April 27, 1999

CELEBRITY DREAM TEAMS: MONICA, DONALD, BARBARA, GEORGETTE

By ROGER ANDERSON Scripps Howard News Service

THE PLACE: Donald Trump's fabled manse and guest resort, Mar-­A-Lago, in Palm Beach, Fla.

THE SCENE: Breakfast on the terrace.

CAST OF CHARACTERS: Best-selling co-authors Monica Lewinsky and Andrew Morton, enjoying each other's company over scrambled eggs or whatever.

ACTION: Donald Trump himself comes upon the pair and accepts their invitation to take a load off.

THE UPSHOT: Andrew, who also worked with the late Princess Di on a best-selling book, says he wants to pen Donald's future bio. "It would be nice if they got you right for once," he remarks, according to one report. Also, Donald asks Monica to serve as a judge at the next Miss Universe pageant, of which he is the proprietor. (Later, Donald will deny he issued any such invite, while admitting that the idea is "wonderful.")

THE PLACE: Petra, the ancient monumental city located in Jordan.

THE SCENE: Somewhere amid the tombs, mummies and other brlc-a-brac.

PRINCIPAL CHARACTER: Georgette Mosbacher, super-wealthy cosmetics lady.

ACTION: Georgette's archeological reverie is interrupted by the sound of someone with a lisp crying, "Georgette! Georgette!"
Enter Barbara Walters, who is touring the site in tandem with Queen Noor.

THE UPSHOT: The three gals have a nice chat about the lovely yacht on which Georgette has been seen cruising around the Red Sea, according to a "spy" who then turns around and retails the story to the New York Post.

GIVE OUR REGARDS TO BROADWAY: Now that we've apprised you of the precise means by which people who could buy and sell you many times over tend to put in their time, check out what musical-stage star Patti Lupone has to say about her latest brainstorm - namely, producing a musical-stage version of "The Dead," the James Joyce story already cinematized by the late, great John Huston.

“Everybody who reads it wants to be in it," Patti tells a reporter at the New York Daily News. "But producers are afraid of it. Nobody wants to take a chance. The landowners on Broadway don't have the vision. They'd rather pull shows that have already become successful in London." And they call themselves landowners!

MORE FROM THE GREAT WHITE WAY: Meantime, Pierre Cossette - who is one of the producers of the recent Broadway extravaganza, "The Civil War" - handily fields free-floating objections to the fact that the show's stars wear flesh-covered face microphones to ensure that every syllable they sing or say will reach the folks in the back row.

"Gone are the days when singers like Al Jolson, John Raitt and Ethel Merman would come in and belt out a song with no mike," Pierre observes. "We have 27 musicians in the pit, playing loud, brassy arrangements. If the performers weren't miked, either the arrangements would have to be quieter, or there would be a shouting contest on stage each night.” That sounds like fun. "We certainly can't have that." And why can't we?

CASTING NOTES FROM ALL OVER: You know perfectly well that Ed Harris has been tapped to portray the great abstract expressionist painter Jackson Pollock in an upcoming film, but we bet it's news to you that Val Kilmer has been inked for a cameo role as Jackson's fellow-artiste, Willem de Kooning.

MORE ABOUT Di: We would be remiss if we didn't mention that James Hewitt, the British military fellow who notoriously had an extramarital liaison with the Princess of Wales, has a volume coming out. "The book is not just about his affair with Diana," James' agent points out. "It's his autobiography, and it's a very good story." And that's exactly why we'll wait for the movie.

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

back to top