PEOPLE WATCHSurgery Buys Time for Hagman: Larry...
PEOPLE WATCH
Surgery Buys Time for Hagman: Larry Hagman, who became a TV legend playing the villainous J.R. Ewing in the long-running “Dallas” series, has undergone surgery on a liver tumor to buy him more time while waiting for a donor organ, his doctor said Monday. Leonard Makowka, a liver transplant surgeon at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, said the operation took place Saturday morning “to give Larry that extra insurance” while he waits for a new liver. Makowka said the operation consisted of bombarding the tumor with chemotherapy to neutralize it and that the actor had “absolutely no complications” from the surgery. The 63-year-old actor left the hospital Sunday.
*
Divine Advice: Divine Brown, the Hollywood prostitute arrested in June with British actor Hugh Grant, starred over the weekend in a lingerie commercial that will air on Brazilian television. A spokesperson for DM9, the Sao Paulo, Brazil, advertising agency that produced the commercial for Valisere lingerie, said Brown was featured riding in a limousine, offering women words of advice on how to keep their men from straying. “I love men. They’re so much fun, so sure of themselves, so unpredictable. And yet--too bad for you--so fickle,” she says. “So if you don’t want to lose your man to someone else, if I were you I would wear Valisere.” Brown received $30,000 for her work, which also includes a related print ad for Brazilian magazines and newspapers.
*
In a (Slightly) Related Story: British actress Elizabeth Hurley on Monday joined Grant in “International Who’s Who.” Richard Fitzwilliams, editor of the directory, said he included Hurley, Grant’s girlfriend, for her new modeling contract with cosmetics firm Estee Lauder. “She has also been included because of her influence on fashion--you remember that dress--and because she is an accomplished actress,” he told reporters. Hurley sprung to instant fame at the London premiere of Grant’s hit film “Four Weddings and a Funeral,” when she wore a plunging dress by designer Versace precariously held together by 24 safety pins.
*
Battling Thespians: Richard Harris has come out swinging in a verbal pub brawl with Michael Caine. The fight started July 23 when Caine said in an interview with the Sunday Times of London that Harris, Peter O’Toole and Richard Burton were all drunks. Harris, in letter from his home in the Bahamas that was printed in the newspaper Sunday, called Caine’s remark “a cheap shot by an actor I consider not in the same league as Burton or O’Toole or even myself. . . . He is an over-fat, flatulent, 62-year-old windbag, a master of inconsequence now masquerading as a guru.” Responded Caine: “I have not read the letter, I am not interested in reading it, and that’s my only comment.”
*
‘Spirit’ to Hit West Hollywood: Ghanaian playwright-actress Akuyoe brings her autobiographical odyssey “Spirit Awakening,” her personal journey of an African woman rediscovering her identity, to the House of Blues in West Hollywood on Aug. 19 at 1 p.m for a one-time performance. Akuyoe’s critically acclaimed solo work, in which she plays several characters, dramatizes an odyssey that goes deeper than ancestry in a search for roots that takes her from Ghana to England to the United States.
TELEVISION
No Court TV for Menendez Brothers: Steven Brill, founder and editor in chief of Court TV, announced that the network does not plan to offer live or gavel-to-gavel coverage of the retrial of Eric and Lyle Menendez, in part because the network’s plan to cover the U.N. prosecution of possible war crimes in the Balkans will take precedence. Brill said the trial at the Hague will be the first such United Nations tribunal since the Nuremberg trials and as such “will be by far the most important trial we have ever covered.”
MUSIC
Pinch-Hitters at Bowl: Conductor Jeffrey Tate will bow out of the Los Angeles Philharmonic concerts this week at the Hollywood Bowl because of an arm injury. Kent Nagano, music director of the Opera de Lyon, will take over tonight at 8:30. Soprano Kathleen Battle will sing Mozart and Stravinsky arias previously announced. Nagano will also conduct Mozart’s Symphony No. 15 and Mendelssohn’s “Scottish” Symphony. Jahja Ling, resident conductor of the Cleveland Orchestra, will conduct Thursday night in a program to be announced.
QUICK TAKES
Bob Marley and his natty dreadlocks are featured in a new collection of Jamaican stamps marking what would have been the late reggae superstar’s 50th birthday. Jamaica celebrates his actual birthday, Feb. 6, as Bob Marley Day. . . . Actor James Cromwell says he has become a vegetarian since his starring role with a pig in Universal’s movie “Babe,” which opened Friday. . . . Michael Jackson’s first on-line chat, which takes place Aug. 17 at 7 p.m. on America Online, Prodigy, Compuserve and Sony’s World Wide Web site, will also air live on cable’s MTV.
