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

POP/ROCK

Lynne Cheney and Eminem Face Off

Bad-boy rap artist Eminem lobs an obscenity at Vice President Dick Cheney’s wife on his upcoming album “The Eminem Show.” Lynne Cheney, a leading critic of violent lyrics in songs promoted by the recording industry, singled out the Detroit-based singer in congressional testimony in 2000, months before her husband was elected vice president, and in numerous media interviews since then.

In the yet-to-be-released track “White America,” Eminem follows the exclamation toward Cheney with the line “with the freeness of speech this Divided States of Embarrassment will allow you to have.”

Cheney fired back through her spokeswoman, again condemning Eminem’s lyrics as a “glorification of violence” against women and homosexuals. A spokesman for Interscope Records, a division of Vivendi Universal, defended the singer. The song “addresses personal attacks against him, his music and his right to artistic expression,” he said.

The rapper’s third major-label release is due out June 4.

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TELEVISION

Small-Screen Diversity: A Long Way to Go

A 1999 vow by the major TV networks to include more minorities in prime-time series has largely gone unfulfilled, according to an analysis by Children Now, a research and advocacy group.

“Fall Colors 2001-02,” the group’s third-annual study of prime-time programming, examined the first two episodes of each evening series airing last fall on ABC, CBS, Fox, NBC, UPN and WB. Its findings, released Wednesday, said the networks are “telling the same old tale,” in which younger white males predominate, ethnic actors are relegated to supporting roles, and female characters are often stereotypes.

Shows in the sitcom-dominated 8 p.m. hour--when young viewers do most of their prime-time viewing--tend to be the most segregated on prime-time TV, Children Now reported. Only 7% of comedies had ethnically diverse starring casts, compared with 14% a year earlier, it said.

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MOVIES

Allen Shuns Notion of Boycotting France

Woody Allen said Wednesday that he disagrees strongly with an ad from an American Jewish group that asks Americans to reconsider attending the Cannes Film Festival in light of recent anti-Semitic outbursts in France.

The ad, placed in Hollywood trade papers last week by the American Jewish Congress, does not call for an out-and-out boycott of the festival, which opened Wednesday, but says those who attend should do so only if they’ll speak out against anti-Semitism.

“I don’t believe in it,” Allen said at a news conference in Cannes. “I’ve never felt the French people were in any way anti-Semitic.”

During a radio interview earlier in the day, Allen, who is Jewish, went even further. “I think any boycott is wrong,” he said. “Boycotts were exactly what the Germans were doing against the Jews.”

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QUICK TAKES

John Wayne Bobbitt was removed from Wednesday night’s taping of Fox’s “Celebrity Boxing 2” after he was arrested for allegedly beating his wife in their Las Vegas home.... 20th Century Fox is reinventing the Charlie Chan franchise, with Lucy Liu (“Charlie’s Angels”) playing the lead character, a detective named Charlie after her grandfather.... Winona Ryder will host the season finale of “Saturday Night Live” this weekend, with Moby as musical guest.