Oscar time tonight! The suspense! The excitement!...

Oscar time tonight! The suspense! The excitement! The arrests!

In recent years, the Academy Awards show has served as the backdrop for a series of colorful, real-life brushes with the law.

And, now, the police blotter, please:

1988--Gustav Hasford, nominated for an Academy Award for screen writing (“Full Metal Jacket”), is a no-show after it is disclosed that he’s forgotten to return 748 library books.

1984--KNBC-TV reporter Phil Shuman is thrown to the floor and arrested by Beverly Hills police for broadcasting from inside a roped-off area reserved for dignitaries at the post-awards Governor’s Ball in the Beverly Hilton.

1983--A Polish emigre who won an Academy Award for making the best animated short subject winds up in Los Angeles County Jail after kicking a security guard and a sheriff’s deputy while leaving the ceremonies.

1981--A man in a replica of a California Highway Patrol officer’s uniform is arrested for trespassing when he sneaks into the ceremonies posing as television actor Erik (“CHIPs”) Estrada.

1974--Artist Robert Opel dashes nude across the Oscar stage. The authorities decided not to arrest Opel, but the streaker didn’t escape unscathed. Actor David Niven, who was about to present an award, watched Opel disappear, then quipped that the latter had revealed “his shortcomings.”

Sculptor Mario Magro arrived in town the other day, bearing some unusual sandwich boards on his roof--3-by-7-foot wood bas relief carvings of Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev.

Magro, who lives in British Columbia, fashioned the works to honor the former President and the Soviet leader for their “work toward achieving world peace.”

He wants to send a two-portrait, 200-pound set to each man. But postage being what it is, he lacks the funds to send the cargo to Moscow.

“I came to Los Angeles to raise money because there’s lots of money in this town,” Magro said frankly.

He also wants to give Reagan his set but so far hasn’t made contact.

Adventure (?) Island update:

Mayor Tom Bradley will again attempt to preview the Los Angeles Zoo’s new Adventure Island exhibit this morning.

His previous scheduled appearance there was postponed because it sprinkled.

You figure it:

Recent polls and surveys have variously asserted that, compared to other metropolitan regions in the United States, Los Angeles is:

The seventh best place to live.

The ninth most stressful.

The second most health-conscious.

The tenth least relaxing.

The second most romantic (behind San Francisco).

The chase, said Inglewood Police Sgt. Bill Thompson, was like something out of a stunt-driver truck competition.

Federal agents and local police finally nabbed three suspects fleeing an alleged drug transaction in a Blazer 4-by-4 Tuesday. But not before the big-wheeled truck, cornered at one point, ran up and over the top of an unmarked police car.

“Just like you see at the Coliseum!” marveled Thompson.

Will Hollywood’s trashy movies be on the agenda?

City Council members Ruth Galanter and Marvin Braude are passing up the Oscar telecast tonight to meet with Westchester residents to discuss waste disposal.