O.K., how about Howard for president?
Step aside, General Powell. In its first week, Howard Stern's latest opus sold more copies than Powell's "My American Journey" and O.J. Simpson's "I Want To Tell You" did in their first weeks -- combined.
According to Publishers Weekly, Stern's "Miss America," broke all first-week sales records for 1995, and looks to outsell his first book, "Private Parts."
In fact, with 1.4 million copies in print, the latest offering from the self-hyped King of All Media is outselling all other PW top 15 nonfiction bestsellers combined. No. 15 on the list: "The Moral Compass," by trash-talk trasher William Bennett.
Stern, 41, is garnering respectable reviews for "Miss America," which apart from Stern anecdotes about his battles with the FCC, recounts his serious battle with "obsessive-compulsive disorder." The book was published a week ahead of schedule, Stern told a gathering of newspaper reporters, "because the Miss America Pageant people were starting to make waves. I've checked with 100 billion lawyers and there is no way you can mistake me for a Miss America."
Nixon: Now more than ever!
Early word on Oliver Stone's "Nixon": "Looks promising, but tricky to sell." Disney will hold a "limited release" for the 3-hour move beginning Dec. 20 -- so that it qualifies for the Oscars -- but will hold off on general release until January, complete with "Nixon in '96" buttons.
Former Nixon domestic policy chiefJohn Ehrlichmann cooperated on the project originally, but withdrew once he saw the script -- which blames aides for Nixon's downfall -- according to United Press International.
Anthony Hopkins stars as the 37th president. While some observers say he is a shoo-in for an Academy Award nomination, others wonder how close the English actor will get to a Southern California accent. Stone had originally considered Tom Hanks and Robin Williams for the lead.
In "JFK," Stone took a wildly inaccurate swing at history, pinning the assassination on a hapless gay businessman from Louisiana. Will the real- life Nixon get any better treatment? Sources say the president who quit in disgrace gets sympathetic treatment from Stone, who will portray the young Nixon growing up in the Depression, at sea during World War II, as well as his more notorious activities in the Cold War years and beyond.
Price takes on Susan Smith
Like his earlier book, Price's as-yet untitled work in progress is set in a run-down New Jersey housing project. It traces the parallel lives of a black detective assigned to the projects, and a white woman from the other side of town who is rushed into the emergency ward one hot summer day in Newark with injuries and a story that points to the abduction of her four-year-old son by a black carjacker.
Price's book was inspired by Susan Smith, the South Carolina woman who made up a story about a black man kidnapping her two children to cover her own infanticide. Price sets his tale in far more explosive territory: the racial tinderbox of urban New Jersey, where his barely-fictionalized white community, Avalon, is poised on the brink of a full-blown race riot.
Price recently read a chapter from his new book at New York's Donnell Public Library. Quick-witted and acerbic as some of his own characters, Price, in a brief interview, explained how he came to write off-the-news novels. In the early 1980s, when he was in his early 30s and going nowhere writing his "fourth autobiography," Price realized he was not, at least for literary purposes, "the center of the universe." He began researching stories "like a journalist," immersing himself in the underworld of two-bit cops, petty criminals and lost souls.
To get material for his new book, Price attended the Susan Smith trial last spring and spent months revisiting the territory that served as the landscape of "Clockers," adding some forays into the surrounding white suburbs.
"I put myself into places where things happen," said Price. "I'm runnin' with the cops, I'm learnin' stuff, taking voluminous notes. I fashion fiction out of what I absorb. I know I'm ready to start writing when I'm grounded enough to make up responsible lies."
As well known for his screenwriting ("Sea of Love," "The Color of Money," "Mad Dog and Glory") as for his fiction, Price has already sold the unfinished work, scheduled for publication next year, to Paramount. But he harbors no illusions about what happens when literature turns into celluloid.
"Putting a book on the screen is like putting an elephant in a phone booth," Price said. "You may get him in there, but nobody's making any calls."
-- Mark Schapiro
H-e-e-r-e's Tammy
According to Advertising Age, "The Jim J. & Tammy Faye Show'' is being touted by its producers "as a breakthrough programming concept that will resuscitate the daytime TV talk show genre."
"You may think this is crazy," said Worldvision President-CEO John Ryan, "but it just might work.''
The show is scheduled to roll out the day after Christmas on about 30 TV stations across the country. Ryan told Advertising Age that Worldvision hopes many stations will use the "Jim J. & Tammy Faye'' show as midseason replacements for the more controversial daytime talk shows.
"Our stations are feeling the backlash of some of the recent comments from advertisers and from the community on the all-time low that some of the talk shows have stooped to in recent months,'' said Michael Lambert, president of Partner Stations Network. "Admittedly, if the shows were doing higher ratings, perhaps we'd all be less concerned about that.''
Lambert told Advertising Age that the show wouldn't deal with sex-related topics, but would opt for upbeat general interest concepts and guests similar to the "Regis & Kathie Lee'' show.
The former Tammy Faye Bakker (now Messner) is divorced from Jim Bakker, former PTL Club founder and jailbird. In addition to "Hollywood Squares," Bullock has appeared in "Too Close for Comfort" and "ALF."
