August 3, 1999

TALK IS CHEAP? NOT WITH TINA BROWN AT THE HELM

By ROGER ANDERSON Scripps Howard News Service

WALKIN' THE TALK: Fresh from running The New Yorker magazine even further into the red than it already was, Tina Brown is currently getting media attention all over the country for starting up a brand-new mag called Talk. So much the publishing gal of the minute is she that gossip dowager Liz Smith sits down with her for a very newsworthy, quotable tete-a-tete.

For one thing, Liz wonders aloud if there's any truth to the rumor that Tina is on the outs with Graydon Carter.

"Indeed, I am not feuding with anybody," says Tina, who (as you can probably tell) is British. "All I've done is try to start up Talk, and this summer has been the summer from hell for my poor family. I am not feuding with Graydon Carter, who succeeded me at Vanity Fair. Forget it."

Forget what?

ANOTHER TON FROM TINA: The conversation becomes especially interesting, though, when Liz gets Tina to say something substantive about her fledgling periodical.

"I am trying to create new writing voices," Tina explains. "I can't just use all the same people who are already out there - although I admire their bylines and helped create some of them."

And no doubt they're all very grateful for having been so created.

"I'd like the magazine to have a private view in public," Tina continues, not very understandably,"'like the sort of things a writer e-mails to his pals."

Tina, we get a lot of e-mails from our writer pals, and we can assure you it's nothing you want to build an expensive magazine around.

"I'd hope we can escape a lot of bureaucratic, corporate editing!" Or maybe just dispense with editing altogether!

UNUSUAL CELEBRITY QUOTES: Tamerlane Phillips is one of the extended John Phillips clan that includes Chynna Phillips, Mackenzie Phillips, Bijoux Phillips and others. Chynna and her husband, Billy Baldwin, have this deal going where they're supposed to star in a movie titled "Skyscraper," whose producers want to use a song of Tamerlane's on the soundtrack. Tamerlane's asking price? A cool $10 million direct to the Hare Krishnas, even though, according to the New York Post, he isn't a Krishna himself.

"I actually asked one to marry me last week," Tamerlane recalls, "but they're very celibate people." That would put a crimp in the wedding night. "She was able to walk away from me ... I love heavy detachment and desirelessness. I love the whole concept of just walking away from huge offers." We just like being able to move on to the next item, especially in cases like this one.

A REMINDER: How many months passed with reporters saying Billy Bob Thornton and Laura Dern were a romantic item while flacks for both stars denied it vehemently? We lost track, but we offer the following quote from Billy Bob to illustrate how radically things have changed since then.

Asked by a columnist how he likes to spend a Saturday night, the thespian replies: "Lying on the couch watching TV, eating fat-free chocolate cake with syrup on it and drinking coffee with fat-free Coffeemate, with Laura Dern."

DISTAFF WRESTLING: Far be it from us to intrude on the beat of serious sports writers by going into the Sable brouhaha in any depth, but suffice it to say the beleaguered lady grappler, having freed herself from entanglements with the World Wrestling Federation, is not shy about her hopes and dreams in the realm of acting.

"A lot of acting projects and endorsement opportunities are coming my way," she assures a reporter. "I've been offered guest spots on the TV shows 'Walker, Texas Ranger' and 'Martial Law,' along with others." Can "Titus Andronicus" be far behind?

POP QUIZ: In what appears to be an effort to assuage the disappointed feelings of the stars of the NBC program "Will & Grace," who cruelly were not nominated for Emmys, the network has showered what gift item on all four of them, according to USA Today?

1. A popcorn popper.
2. A bowling trophy.
3. A pound of gold bullion.
4. A Porsche.

The answer is (4). If you guessed correctly, go buy yourself a popcorn popper and send NBC the bill.

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

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