Contrary to What Was Heard, Surgery Was More Than Skin Deep

Marilyn Young and her husband were dining in Newport Beach the day that TV host David Letterman had heart bypass surgery. She overheard a man at a nearby table say, “Well, David Letterman had the big surgery today.” A woman at that table responded, “He had a face lift?”

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THANKS FOR THE WARNING! Chris Koseluk and Cindy Mulkern of Never Dull Productions, which develops television projects, received a piece of junk mail from a music service that was trying to personalize the offer by writing on a first-name basis. Unfortunately for the music service’s pitch, the first name was “Never” in this case (see accompanying).

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CAN’T MAKE UP HIS MIND: Kevin Costner, as you might have heard, plays an advisor to President John F. Kennedy in “Thirteen Days,” a new film about the Cuban missile crisis of 1962.

By coincidence, Costner has the odd distinction of having uttered contrasting Kennedy assassination theories during his acting career.

In “JFK” he was Jim Garrison, the New Orleans attorney who believed that Lee Harvey Oswald did not act alone in the shooting of Kennedy.

And in “Bull Durham” he was Crash Davis, a minor league ballplayer who told his girlfriend (played by Susan Sarandon) that he believes in hanging curves and long, wet kisses and “I believe Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone.”

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EAT YOUR HEART OUT, HOUSTON: Did you hear the World Wrestling Federation says it’s going to organize a pro football league--the XFL? What’s more, one of the teams is going to be based in the L.A. Coliseum. And there’s no mention of Houston, the city that outbid L.A. for the next expansion franchise in that other pro league, the NFL. Details have been few, but the World Wrestling Federation’s football games, unlike their matches, apparently will not be scripted beforehand.

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TRUMPED: If Donald Trump receives the presidential nomination of the Reform Party in Long Beach or St. Paul (the two cities are vying for the convention), he shouldn’t count on the support of fellow business mogul Steve Wynn.

After Trump derided the design of Wynn’s new casino in Biloxi, Miss., Wynn told the Wall Street Journal: “Donald Trump doesn’t know what he’s talking about, and I refuse to have my business shaped by anything that imbecile says.”

Gee, doesn’t anyone have respect for presidential timber anymore?

Steve Harvey can be reached at (800) LATIMES, Ext. 77083, by fax at (213) 237-4712, by mail at Metro, L.A. Times, Times Mirror Square, L.A. 90053 and by e-mail at steve.harvey@latimes.com