August 1, 2000

Barbra tix bankrupt fans

By ROGER ANDERSON Scripps Howard News Service

BARBRAMANIA: Word having gone around that Barbra Streisand will put on four "farewell" concerts, two in New York and two in L.A., her fans turned out in droves the other day to snap up ducats for her Madison Square Garden shows, which are scheduled for Sept. 27 and 28. The tix were gone in two hours.

"I just wasted my total bank account to see her," one woman told a reporter after shelling out cash for two seats priced at $1,500 apiece.

We hereby call on Barbra, who is enormously wealthy, to give this impecunious fan a rebate.

TIGER RAG: Recently we mentioned that Elizabeth Hurley was in dutch with the Screen Actors Guild for appearing in an Estee Lauder commercial shoot while the guild was on strike. Now we hear that golfing phenom Tiger Woods is also in trouble with the union, in his case for appearing in a General Motors ad.

“It was an extremely tough situation," Tiger says in a statement, "but I have relationships to uphold with my sponsors who have supported me over the years. This is in no way a stance against the union." It's merely a conscious decision to cross the picket line, and that, somehow, is different.

EXERCISE EQUIPMENT AND THE STARS: We are accustomed to sharing items with you about how this or that celebrity has ordered up, say, $9,243.33 worth of top-of-the-line exercise equipment, the better to keep those high-profile abs and pecs in the best possible shape. The New York Post puts a new wrinkle (if you will) on the subject by rumoring that Jessica Sklar, a.k.a. Mrs. Jerry Seinfeld, recently took delivery of 1,000 pounds of the stuff.

In tenuously related news, Entertainment Weekly reports that Courtney Love recently ran afoul of her exercise equipment, resulting in an ankle injury that has sidelined her from the upcoming production of "John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars," in which Courtney was to appear in a dual role as Eleanor Roosevelt and Indira Ghandi.

IS IT GOOD NEWS OR BAD NEWS? YOU BE THE JUDGE: It is gossip dowager Liz Smith's sad duty to report that Joe Eszterhas, the "Basic Instinct" screenwrlter who recently got back on the cultural radar with a tell-all tome titled "American Rhapsody," had to cancel his tour in support of the book because the docs said his pregnant missus has to take it easy.

SOCIAL AWARNESS, ETC.: And then there are those who think Rebecca Romijn-Stamos looked entirely too naked in "X-Men," even though she was quite thoroughly covered in expensive body makeup. (It just so happened the purpose of the body makeup was to make her look naked.)

"I felt very covered up actually," Rebecca tells People mag. "I didn't feel naked, even though I looked naked. It's just how Mystique (that's the name of her X-character) prefers to be. In terms of her morphing capabilities, clothes would get in the way. So it’s a convenience thing."

Yet Rebecca hastens to add that it shouldn't be a trick-or-treating thing.

"I'm actually trying to convince mothers not to let their daughters go out as Mystique this Halloween," she observes.

NAME THAT POOCH: Here's a report saying Kate Hudson, whose mom is Goldie Hawn, is currently pitching woo with Chris Robinson, who is the frontman for the Black Crowes, the world's most highly paid Led Zeppelin cover band. Chris even accompanied Kate to the Santa Monica, Calif., set of her upcoming pic, "The Cutting Room," along with Kate's dog.

What is the dog's name?

A: Courtney Love.

B. Rebecca Romijn-Stamos.

C: Clara Bow.

Nice try, but the answer is C

KATHIE LEE AFTERMATH: Kathie Lee Gifford having bade adieu to all the fans she's garnered during her years in syndication with Regis Philbin, here's a report saying that some woman named Julie Moran who does on-camera turns for "Entertainment Tonight" spent Kathie Lee's last couple of days madly trying to position herself as the next first name to be linked in a title to Regis's.

What the New York Daily News reports is that Julie interviewed Kathie Lee on Monday but was still making a pest of herself around the set on Wednesday, even managing to wangle a few precious moments of air time.

"Julie is not positioning herself for anything," ripostes Julie's "rep," whose name is Leslie Sloane-Zelnik, "because she's very happy at 'ET.' Her friend Kathie Lee gave her an exclusive interview and asked her to spend the week here. Regis brought Julie on stage because that's what Regis does."

CELEBRITY DERRING-DO: We gaze into our crystal ball to see that this Sunday a person named Lloyd Edwards will write in to Parade's Walter Scott wanting to know if it's true that Tom Cruise did his own hazardous mountain-climbing stunts in the summer semi-blockbuster, "M:I-2."

"Tom did all his stunts on that scene," Walter gets executive producer Terence Chang to explain, "hanging off a cliff 2,000 feet up. John Woo (he's the fellow who directed the movie) wanted to do the shot in one take, but Tom made him do it eight times. Sometimes he was assisted by a wire, which was removed digitally in the editing. Usually, a studio won't let a star do dangerous stunts, but Tom was the producer of the film, and he insisted. He loves heights? And loves being stupid, we guess.

Roger Anderson is arts and entertainment editor at Scripps Howard News Service.

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