Arts and entertainment reports from The Times, national and international news services and the nation’s press.

ART

Now That’s Stamp Art: Postage stamps depicting four centuries of American art went on sale nationwide Friday, marked by ceremonies at Washington’s Corcoran Gallery, where two of the 20 paintings featured in the set are housed. The Corcoran’s contributions to the stamp collection are Albert Bierstadt’s “The Last of the Buffalo” (1889) and Frederic Edwin Church’s “Niagara” (1857). Other works depicted on the 32-cent stamps include Mary Cassatt’s “Breakfast in Bed” (1897), which is housed in Southern California’s own Huntington Library; George Caleb Bingham’s “Boatmen on the Missouri” (1846), from San Francisco’s Fine Arts Museums; Edward Hopper’s “Nighthawks” (1942); Franz Kline’s “Mahoning” (1956); Mark Rothko’s “No. 12” (1951); and Winslow Homer’s “The Fog Warning” (1885). Other artists featured in the Postal Service’s latest Classic Collections series are John Foster, Ammi Phillips, Rembrandt Peale, Asher B. Durand, Joshua Johnson, William Harnett, George Catlin, Thomas Moran, Grant Wood, Charles Sheeler, John Audubon and an unknown artist described as the Freake Limner (meaning a painter of the Freake family).

TELEVISION

Director’s Cut: “GoodFellas,” the 1990 Martin Scorsese gangster film that received six Academy Award nominations and was recently included on the American Film Institute’s Top 100 Films of the Century list, will have its broadcast premiere Sept. 13 on CBS (opposite the Emmy Awards on NBC). Scorsese edited the film for TV back in 1993, but it has just now been scheduled by CBS, which declined to say how many minutes had been cut. The 8-11 p.m. program will include a brief prologue from Scorsese in which he calls the movie “a violent story” and warns that “enough [violence] has been left in so that viewers will not misinterpret the underlying brutality of the mobsters as entertainment. . . . I did not want to remove all of the violence, because I did not want to give the impression that this film depicts a remotely glamorous lifestyle.” The film, based on Nicholas Pileggi’s book about the real experiences of a Mafia member who winds up in the federal witness protection program, will be rated TV-MA (for mature viewers) for dialogue, language and violence. Robert De Niro, Ray Liotta and Joe Pesci (who won a best supporting actor Oscar for the role) star.

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Gilligan Goes to Court: Former “Gilligan’s Island” star Bob Denver made a surprise appearance at a West Virginia courthouse Thursday to plead no contest to marijuana possession. Under an agreement, Denver won’t have to stand trial next month on the misdemeanor charge of allegedly possessing about 1 1/2 ounces of marijuana and related drug paraphernalia. Denver was placed on six months’ unsupervised probation. Police arrested him June 4 after being tipped that a package containing marijuana had been delivered to his Princeton home.

DANCE

Byrd Abounds: Dancer-choreographer Donald Byrd will have two separate productions mounted in the Southland this fall. The West Coast premiere of his new work “Jazz Train,” a full-evening piece performed to the music of Max Roach, Vernon Reid and Geri Allen, will be held Oct. 2 at El Camino College’s Marsee Auditorium. Meanwhile, his holiday offering, “The Harlem Nutcracker,” based on the classic E.T.A. Hoffman tale and inspired by the music of Duke Ellington, will be performed Nov. 12-15 at the Wiltern Theatre.

RADIO

KROQ Fined: Radio station KROQ-FM (106.7) has been fined $2,000 by the FCC for broadcasting indecent material at “a time when there was a reasonable risk that children may have been in the audience.” The FCC complaint centers on the station’s airing at 9:10 p.m. on March 28 of a song, “You Suck,” by the group Consolidated, which includes explicit descriptions of oral sex acts. KROQ General Manager Trip Reeb did not return calls seeking comment on the fine.

QUICK TAKES

Luciano Pavarotti is recuperating at his seaside Italian villa after undergoing hip surgery earlier this week. The tenor’s spokeswoman said he was “doing great” and “recovering well,” but didn’t elaborate on the nature of the surgery. She said that Pavarotti, 62, plans to resume performances in October. . . . KCET-TV Channel 28 will debut a new afternoon lineup on Sept. 14, including a 5 p.m. rebroadcast of the previous evening’s episode of the late-night interview show “Charlie Rose.” “The NewsHour With Jim Lehrer” will follow at 6 p.m. (airing half an hour earlier than before). “Life & Times Tonight” moves up to 7 p.m., followed by Huell Howser presenting encores of two of his series. . . . Steve Martin and Eddie Murphy are teaming up for “Bowfinger’s Big Thing,” a Universal Pictures comedy that began production this week in Los Angeles. Martin conceived and wrote the story, about a wannabe film producer who stalks Hollywood’s hottest action star to get him on film for a movie. . . . Cindy Young, a longtime professional fund-raiser and public radio executive, has been named interim general manager of public radio station KPCC-FM (89.3), replacing Rod Foster, who was relieved of his post last week due to consistent budget shortfalls at the station. . . . Actor Robert Urich was named Friday as grand marshal of the 67th annual Hollywood Christmas Parade, which will be held Nov. 29.