ARTS AND ENTERTAINMENT REPORTS FROM THE TIMES, NEWS SERVICES AND THE NATION’S PRESS.

TELEVISION

Sniper Satire Pulled: Cable’s Bravo network said it won’t show a Michael Moore satire about a “teen sniper school” because of public sensitivities after the Columbine High School massacre. The four-minute segment, produced five months before the April 20 shootings, was to have been shown this Sunday on Moore’s Bravo series, “The Awful Truth.” Moore (“Roger and Me”) said the satire takes easy access to guns to its “logical extreme,” by showing armed children being taught to be better shots as part of the school curriculum. In an e-mail to his fans, Moore said that he disagreed with Bravo’s decision to edit the program. “One of the main functions of satire is to confront the uncomfortable issues,” he wrote. “Satire is not supposed to be the kind of ‘Comedy Lite’ you can find on every other channel.” A Bravo spokeswoman, meanwhile, said the network didn’t object to the segment’s content, but felt the timing was inappropriate. It was unknown if the satire might be shown at a later date.

POP/ROCK

Who Needs Record Stores? Randy Newman, Lyle Lovett and Robert Cray are among 14 artists whose songs will be offered for free download starting this week by Amazon.com, the popular Internet book merchant. The posting of high-quality recordings of full-length songs (instead of sample snippets) by the Seattle-based online company is being viewed by many music industry observers as another stride in the race to embrace digital download as a music delivery system of the future. While some worry that music downloading will create widespread piracy, Newman said Tuesday that the Internet is a powerful tool to reach new music consumers: “I don’t think you lose anything in giving something away. . . . It gets people to notice you, and I’d wear a pickle suit and carry a billboard to get my music noticed.”

*

Concert Advisories: In the first measure of its kind in the nation, a bill that would require parental advisories on concert tickets is under consideration in Michigan. The measure--sponsored by state Sen. Dale Shugars after he attended a Marilyn Manson concert in which the shock rocker appeared strapped to a cross and wearing a black G-string--passed Michigan’s state senate last month and is now before a house committee. “[Would this measure] guarantee that parents won’t let their kids go to these concerts?” Shugars asked. “No. But it does guarantee a red flag.” Among the bill’s critics, however, is the Recording Industry Assn. of America, which said the measure “could undermine” the recording industry’s current system of voluntary warning labels on objectionable record albums.

STAGE

Remembered in His ‘Home’: The late director Jose Quintero, renowned for his legendary stagings of the plays of Eugene O’Neill and Tennessee Williams, was remembered by a large gathering of friends and colleagues at a memorial celebration Monday at the Mark Taper Forum, hosted by Taper and Ahmanson Theatre artistic director Gordon Davidson. Among the speakers were actors Burt Reynolds, Salome Jens, Charles Nelson Reilly, Barry Primus, Sam Anderson, Ray Stricklyn and Suzanne Benoit, who announced the formation of the Jose Quintero Foundation for Theatre Arts. The nonprofit organization’s first goal is to fund a $10,000 annual American Theatre Wing Quintero Award, followed by awards to individual artists and theater companies. The director--who called theater “my home, my church and my sense of purpose”--will also be remembered with memorial activities in New York.

VIDEO

‘Ryan’ Wins Rental Battle: In its first week in stores, “Saving Private Ryan,” which was released on video for rental only, has set a new record, generating about $9.6 million in rental revenue in the 10,000 stores nationwide that are surveyed by the Video Software Dealer Assn.’s VidTrac service. The previous record-holder was “There’s Something About Mary,” which took in about $9.1 million in its first week in rental stores.

QUICK TAKES

In an unusual programming move, ABC will air a new game show, “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?,” for 13 consecutive nights this summer. The half-hour prime-time show--an adaptation of a popular British game show to be hosted by Regis Philbin--is expected to begin its two-week run in August. . . . Advance sales for Disney’s “Tarzan” at the El Capitan Theatre are running ahead of comparable sales figures for the El Capitan presentations of Disney’s last three animated films--”A Bug’s Life,” “Mulan” and “Hercules”--with $1 million in tickets already sold. The film opens next Wednesday. . . . Community Concerts, a nationwide network of concert presenters that’s been responsible for launching thousands of performing-arts careers, has been acquired by New York agency Trawick Artists. Community Concerts had been been a division of Columbia Artists Management Inc. for decades. . . . The walls and carpeting at a Getty Center library were damaged Monday when a pipe burst and sent about four inches of water into a lower level of the Getty Research Institute building, a museum official said. But the library’s collection of books and photographs appeared to suffer only slight damage. “The greatest concern we have is with the high humidity levels that will remain until we can dry the area out,” said J. Paul Getty Trust official Stephen D. Rountree.