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MONDAY BUSINESS
With his waist-length pony tail and jeans, Scott Page looks very much the laid-back rock 'n' roller he used to be. But these days the former Pink Floyd saxophonist sports a corporate title and far loftier ambitions.
"When you look at film, there's Steven Spielberg and George Lucas up there. When you look at music, there's Pink Floyd. When you look at TV, there's Aaron Spelling and people like that," Page said. "But when you look at multimedia, that chair is empty."
Page jabs his finger skyward. "We want to fill that chair."
Page's "we" is 7th Level Inc., a 2-1/2-year-old multimedia production and distribution company that exemplifies the much-balleyhooed convergence of Silicon Valley and Hollywood - even though it's actually based in a Dallas suburb and an industrial strip just west of Glendale.
7th Level is best known for "Tuneland," the award-winning children's CD-ROM starring comedian Howie Mandel; "Monty Python's Complete Waste of Time," which won the Software Publisher's Association 1994 award for best strategy program; and the newly released "Timon and Pumbaa's Jungle Games," a joint venture with Disney Interactive.
A series of CD-ROMs featuring Ace Ventura, the popular Jim Carrey pet detective, is in development under another joint venture with Morgan Creek and a second Tuneland title is in the works. At last week's Comdex trade show in Las Vegas the company announced five more projects including a second Monty Python title and "The Universe According to Virgil," a science...