Filmed over four weeks this past summer in Quebec and New York state, the movie reunites - with one exception - the play's original Off-Broadway cast: John Glover, Stephen Bogardus, Stephen Spinella, Justin Kirk, John Benjamin Hickey, and Randy Becker with playwright/screenwriter McNally and director Mantello. In a well-publicized rift with McNally, Nathan Lane, co-star of the Off-Broadway and Broadway productions, turned down the L!V!C! movie, thus delaying the start of filming for a year until Jason Alexander signed on to play the pivotal role of Buzz Hauser.

The Sundance premiere will cap a season of movie debuts by three of New York's leading stage directors. Besides Mantello's L!V!C!, Daniel Sullivan's The Substance of Fire will open December 6 and Jerry Zaks' Marvin's Room premieres December 18. L!V!C!'s unveiling at Sundance will ensure significant press coverage, as the festival has grown to become the premiere showcase for American independent films. In past years, Sundance has been responsible for bringing to light such celebrated movies as Hoop Dreams, sex, lies, and videotape, Crumb, and The Brothers McMullen.

-- By Andrew Ku