Go Yankees? Or Is It Just Go Seven Games?

Those fond of keeping statistics may want to track shots of Ted Turner--owner of the Atlanta Braves--during Fox’s World Series telecasts. That’s because Turner, vice chairman of Time Warner, has been party to a celebrated feud with Rupert Murdoch, chairman of News Corp., which owns Fox. The war of rhetoric has included Turner likening Murdoch to Hitler and accusing his newspapers of practicing yellow journalism. One of Murdoch’s newspapers, the New York Post, responded to a dispute over Fox’s new cable channel by briefly dropping Turner’s CNN from its TV listings. The irony is that Fox actually lucked out by getting a matchup between the Yankees (situated in New York, the largest TV market in the U.S.) and Atlanta, which has widespread appeal thanks to all its national TV exposure on Turner cable network TBS. Fox is counting on the World Series to boost its prime-time ratings and promote its shows, so if Turner wants to bury the hatchet with Murdoch, as it were, a high-rated seven-game series may be a nice place to start.

Are There More Spankings on the Horizon?

“I thought I was done with this,” radio bad boy Howard Stern said on the air last Friday, referring to the $1.7-million settlement that his parent company, Infinity Broadcasting Corp., reached with the government last year. Nope. The Federal Communications Commission issued a $10,000 “notice of apparent liability” against a Richmond, Va., station last week for two Stern broadcasts deemed to be indecent, and more may be coming. “There is a possibility that we may ask Infinity Broadcasting if Infinity-owned stations carried the shows broadcast in Richmond,” Charles Kelly, chief of the enforcement division of the FCC’s mass-media bureau, told The Times. “That’s certainly something we have done in the past.” Those stations also could be liable for fines in connection with the broadcasts on Oct. 23, 1995, and June 3, 1996. And Kelly said that there are complaints pending over other Stern broadcasts from Chicago, New Orleans and New York. “I’m so discouraged by it,” Stern told listeners. “I swear I’m not saying this as a bit: I truly want out of radio.” Perhaps Hollywood will offer him an out if his movie debut, “Private Parts,” is a hit next year.

When It’s Cimino, You Cover All the Bases

After six years away from the screen, director Michael Cimino returns with “The Sunchaser,” opening Friday in Los Angeles, New York and Toronto. The New Regency picture, distributed by Warner Bros., stars Woody Harrelson as an overachieving doctor who allows nothing to distract him from the fast track. Kidnapped by a critically ill prisoner (Jon Seda), he undergoes a spiritual change as they traverse the American West in search of a legendary Navajo healing place. Scrutinizing the print advertising, moviegoers might come up with two very different perspectives on the film. The ad in Sunday’s Times shows the convict sitting serenely on a mountaintop as he and a contemplative Harrelson stare down from above. The L.A. Weekly ad suggests a grittier thrust, portraying the gun-toting prisoner superimposed on a close-up of Harrelson’s face. Cimino’s seventh film drew mixed reviews when it premiered in May at the Cannes Film Festival--his first appearance at the event since the screening of “Heaven’s Gate” in 1980. That film was one of the more conspicuously over-budget flops in Hollywood history, made all the more dramatic in the wake of Cimino’s critically acclaimed “The Deer Hunter,” which had brought him a couple of Oscars two years before. Cimino’s last three films--”Year of the Dragon” (1985), “The Sicilian” (1987) and a 1990 remake of “The Desperate Hours”--failed to take off. Says longtime friend Francis Grumman, who served as the second unit director of photography on “Sunchaser”: “Michael has a lot riding on this movie.”

One Nation, Under a Troubled Groove

With the shooting death of Death Row artist Tupac Shakur and isolated gunplay at the recent “How Can I Be Down” conference in Miami, the rap community is in a state of disarray. The obstacles facing the music haven’t been lost on Darryl James, the editor and owner of Rap Sheet, a Santa Monica-based national monthly rap publication that has been among the most successful fanzines of the genre for the last 5 years. “We’re at a crossroads,” said James when announcing his third annual “Working Towards a Unified Hip-Hop Nation,” a three-day conference being held Wednesday-Saturday at the Hollywood Roosevelt. “We want to show that there are some people in rap music that are about positivity.” The main issues of the conference are the increased commercial influence of independent rap labels and the reemergence of female rap artists. Shakur’s death will be discussed by participants but won’t be a primary focus of any of the panels. “I think it’s too soon for any of us to surmise the full impact of his death,” James said. “I didn’t want to have a reactionary panel based purely on raw emotions. Rap music isn’t to be blamed for Tupac’s death. His life ended tragically, but he was someone who was shot who happened to be a rap artist. The beauty of the art form is that it offers so many different aspects to choose from--outside of the violence.”