High Court Won’t Provide Another Sequel to Baldwin Saga
Puck’s bucks . . . No angels . . . Settle, people . . . The making of a Puff Mama . . . Di lives on in kitsch
It was the punch heard ‘round the world. In 1995, Alec Baldwin applied his celebrity knuckles to the schnoz of a photographer lurking at the end of his Woodland Hills driveway. As the case exits the legal system, Baldwin’s debt to the pesky paparazzo remains a relatively paltry $4,500.
The actor had public sympathy on his side: People understood if he was a little touchy about the intrusion because he was bringing wife Kim Basinger and their newborn daughter, Ireland, home from the hospital. He said his privacy was being invaded.
Baldwin, who also coated the photographer’s truck windows with shaving cream and broke his glasses, was acquitted of misdemeanor battery in Van Nuys in 1996.
Two years later, another jury in Van Nuys found in a civil case that Baldwin and Alan Zanger were both to blame. The jury awarded Zanger $4,500 to cover lost wages and medical treatments for his punched-out proboscis--far less than the $85,000 he sought for what he called an unprovoked attack.
So Zanger turned to the 2nd District of the state Court of Appeal, seeking to recover $18,000 in legal costs. The court turned him down. Recently, the California Supreme Court also decided to leave well enough alone. End of case, end of story.
So tell us, Alec, was it worth it?
PASSING THE PUCK? Wolfgang Puck’s food services company is suing Edward James Olmos and his production company for payment of a $34,420 catering bill from a film fest in Denver last year.
According to Puck’s Los Angeles Superior Court suit, event sponsors Olmos & Co. never intended to pay for the catering services Puck & Co. provided at the 1999 Denver Latino International Film Festival. The suit alleges breach of contract and negligent misrepresentation. It seeks the past due amount, plus 10% interest, plus punitive damages. Olmos could not be reached for comment.
9021UH-OH!: Actor Robert Wagner is suing Aaron Spelling’s production companies for $20 million, alleging that the prolific television producer entered a “clandestine” deal with Fox Television, which then dumped a series in which Wagner had an interest in favor of what would become the long-running “Beverly Hills, 90210.”
Wagner’s suit asserts that he and his late wife, actress Natalie Wood, came up with the idea for Spelling’s 1970s jiggle hit “Charlie’s Angels.” Wagner says he signed a consulting contract entitling him to 7.5% of the gross from a proposed sequel called “Angels 88.”
The actor only recently learned that Fox had committed to air at least 13 episodes of the sequel, he says. When Fox backed out, Spelling threatened to sue, according to Wagner’s lawsuit.
To settle the dispute, Fox invited Spelling to submit two new pilots, the suit says. One of them was “Beverly Hills, 90210,” starring Spelling’s daughter, Tori.
Wagner’s suit says that he is owed part of the take from the popular series, which ended this year, because he held a piece of the original “asset”--”Angels 88.”
We wonder which one of Charlie’s Angels Tori would have played if things had turned out differently.
CASE CLOSED: That dispute over the origins of the “Judge Judy” show has gone off to Settlementland.
Attorney Allan Sigel, who represented producers Sandi Spreckman and Kaye Switzer, reports that his clients settled their malpractice suit against their entertainment lawyer about three-quarters of the way through a trial in Los Angeles Superior Court.
Spreckman and Switzer said the lawyer, Fred Fenster, had allowed the hit show to be swiped out from under them.
The star witness at the trial was Judge Judith Sheindlin, who testified that the women approached her with the idea of a “People’s Court”-style TV show in 1993.
Sheindlin testified that she promised they wouldn’t be left out of any deal. “We’re in it together,” the TV jurist said she told them.
Details of the settlement are confidential.
“All I’m permitted to say is that the parties resolved their differences amicably and they’re satisfied there was a just conclusion,” Sigel said.
LA VIDA LOPEZ: It’s that same old story: Striving starlet meets the managers who say they can make her a star. Then, when she hits the big time, she doesn’t know them anymore. It’s like, “And you are?”
So goes the tale as laid out in a Los Angeles Superior Court lawsuit against Jennifer Lopez, who sings, acts and appears in public barely dressed, often on the arm of rapper Sean “Puffy” Combs.
Lopez’s former personal managers at the Gold Co. say they discovered her in 1994, when she was an unknown working as a backup Fly Girl dancer on TV’s “In Living Color.”
They entered “an oral management agreement,” the suit says, giving Gold 15% of whatever Lopez made. Under Gold’s management, the suit says, the actress went on to appear in commercials, then feature films, including “Selena.” Ultimately, she became the most highly paid Latina actress.
Lopez fired Gold in 1998--just as the money started rolling in. Gold seeks $1 million from the Puff Mama. Her new reps couldn’t be reached for comment.
MAKING A MINT: A federal judge in Los Angeles has ruled that use of Princess Diana’s name or image on kitschy trinkets does not imply endorsement by her estate or its charitable trust.
After hearing arguments by lawyers for Diana’s heirs and the Franklin Mint, U.S. District Judge Florence-Marie Cooper tossed out the estate’s allegations of false advertising, unfair competition and trademark dilution. It was the second court decision in the mint’s favor in the case filed two years ago on behalf of the Diana Princess of Wales Memorial Fund.
The mint has made, well, a mint peddling 300,000 Di products since the princess’ death in a Paris auto accident Aug. 31, 1997. Prices of the plates, dolls and other Di doodads range from $29.95 to $595, according to court records.
