The Serenaded Muse
Rosanna Arquette has more musician friends than film friends. In the twentieth century, she wasn’t known for dating actors. In the entertainment industry, there are the relationships that you see then there are the ones which you don’t see. As for what can be seen, it would appear that Rosanna was dating Paul Buchanan in 1991 before she split up with Peter Gabriel in 1992. Paul (on the left in the cover) was the vocalist and all-round instrumentalist in The Blue Nile, and he had met Rosanna through Peter. In March 1991, she could be seen dining with French composer Eric Serra at the 16th César Awards. In 1992, Peter’s Us album had a song called Kiss That Frog. Eric composed a 1988 Luc Besson film, Le Grand Bleu, where Rosanna kissed a Frenchman. Her father was a French-Canadian descendant.
For the July-August 1985 issue of American Film (which was published by the American Film Institute), Julia Cameron had interviewed Rosanna Arquette inside a music management firm called Fitzgerald Hartley. The reason for the setting was because Rosanna’s business manager had an office there. The interview was reprinted in the May 1986 issue of a British magazine called The Face. Coincidentally, Julia Cameron wrote a season 2 episode of Miami Vice that was aired in England on May 1986. Anyway, she mentioned that one of Rosanna’s babysitters, who became a Hollywood hair stylist, had a memory of Rosanna’s room being not papered with Walt Disney characters but with posters of Marilyn Monroe (albeit her true role model was Natalie Wood). In March 1985, U.S. audiences could see Rosanna star alongside the ‘80s Monroe in a film called Desperately Seeking Susan.
After being listed in the liner notes of Michael Jackson’s Thriller (1982), it shouldn’t have been a surprise that Rosanna Arquette would star in a film alongside Madonna. If that isn’t a tell-tale sign, the AFI article mentioned that Rosanna’s boyfriend in 1985 was a record producer. His name isn’t mentioned but one could deduce that it was James Newton Howard. The article references a diamond ring. Rosanna had already married a composer (Tony Greco) from 1979 to 1981. James Newton Howard had worked as an orchestrator on an album featuring her previous boyfriend i.e. Steve Porcaro’s fourth Toto album was released in April 1982. Four of the six members in Toto had worked on Michael Jackson’s 1982 album where Rosanna was thanked as “Rosanna Porcaro” despite the fact that she didn’t marry Steve, but one could forgive that after Toto had named a song after her. Their relationship ended in late 1983. On August 4, 1984, Rosanna attended the Jacksons Victory tour in New York. Madonna was also there.
As for Steve Porcaro, Rosanna Arquette was still his friend by the time that it was 1985 (if her interview for the October issue of Playboy is anything to go by). In the April 1985 issue of Moviegoer, it was revealed that they had been a couple for two and a half years when Rosanna decided to call it quits in late 1983. During a break in the filming of The Aviator (which Christopher Reeve was responsible for casting her in), Rosanna took a trip to Venice, Italy where she claims: “I made a decision to change my life. I got out of situations that were bad for me, business relationships and personal relationships, and got my life together. I really feel that being stoned messes up your judgment. It’s not real – it gives you fake creativity, fake everything. I just wanted to clean my system completely. I’ve really been through a lot of s#!t for someone my age.”
Even as far back as the eighties, Rosanna Arquette claimed that she was outspoken to her detriment. In 1985, she spoke about wanting to be a producer and director but these things happened two decades later. There could be more to her downfall as an actress than being blacklisted by Harvey Weinstein, going by what she said in 1985: “I could make a film right now if I had a great cinematographer and a great editor so I could work with the actors. I’m very good with actors. I’ve directed children in a lot of plays, and I make my own video films. They’re very strange. When I go to a party or to see my friends, I take along a camera and become the most obnoxious person. Once, I followed Steve Porcaro’s daughter around and got her view of Easter. We went to three parties, and it was all from the point of view of a little girl.”
After it began in September 1986, Rosanna Arquette’s marriage to James Newton Howard ended in October 1987. In Vol. 2, issue 2 of Celebrity Sleuth (circa 1988), it was revealed that she two-timed on him with a French actor before the 12th month of their marriage. This coincided with the making of a French film called Le Grand Bleu. In spite of this, Peter Gabriel became known as her next boyfriend. Her relationship with Paul Buchanan ended in 1993, which was when she began dating a composer named Jon Sidel. They married in December 1993 but they divorced in February 1999. Following this came a relationship with British rock star and actor Michael Des Barres. They did three films together: Diary of a Sex Addict (2001), Poison (2000) and Sugar Town (1999). The latter featured Spandau Ballet’s Martin Kemp and Duran Duran’s John Taylor.
It’s ironic that Rosanna Arquette never recorded her own album or even starred in a musical, yet she co-starred in a film with David Bowie - The Linguini Incident (1991). In the early nineties, Rosanna was in a film with Grace Jones called Palmer’s Pick-Up but it didn’t get released until 1999. Both women were seen laughing at a table at the Cannes Film Festival in May 1989. Not even a shelved film could thwart Rosanna’s attempts at associating herself with the rock music scene. In 1995, she starred in a pilot for a sitcom that was basically the alternative rock version of Cheers. Titled Daisy & Chess, Seattle band Mudhoney made an appearance. One could assume that the format for the sitcom was akin to how Saturday Night Live handles music guests. Rosanna’s Daisy was a bartender whereas Chess was the name of her son whose bass-playing father had yet to be identified.
