POP GOES CAVIEZEL

Hollywood

Sean Penn, John Travolta, George Clooney, Woody Harrelson, and ... Jim Caviezel? The A Team cast of Terrence Malick's war epic, The Thin Red Line, includes a star-in-waiting

Terry would like to speak to you.

The sentence that everyone in Hollywood dreams of hearing was spoken last year to an obscure actor named Jim Caviezel, whose film credits were bit roles in a boxing movie, Diggstown, and Ed, starring an animatronic monkey (and Matt LeBlanc). Caviezel, now 30, had auditioned for the role of Witt, an old-fashioned country boy in Terrence Malick's first film in two decades, The Thin Red Line, which opens this month. In person, Malick was encouraging, but advised Caviezel not to turn down other projects. Instead, Caviezel rejected three TV pilots and prayed. Weeks passed. Finally, the phone rang. It was Malick, who said, "Jim, I'm wondering if you'd be interested in playing Witt," recalls Caviezel, mimicking the director's high-pitched voice. That's how the soft-spoken Caviezel joined a cast which includes Sean Penn, John Travolta, George Clooney, and Woody Harrelson. On location in Australia, Caviezel peppered them all with questions about Acting, and regularly played basketball with Clooney and Harrelson. "Sean would call some mornings," says Caviezel. "I'd say, 'Sean Penn just called me. ' " Caviezel has since filmed Ang Lee's Civil War drama, Ride with the Devil. For the record, his name's Swiss, and it's pronounced Kuh-vee-zuhl.

NED ZEMAN

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