ITTY BITS : The World <i> Was Too</i> Waiting for Mr. Bean

Make way for Mr. Bean.

Who?

He’s that guy you may have seen at your local theater, the unexpected attraction who’s drawing laughter at nearly 3,000 movie theaters in a six-minute featurette being distributed by 20th Century Fox.

British actor-comedian Rowan Atkinson plays Mr. Bean, a bumbling, fumbling fellow, who finds himself in ordinary situations that become unexplainably complicated thanks to his own behavior.

“He’s a little Charlie Chaplin, a little Peter Sellars,” said Roger Birnbaum, 20th Century Fox president of worldwide feature production. “This is a guy who doesn’t have to speak. He’s Everyman.

“And internationally, people will respond to this type of physical humor,” Birnbaum predicted.

The current “Mr. Bean Goes to a Premiere” will soon be followed in theaters by a sequel, “Mr. Bean Takes an Exam.” Among the chains showing “Mr. Bean” in Southern California are selected AMC, General Cinema and Cinexplex Odeon theaters.

Atkinson is the star of “The Black Adder,” one of the most popular TV series in England. (It aired on A&E; cable in the States.) Birnbaum said the Fox office in London “alerted me to Atkinson’s talent, and on a trip to London, (20th Century Fox Film Corp. Chairman) Joe Roth and I met him.

“That’s when I got the idea to take a couple of the skits he had done and film them. HBO also has made a deal with him, to air his other sketches,” Birnbaum added.

In an unusual move, Fox has made the short film available to theater operators for free .

So what’s in it for the studio?

“Well, it wasn’t very expensive to make, taking only one day to shoot,” Birnbaum said. Besides, he said, the exposure to American audiences is making Atkinson better known. “He is under contract to the studio and we’re developing material for him for a feature film.

“The response we’ve been getting is tremendous. We’re finding that audiences think it’s a delight to get an extra added attraction at the movies, rather than getting to see an ad for the local newspaper.”