In the News: The man who played...

In the News: The man who played Lou Grant on the TV drama of the same name said a book on media bias reminds him of the pressures his program faced. “Corporate pressure” and “the powers that be” in Washington can influence content of television news and dramas, Ed Asner said at a reception late last week in Washington, D.C., for “Unreliable Sources: A Guide to Detecting Bias in the News Media” by Martin Lee and Norman Solomon. “Lou Grant” dramatized public pressures on journalists.

Full Circle: Ronald Reagan will dedicate a sculpture made from parts of the Berlin Wall at Westminster College in Fulton, Mo., on Nov. 9, the first anniversary of the day the wall was breached. The work is by Edwina Sandys, one of Winston Churchill’s granddaughters. It was at that college 44 years ago that her grandfather spoke of an “iron curtain” descending across Europe. The Berlin Wall was erected in 1961.

Gala Goof: Princess Diana, garbed in fuchsia silk, was guest of honor last week at a charity gala in Washington, D.C., boycotted by some prominent people. The high price of tickets was the ostensible reason for the absence of some of the event’s organizers, including television personality Barbara Walters and Georgette Mosbacher, wife of the secretary of commerce. Tickets to the benefit cost $2,500, or, for those who wanted to shake Diana’s hand at a reception, $3,500. Only 260 tickets were sold, and the hall was well short of full.

Booked Up: The world’s largest private collection of books on Rome sold for about $4 million during a three-day sale last week in London, Christie’s auctioneers said. Top price for the sale was $240,000 paid anonymously for a 14-volume set of 18th-Century architectural etchings. The books had belonged to Franklin H. Kissner, an American who died in 1988.