FILLING IN

In Kristine McKenna’s fine interview with Alan Arkin (“Who Says You Have to Be a Star?,” Jan. 25), John Cassavetes is identified as the director of “Big Trouble.” Although he was the accredited director, the film is not his work.

According to a Film Comment article by Raymond Carney, perhaps the leading authority on the director, Cassavetes stepped in “for a variety of personal reasons and for the only time in his career” when Andrew Bergman bailed out in mid-production. Although his efforts to make something from the mess he inherited proved futile, Carney writes, Cassavetes allowed his name to be attached to the film and declined to reveal the truth behind it, “out of professional loyalty to the production and personal loyalty to some of his actor friends involved in it,” including Peter Falk, who co-starred with Arkin.

JORDAN R. YOUNG

Anaheim