IN THE tinsel town famed for movie making, Walter Smith is trying to find the right characters to make Rangers a box-office success rather than yet another horror story.

Numerous names have already been despatched to the cutting room floor, but the Ibrox manager is now getting closer to finalising his cast list.

Auditions have been cast around Europe, England and beyond as he tries to sign six or seven players he wants to help get the Light Blues name up in lights again next season.

Smith is believed to have around £8m - plus anything gained from player sales - to go after the men he wants.

No concrete bids have been lodged for anyone apart from the failed move for Scott Brown, the Hibs player opting to follow a different script and move across the city to Celtic.

But they are about to be lodged with various clubs and agents. The Rangers manager, it appears, is ready to move.

He said here in LA: "We're looking to sign players on two fronts, guys to start and others to bolster the squad.

"We don't have a lot of players. Think back to the Uefa Cup game against Hapoel Tel Aviv in Israel. Our bench had two professionals and the rest were young boys. That makes it an attack on two fronts in terms of signings.

"We have looked at a lot of players but have only bid for one player and that was a well-documented attempt to get Scott Brown.

"We are trying to identify different targets. We have had an interest in quite a number of players but, so far, we have only made that one bid. But we will be busy in the next few weeks. It's difficult for us to actually know which players we're going to get, but we have been extremely active."

Smith is conscious of the fact that millions of pounds have been squandered at the club in the past few years. Signings have not worked, and pay-offs have had to be dished out to get them out the door.

That will not happen this summer. If clubs don't come in for the players Smith wants to leave, they will remain.

But this vicious circle has led the management team to look at potential signings more closely than they may have in the past. There is a need to try and get things absolutely right.

Smith continued: "We have been working very hard in the background for a while.

"You always hope that every signing comes good. But you look at the Premiership clubs. They have a lot of money to spend and a lot of their transfers still don't work out. That will happen, but you sign someone hoping it'll work out.

"But the ones who will be leaving here, there is no way they'll be paid off. If no-one comes in for them, they will play in the reserve team and that will be it."

No matter the arrivals, the mission is quite clear for all of them - and Smith. Rangers cannot be as bad as the last two seasons domestically, when they failed to muster any kind of title challenge and didn't do enough even to reach cup semi- finals, never mind finals.

Smith is well aware that the support is looking to him as the man to lead them back to the glory days.

He added: "What we do know is that we have got to compete far better than we did last season.

"What level of success that will bring, we will just need to wait and see.

"Certainly we have got to start out by making a better attempt at winning trophies. That means we MUST compete on a far better basis than we have done.

"The majority of the other squads, maybe Hearts apart, have reasonably settled squads now."

And the gaffer added: "Hibs have lost a few players but have been well compensated for it and will bring in new players.

"When you bring a lot of players in, as we hope to, it can be awkward for the first year.

"We hope at this stage next year to be in a position where we will need only one or two players but, at the moment, we need more than that and it could be difficult to integrate them. We will need to hit a far better level of consistency than we achieved this season.

"The run prior to losing to Kilmarnock gives us an indication of what can be achieved if we maintain a competitive edge in our game.

"The problem in the last couple of games was that the edge wasn't there.

"It's not acceptable but it is probably understandable at this stage of the season.

"We have shown, if we can maintain it, that we can have that competitive edge on a consistent basis."