‘Underpants’ to return

Author Dav Pilkey has agreed to write four more of the multimillion-selling series that helped establish the giggly genre known as “poop fiction.” The first book, “The Adventures of Ook and Gluk, Kung-Fu Cavemen From the Future,” comes out in August with a worldwide printing of 1 million copies, Scholastic announced Thursday.

The new book is the first “Captain Underpants” in four years. In an e-mail message to the Associated Press, Pilkey said he and his wife “had to take some time off to care for my father, who had terminal cancer.” (His father, David M. Pilkey, died in 2008.)

-- associated press Art fraudster awaits prison

Art dealer Lawrence B. Salander, accused of conducting the largest art fraud in New York history, pleaded guilty Thursday in Manhattan.

Salander, 60, will be sentenced to a minimum of six years in prison and no more than 18 years, New York Supreme Court Justice Michael Obus said. Salander also must pay restitution of $120 million.

Prosecutors said Salander stole from or defrauded 28 victims out of more than $92 million. The victims included tennis star John McEnroe, the estate of Robert De Niro’s father and Earl Davis, the son of artist Stuart Davis.

Salander’s Upper East Side gallery, Salander-O’Reilly Galleries LLC, filed for bankruptcy in November 2008.

“I am deeply ashamed and sorry for my actions,” Salander told the judge.

-- bloomberg news Deitch plans to sell artworks

The Museum of Contemporary Art braved considerable controversy when it announced in January that it was hiring Jeffrey Deitch, a leading contemporary art dealer, to be its next director. Part of the deal was that Deitch would liquidate his New York-based business, Deitch Projects, before beginning his MOCA job on June 1, thus shedding the potential conflicts of interest and the ethical murk that could arise if a museum director tried to serve both the scholarly, educational and public service mandates of a nonprofit museum and the profit motive of a commercial art dealer.

Now, Deitch says he expects that when he starts at MOCA he will still have “a few hundred works” on his hands that belong to Deitch Projects and that he expects to fold into his personal collection. He said he planned to go on selling some of those -- following protocols previously worked out with MOCA’s board that apply when he sells pieces from his personal art holdings.

One of those rules is that the museum gets first dibs on anything he sells.

Deitch said he needed the money to cover the cost of shutting down his business, including breaking leases and keeping financial promises he made to gallery employees who would be out of a job.

-- Mike Boehm

Leno still tops Letterman

Jay Leno won Week 2 of his renewed late-night ratings battle with David Letterman but by a much smaller margin than the first week, figures from the Nielsen Co. showed Thursday.

NBC’s “The Tonight Show” averaged 4.4 million viewers last week, down from 5.6 million in the previous week, Leno’s first after replacing Conan O’Brien in the host’s chair. CBS’ “Late Show,” by contrast, averaged 3.8 million in Week 2, a slight increase over the previous week’s 3.7 million.

Leno also held the advantage among viewers in the 18-49 age bracket that many advertisers covet, but as with the overall audience, the margin of victory was smaller that the previous week.

-- Lee Margulies Finally

Mulling options: Stephen Eich, managing director of the Pasadena Playhouse, says board members will decide in the next three weeks whether to file for bankruptcy or try to raise enough money to pay off creditors. The theater closed Feb. 7, saying it was about $2 million in debt.