Hollywood Hawk of Fame

HYPED AS: “A Hollywood Frame of Mind,” an art opening/fund-raiser at “respected celebrity hairstylist” Tina Cassaday’s Beverly Hills salon.

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REALITY: Double-hosted by Hitchcock leading ladies Janet Leigh and Tippi Hedren (“Psycho” and “The Birds,” respectively), the event presents 17 oil paintings of film stars for sale and auctions off donated movie packages to raise money for Hedren’s Shambala animal preserve and the Leigh-backed Motion Picture Television Fund. “I paint regular people, too,” says Peter Alexander Samuels, whose very large and, uh, colorful celebrity portraits have appeared in many fine restaurants. “But when I’m having a public show, it’s always better to have people that people recognize, so they can see that I can catch their likeness.” Yup, the picture in the window of the guy leaning over the Harley handlebars, that’s definitely Brando. Mounted above the sink? Judy Garland as Dorothy. And in back, opposite the lavatory, a giant, glamorous, unmistakable Liz, the canvas cordoned off behind a gold velvet rope. Cassaday recently discovered Samuels’ art (which goes for $2,500 to $5,000). “I said, ‘It’s fantastic. I need you to do my clients,’ ” she recalls. “I had him paint Jamie Lee Curtis, Janet Leigh, Tippi Hedren.” (None posed--Samuels works from photographs.) The L.A. cast of “Sunset Boulevard” once presented Glenn Close with a Samuels rendering, but tonight, none of Cassaday’s famous clients will be taking their own portraits home. “I don’t have any room,” insists Leigh. And, swears Hedren, “I’m broke.”

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I’M ON THE LIST: Besides the co-hostesses, well . . . Tony Curtis’ daughter (no, not Jamie Lee, it’s Kelly), Brando’s makeup artist and a guy who, Cassaday says, was the inspiration for Warren Beatty’s character in “Shampoo.” Jack Lemmon and Jamie Lee Curtis donate memorabilia, as does celebrity biographer Donald Spoto. (The bidding sheet estimates the value of his package of autographed tomes as “priceless.” The bid, $35.) To keep this fabulous Bev Hills affair safe from crashers and paparazzi, the stylist-to-the-stars posts uniformed security guards at the salon’s points of entry. Not a bad assignment, confides one. “A lot of foxy ladies in there.”

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CELEB QUOTIENT: With such a lifelike Marilyn, who needs those WB kids?

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WOW FACTOR: Big art; Leigh’s shrieking stabbed-in-the-shower OO-EE! OO-EE! OO-EE! adds “Psycho” touch.

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Chow Line: Wine and water, pizza and calzones, cookies and cakes, plus lots and lots of cheese.Photographs by Rachel Weill