Mudhoney played their latest single, Generation Spokesmodel. The popularity of the alt rock movement in the ‘90s should have afforded all parties involved to have the bells and whistles that came with being affiliated, as was the case with Cameron Crowe’s Singles (1992). Rosanna Arquette’s sitcom didn’t get picked up. This meant that Anthrax remained as the edgiest band to appear on a sitcom i.e. Married…with Children in 1992. That year was when she co-starred opposite Jean-Claude Van Damme in Crossing the Line before it became known as Nowhere to Run. This became the set-up for a curious punchline when she later co-starred in a Scott Bakula TV movie called Nowhere to Hide (1994). This leads to another quirk - Rosanna’s husband at the time, Jon Sidel, contributed to the soundtrack of Van Damme’s TimeCop (1994).
Despite not having any musical inclinations that manifested in the form of being a recording artist, Rosanna Arquette threw herself head first into being known as a music lover. She could be seen next to Charlie Sexton on the cover of “In Fashion” for their November 1986 issue. The stars interviewed each other, which paved the way for Charlie to achieve mainstream visibility when one of his songs was placed on the soundtrack of a John Hughes movie called Some Kind of Wonderful (1987). When people in cartoons look at each other as prospects, there are one of three symbols that are in the beholder’s eyes - dollar signs, Valentine’s hearts or stars. Both Rosanna and Charlie have the same star signs - Leo. However, Charlie was 18 in 1986 while Rosanna turned 27 that year.
Although she was engulfed in the music scene, Rosanna Arquette wasn’t completely estranged from actors in her social life. In the April 22, 1985 issue of a magazine called Us, she referred to Mare Winningham as her best friend. Other actor friends include Joyce Hyser, Laura Dern, Ally Sheedy and Rebecca De Mornay (Ally’s best friend). The latter is notable for having actually worked in the music industry. As a teenager, she had written songs that were recorded by others. One example is The King of Kung Fu, which became the theme tune to a Chinese movie called Goodbye Bruce Lee: His Last Game of Death (1975). In the aforementioned issue of Us, Rebecca was interviewed but her cited age was a fabrication. She was not 22. In fact, she was born in the exact same month as Rosanna - August 1959.
Conversely, Madonna was born in August 1958. In the April 1985 issue of Moviegoer, Rosanna Arquette complained about Desperately Seeking Susan being changed because of Madonna’s success with the Like a Virgin single. A disco scene being incorporated made Rosanna exclaim that if she wanted to do a “rock video” then she would do it with her friends, specifically naming Peter Gabriel and Toto. 1987 was when she officially began dating Peter, but then we do have the instance of herself being the inspiration for his 1986 song - In Your Eyes. She convinced Peter to consider having the song placed on Cameron Crowe’s Say Anything… (1989), which co-starred Ione Skye. Madonna and Ione Skye were directed by Allison Anders in Four Rooms (1995) then Allison directed Rosanna in Sugar Town (1999) and Things Behind the Sun (2001).
In the latter, Kim Dickens played a rock singer. Kim is a lesbian who has had a long romantic history with Leisha Hailey, one of the stars in a TV franchise called The L Word. In the first series, Allison Anders directed an episode whereas Rosanna Arquette appeared in a handful of episodes across three seasons. By handful, I mean that you could actually count them all on one hand. In the fistful of episodes, Rosanna played a character named Cherie Jaffe. The inspiration behind the forename was Cherie Currie playing a character who Rosanna was considered for during the casting of Foxes (1980). As for the surname, Rosanna auditioned for the protagonist in a film produced by Stanley R. Jaffe i.e. The Accused (1988). Both films starred Jodie Foster, who is known for being a lesbian. Cherie Currie was known for being in a band called The Runaways whereas Rosanna appeared in a 1979 episode of a TV series that just happened to be called The Runaways.
Rosanna Arquette must have influenced Martin Scorsese to hire Peter Gabriel as a composer for The Last Temptation of Christ (1988). Martin had previously directed Rosanna in After Hours (1985), and he cast her as well as Peter in his segment for an anthology titled New York Stories (1989). What started out as a passion play became a power play as another actress had supplanted Rosanna as Martin’s muse. Illeana Douglas had a voice acting part in Martin’s Christ film, which Mel Gibson had turned down. Mel was considered for the role of Rosanna’s love interest in Luc Besson’s Le Grand Bleu. In a strange turn of events, Rosanna claimed that Mel was considered for the role that went to Jean-Claude Van Damme in Nowhere to Run. Back to Illeana Douglas, Martin Scorsese later cast her in New York Stories, Goodfellas (1990) and Cape Fear (1991).
From 1989 to 1997, Illeana was in a relationship with Scorsese. One declaration of love from him was agreeing to executively produce a starring vehicle directed by Allison Anders - Grace of my Heart (1996). Rosanna Arquette didn’t act in this but she did act in another film executively produced by Scorsese and featuring Illeana - Search and Destroy (1995). On her Instagram page, Rosanna posted a photo of herself being convivial with Illeana during the making of this film. One film worthy of note is Quiz Show (1994) which Scorsese and Illeana had acted in. It’s notable because Griffin Dunne had acted in it, and he was a regular fixture in Rosanna’s life. To digress, Griffin acted in a film that Scorsese executively produced - Naked in New York (1993).
Griffin Dunne and Rosanna Arquette acted in the following films: John Hershey’s The Wall (1982), After Hours, Amazon Women on the Moon (1987), Le Grand Bleu and Men of Divorce (2023). Alongside Amy Robinson, Griffin had co-produced a film starring Rosanna - Baby It’s You (1983). The involvement of Griffin in Rosanna’s life was downplayed in the aforementioned 1985 issue of the AFI magazine. The context of my suspicion is a quote from Amy about casting Rosanna. In her 1985 article, Julia Cameron mentioned that Amy co-produced Scorsese’s After Hours but Julia did not reference Griffin as the other producer. As a matter of fact, he wasn’t even referenced at all despite being the star (the excuse being that the article was about Rosanna in general). Griffin looks like Dennis Boutsikaris, who was born three years earlier.