Thursday September 3 10:54 AM EDT

SANTA FE, N.M. (Reuters) - The famous Wild West movie town of Cook Ranch in northern New Mexico went up in smoke after a planned explosion on a blockbuster movie starring Kevin Kline and Will Smith ran out of control. The explosion on Tuesday at Cook Ranch, a small town about 20 miles south of Santa Fe which was made for filming movies, was planned as part of a stunt sequence for the Warner Bros. movie ``Wild Wild West''. But an unexpected gust of wind spread the blaze to adjoining buildings, causing far more damage than intended. ``Three buildings were rigged to explode and the stunt went off without a hitch,'' movie publicist Michael Singer said on Wednesday. ``But as soon as the directors called ``Cut'', a sudden wind -- and nature does play tricks here in New Mexico -- blew the fire onto the adjacent wooden buildings.'' He said the damage to the town was ``certainly extensive'' but that, as part of the contract with the ranch owner, Warner Bros. had agreed to rebuild the set once filming was over. ``That was always part of the plan,'' Singer said. ``And we're just happy to say there were no injuries of any kind to stunt players, crew members, animals or members of the fire department.''

The movie stars Will Smith, Kevin Kline, Kenneth Branagh, and Selma Hayek but none of them was on the set at the time of the explosion.

Singer said the fire will not have any impact on the completion of the film, which is scheduled for release on the July 4th weekend next year. Cook Ranch has been the set for other popular movies such as Silverado, Wyatt Earp, Lonesome Dove and Buffalo Girls

September 2, 1998

Fire on the set of WILD WILD WEST

I hate to see something like this happen, because all films should have smooth sailing, but well I figured you might be curious about it. Two reports on this with slightly different information from each!

Don't know if you've heard yet, but there was some sort of mishap today in filming at Cook's Ranch on "The Wild, Wild West." Apparently, a scene calling for explosions and the destruction of a small town went awry, and fire trucks were called in from all around.

The local news just ran a piece on it, without explaining exactly what had happened, but it looked like whatever they blew up had burned completely to the ground. They may need to rebuild a little, if they still need any of that. No one was hurt, but neighbors were startled and angry. One even took the time to try and throw an environmental rant into her comments, but was cut off by the reporter.

And there are further sources that say the owners of Cook's Ranch are upset over this and may be looking into filing a lawsuit against Warner Bros. over this. Not a good omen, considering WB's year so far.

Thought you'd be interested--if you use this, call me "Loveless."

And then there was this report...

There was a tidbit on the news today (here in Albuquerque) about a mishap on the set of WWW. Apparently a pyrotechnic effect went a bit out of control and burned a large portion of the set.

Fortunately for Warners, this is the last week of filming, and the effect was supposed to show a large part of the town being decimated anyway. According to the PR guy, this shouldn't hold up filming all that much.

On a more extended note, the residents of Galisteo (the town near the ranch where the film was shot) are beginning to tire of large films coming to their area, as apparently, this isn't the first sort of mishap of this kind. Whether this will be the catalyst for a NM backlash against films being shot here is yet to be determined. Personally I doubt it, but these people seemed rather incensed at the fiasco.

Just thought I'd like to know.

Call me....lessee....The Man From Another Place.

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