Forgiveness May Be a Divine Experience

Question: Should she stand by her man?

Answer: Why not?

Background: An absolutely adorable English actor is arrested off the Sunset Strip by vice cops who report finding him in a luxury car with an alleged prostitute and charge him with engaging in lewd conduct. The actor is 34-year-old Hugh Grant.

The news hits the wires, the tabloid headline writers salivate:

“Hugh’s Sorry Now?”

“Hugh Blows It With Hooker”

“Hugh Dirty Dog!”

An ocean away from Hollywood, a gorgeous 29-year-old model and actress named Elizabeth Hurley leaves the Kensington home of a filmmaker friend on her way to a photo shoot for Estee Lauder, the company that has just signed a huge contract with her to be its “face.”

She is dressed in a pink Versace suit and dark glasses and refuses to answer questions from reporters about her boyfriend, the adorable (and now busted) actor.

Her filmmaker friend is less reticent.

“I am sure they will cope adequately,” he says of the couple. “I was as surprised as anybody else. Liz is calm and collected and very supportive of him. She is coping extremely well. As far as I know, there is no question of them splitting up.”

If I were the girlfriend of the alleged perpetrator of the lewd act--and it is inescapably obvious from a number of indicators that I am not--I think I would consider forgiving him.

Topping the list of reasons for forgiveness is Grant’s heartfelt and immediate world-wide apology:

“Last night I did something completely insane. I have hurt people I love and embarrassed people I work with. For both things I am more sorry than I can ever possibly say.”

That, in this age of buck passing, ought to count for something.

As should his weepy phone call to Hurley from the police station during which (according to news reports) he apologized profusely.

Some of Hurley’s friends describe her as “devastated, humiliated and angry.” Another says, “She will probably stand by him, but she’s a dignified woman.”

If my man were arrested on suspicion of committing a lewd act with a streetwalker (or even lewdus actus interruptus, as I interpret reports of the arrest), I’d be in a hellacious snit.

That instant, widely publicized apology would be an excellent first step on the road to rehabilitation.

A good next move, I suppose, would be many passionate, private groveling sessions complete with bouquets of rare blooms and precious stones in double-digit-carat denominations. And maybe an unsolicited offer on his part to seek counseling for his problem.

We’ll have no way of knowing how Grant makes it up to Hurley until after the tabloids fling about large sums of money and one or some of the couple’s employees or “friends” spill the beans.

Just give it time.

*

If one were superstitious, one would almost have to say Grant had tempted the fates and was due for a fall.

Of the many salacious aspects of this case--including the name of the alleged prostitute, Divine Brown (was she?)--consider this: Mere days before the bust, in a chat with journalists to promote his new movie “Nine Months,” Grant spoke of his seven-year relationship with Hurley and the treatment of their relationship by England’s voracious tabloid press:

“They’ve never really been able to dig up much dirt about disloyalty,” Grant said. “I am amazed they haven’t done better on that.”

How veddy helpful of Grant, then, to make that post-midnight drive along Sunset in the wee hours Tuesday.

The boast calls to mind the remarks of that other cute guy, Gary (“I dare you to follow me”) Hart.

Pride, as always, goeth before a celebrity bust.

*

Question: Who else has stood by her man recently in remarkably similar circumstances?

Answer: Three words, as Letterman would say. Mary Jo Buttafuoco.

When her man was arrested last month on the Sunset Strip on suspicion of soliciting a prostitute (who turned out to be an undercover cop), Mrs. Buttafuoco sprang to her husband’s defense. Tammy Wynette would have been proud.

“This is life,” said Mary Jo. “My husband is a very friendly guy.”

That’s certainly one way of putting it.

After all, Mary Jo’s face is permanently scarred from a gunshot wound inflicted by Amy Fisher, the teen-ager with whom her friendly husband had been sleeping.

Question: What can we learn from the ways some women handle their man’s indiscretions?

Answer: To forgive is human when one errs with Divine.