Do the Math: X Equals a Bundle for Star of TV Show

The $300,000 face. . . . The $1-million rubber check. . . . And the $6.25-million broken dream.

A picture is worth a thousand words, but a picture of “X-Files” star David Duchovny--now that’s worth exactly $366,400. And 54 cents.

So ruled Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Irving Feffer, who ordered a New York mail order company to pay Duchovny $300,000 plus interest, plus attorney’s fees, for peddling autographed photos of the actor without his permission.

Duchovny, who plays agent Fox Mulder on the TV hit, filed suit in 1996 against J.P. Productions, which does business as CPG Direct. The company used a shot of Duchovny in ads in movie magazines offering autographed photos of the star for a price.

Apparently, this is big business. According to Duchovny’s lawyer, Farhad Novian, some companies resort to tactics that include sending people in wheelchairs to celeb appearances to collect dozens of signed photos at a time.

A representative from CPG Direct could not be reached for comment. Arnold Schwarzenegger has a similar suit against the outfit pending in Santa Monica Superior Court.

In Duchovny’s case, Feffer entered a judgment against the company and its president, identified in court papers as James Foreseen, after the firm failed to appear in court to fight the suit. The size of the award was determined after Duchovny stated in a court declaration that he was paid $400,000 last year for Ford commercials that were shown only in Europe.

Lawyer Novian said he bought a couple of the photos and showed them to Duchovny, who told him the autograph wasn’t his.

“It is not my practice to sell autographed photographs of myself,” the actor said in his declaration.

Duchovny argued in the statement that his professional reputation and publicity value had been hurt. And, he asserted, “I have also suffered injury to my peace, happiness and feelings.”

At the bottom of the page: a genuine Duchovny autograph.

WALTON’S MOUNTAIN WAS NEVER LIKE THIS: Actor and aspiring congressman Ralph Waite and his wife, Linda, are suing a bagel shop in Pacific Palisades for negligence, claiming she was seriously hurt when she slipped and fell there a year ago.

Named as defendant was Noah’s Pacific Inc., which, according to the suit, also does business as Einstein’s Bagel restaurant. The suit, filed in Santa Monica Superior Court, claims that the defendant was negligent in allowing a dangerous condition to exist in the restaurant--namely “an area of the floor slippery from a foreign substance.”

Ralph Waite has been deprived of his wife’s companionship while she has received medical treatment, the suit stated.

Their attorney, Karen A. Getz of Riverside, had no comment.

A spokeswoman for Noah’s said the company had no information on the incident and could not comment.

Waite, best known as the patriarch of television’s “The Waltons,” persuaded a Riverside County judge to declare him a Democrat last week so he could run for the congressional seat left open by the death of Sonny Bono in a skiing accident. Waite had failed to check a party affiliation on his most recent voter registration form.

BAUBLE BATTLE: On the federal bankruptcy court docket, she’s listed as Vickie Lynn Marshall, but we know her as Anna Nicole Smith, the former Guess? model who was not yet 30 when she married a billionaire oil tycoon who was pushing 90.

He died soon after their first anniversary, leaving Smith in a legal morass with his less-than-receptive family. The latest chapter centers on who owns nearly $1 million worth of emerald- and diamond-encrusted jewelry that adorned Smith for a tragically brief time.

Smith, who is filing for bankruptcy in Los Angeles, claimed recently in federal court that jeweler Harry Winston is holding the baubles, which were a gift from her late husband, J. Howard Marshall II.

According to Smith’s lawyer, Mark Kester Brown, Marshall clearly intended to bestow the gift on his wife, who was waiting in the limo outside the Harry Winston store on Rodeo Drive while he bought them. When he wrote the check, Brown said, Marshall asked the sales clerk to give him a couple of days to get the funds into his account to cover it.

That never happened, hence the controversy.

Under dispute is whether Marshall forgot to cover his check or whether his son, Pierce, stopped payment because he disapproved of his 87-year-old father spending a small fortune on his bride, a 26-year-old Playboy pinup.

“Let’s just say there was testimony that this was the first check he ever bounced,” Brown said.

At any rate, Harry Winston was never paid and litigation ensued. Smith contends that she gave the jewels back to the store for “safekeeping.” But Gerald Palmer, a lawyer for the jeweler, says the baubles were never hers because they weren’t paid for.

Complicating matters, the jeweler won a $1-million judgment against Marshall’s estate in U.S. District Court last year, Palmer said. The items are now in the hands of the U.S. marshal in Manhattan, where plans are afoot to eventually sell them to satisfy the judgment.

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Samuel L. Bufford has yet to rule on the matter, which is just a skirmish compared to the impending legal battle over Marshall’s $550-million estate--much of which will be fought in Los Angeles’ federal courts, Brown said.

BUMPER CARS 90210: Actress Raquel Welch is being sued in Santa Monica Superior Court over a car accident she had before Christmas in the middle of one of Beverly Hills’ most vexing intersections.

Cathy Jean Rutherford is seeking unspecified damages for personal injury and property damage in connection with the Dec. 15 collision between Rutherford’s Ford Tempo and the brand new Ford Expedition that Welch was driving.

The suit, filed by attorney Barry Locke, did not delve into details, but a Beverly Hills police spokesman said paramedics did treat the drivers for minor injuries at the scene.

According to spokesman Ed Krines, police went to the crash scene shortly after 5:15 p.m. at the six-way intersection just south of the Beverly Hills Hotel where Beverly Drive, Lomitas Avenue and Canon Drive cross. Welch had been headed south on Canon, and Rutherford was northbound, the spokesman said.

The intersection is not controlled by a traffic light. “This is a politeness intersection,” Krines added. No traffic citations were issued against either driver.

Attorneys for Rutherford and Welch could not be reached.

ACTRESS, COVER GIRL, PLAINTIFF: Jennifer O’Neill, who has been waging a five-year, $6.25-million breach-of-contract battle with the late clothing designer Paolo Gucci, is now suing her former Beverly Hills lawyer, claiming his firm abandoned her case before she could collect a dime from dead or bankrupt defendants.

O’Neill’s new attorneys, Timothy Reuben and Teri Pham, said she is still trying to pursue her case against Gucci, along with the malpractice suit she recently filed against her previous lawyer at Cooper, Epstein & Hurewitz.

The former Cover Girl model and star of “Summer of ‘42” claims that the firm took her case on a contingency basis but stopped making court appearances after determining that it wouldn’t make any money. Cooper, Epstein was dissolved in 1994.

O’Neill, who now lives in Tennessee, filed her suit against Gucci and his licensing agent, Ed Litwak, two years earlier, according to court papers.

An accomplished equestrian, she claimed that Litwak told her she would project the perfect image for Gucci’s planned clothing and makeup line. Later, she contended, he told her he hadn’t been authorized to extend the contract to her.

The actress said she didn’t pursue other endorsement opportunities because she expected to be under contract to Gucci for five years. He filed for bankruptcy in February 1994 and died shortly thereafter.

O’Neill’s is among $200 million in claims against his estate, which is being settled by a court in New York, according to legal documents.

Litwak also filed for bankruptcy, according to O’Neill’s recent suit.

Her former lawyer, Brian Kaufman, did not return phone calls.