TELEVISIONMTV Video Nods: En Vogue’s “Free Your...

TELEVISION

MTV Video Nods: En Vogue’s “Free Your Mind” received six nods while R.E.M.’s “Man on the Moon” and Aerosmith’s “Livin’ On the Edge” each got five in the nominations for the 1993 MTV Video Music Awards, announced Wednesday. All three were nominated for video of the year, along with Pearl Jam’s “Jeremy” and Peter Gabriel’s “Digging in the Dirt.” Among the other nominees: Annie Lennox, k.d. lang, Janet Jackson and Neneh Cherry for best female video; Stone Temple Pilots, Porno for Pyros, Nirvana, Belly and 4 Non Blondes for best alternative video; Naughty by Nature, Dr. Dre, Digable Planets and Arrested Development for best rap video, and Stereo MC’s, RuPaul, Janet Jackson and En Vogue for best dance video. Christian Slater will host the Sept. 2 awards show at the Universal Amphitheatre. Aerosmith, Janet Jackson and R.E.M. are set to perform.

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Leading the Pack: ABC led its competitors with 34 nominations for the 1992 News and Documentary Emmy Awards announced Wednesday by the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. The Public Broadcasting Service was second with 30, CBS had 23, Atlanta-based superstation TBS and NBC each had eight, Cable News Network six, the Discovery Channel four, Home Box Office two and Arts & Entertainment Network one. Winners will be named Sept. 8.

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‘Janek’ Jumble: NBC is charging CBS with sabotaging its plans to reprise the “Janek” character popularized by CBS in a series of television movies starring Richard Crenna. CBS had reportedly passed on further installments of the series, and pre-production on at least two “Janek” movies was moving along at NBC under an agreement with Aaron Spelling Productions. But CBS decided this week that it wanted to retain its “legal right” to the “Janek” character and block the NBC project, according to NBC officials. CBS had no comment Wednesday on the charges or whether the network plans to make any “Janek” movies.

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Network Debut: In his first major network interview since being inaugurated July 1, Mayor Richard Riordan will be on ABC’s “This Week With David Brinkley” at 11:30 a.m. Sunday. State Treasurer Kathleen Brown and an as-yet-unnamed entertainment figure will also guest. Riordan will also appear on KCET-TV Channel 28’s “Life and Times” in a half-hour interview on Friday at 7:30 p.m.

THE ARTS

Music Center Dance: The Southern California Theatre Assn., directed by James A. Doolittle, has become a long-term tenant of the Music Center. The first presentation under the new arrangement will be the American Ballet Theatre’s new Kevin McKenzie version of “The Nutcracker” at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in December. No other details were announced, but Doolittle told The Times his plans centered on major ballet companies, with a strong emphasis on bringing in young audiences. He said the initial agreement covered three or four years, and cautiously suggested that a dance school could be in the future. Doolittle is sponsoring the current engagement of the Joffrey Ballet’s “Billboards.”

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Padua Revival: The almost-dormant Padua Hills Playwrights’ Festival, a workshop and playground for many of L.A.’s cutting-edge writers before financial problems curtailed its activities in 1992, has won a $25,000 challenge grant from the Audrey Skirball-Kenis Theatre. The grant is designed to put Padua Hills back on its feet in time for a 1994 summer festival at its most recent home, Cal State Northridge.

QUICK TAKES

President Clinton praised Clint Eastwood’s latest movie, “In the Line of Fire,” in which the actor portrays a Secret Service agent who goes after a would-be presidential assassin. “I think it was as realistic as it could be and still be a real rip-roaring thriller,” Clinton said during Tuesday’s “Larry King Live.” . . . Actress Sheryl Lee Ralph had been cast to replace Bernadette Peters in Broadway’s “The Goodbye Girl” but it will now close on Sunday because no suitable replacement was found for co-star Martin Short. But Ralph has already landed a new role, playing George Foreman’s wife on the boxer’s new fall ABC series, “George.” . . . Soap opera stars Lynn Herring (“General Hospital’s” Lucy Coe) and Wayne Northrop (“Days of Our Lives’ ” Roman Brady) are the parents of a second son, Grady Lee, born Tuesday at a Los Angeles hospital. The couple’s first son, Hank, is 2.

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Quotable: “I’m a black actor, who’s a good actor. You know, I wake up in the morning. I’m black first. I act second. I go to bed, black again.”

--Wesley Snipes on today’s “PrimeTime Live,” about whether Hollywood first considers him an actor or a black actor.