COVER STORY : AT THE CENTER OF THE DOLE FIRESTORM

Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.) got plenty of attention when he scolded Hollywood about sex and violence in movies, TV and pop music. But, as The Times reports today (see Page A1), Dole’s comments aren’t changing the face of show business. Yet. The creative and business powerbrokers will tell you they’ve always been thoughful about what they produce. Here, then, are some snapshots of life on the front lines:

DON SIMPSON

Movie producer “I don’t go to horror movies--they stay with me,� says Don Simpson, 49, who along with his partner, Jerry Bruckheimer, has produced some of Hollywood’s big action movies, including “Top Gun� and “Crimson Tide.�

Simpson remembers attending a graphic horror film--which he wouldn’t name--with Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman. “We had to leave because [Nicole] was getting nauseous. We were stunned that the picture was so violent. There were several decapitations and limbs being chopped off.

“Movie violence . . . doesn’t always play out as popcorn violence. My instinct with all these slasher pictures is that the world would be better off without them.�

As for sex in films, Simpson says the media have unfairly characterized some filmmakers like Paul Verhoeven, who directed “Basic Instinct,� as “pushing the envelope too far.�

“Paul Verhoeven is a fantastic filmmaker,� Simpson says. “I enjoyed Sharon Stone in ‘Instinct.’ I thought it was provocative, but I didn’t think it was sleazy.�

Simpson said his production company currently has 37 projects in development, including “The Rock,� about a band of terrorists who take over Alcatraz.

“It’s going to have some violence in it, but it is our intention to make it as endemic to the context of the film as possible. You can’t have guys take over the Rock and have terrorists threaten to take the Bay Area hostage without some fighting.�

Simpson, who describes himself as a “Jeffersonian democrat,� vowed he would get out of the movie business if the federal government ever imposed censorship.

“The American public is still too individualistic� for that to happen, Simpson says. “The country is still too young a country to allow Congress to completely dominate our private lives.�

Audiences have even changed the content of television shows, Simpson points out.

“ ‘Seinfeld’ does a show on masturbation. That was one of my favorite shows. Television is changing because they realized they couldn’t do ‘The Donna Reed Show’ anymore.