In the news

Compiled from Times wires

© St. Petersburg Times,
published August 23, 2001

Survivor' Hatch: I'm innocent

Former Survivor winner Richard Hatch , accused of pushing a former boyfriend who tried to force his way into Hatch's home, pleaded innocent to a domestic assault charge.

Hatch, 40, went to the Newport County (R.I.) Courthouse on Tuesday to seek a restraining order against Glenn Boyanowski , 39. While there, he learned an arrest warrant had been issued for him, so he turned himself in, his attorney, Christopher Behan, said.

Hatch, who is gay, was released on $1,000 personal recognizance. He also was granted a temporary restraining order against Boyanowski.

On his Boston radio show Wednesday, Hatch said Boyanowski went to his Middletown house and "kind of flipped out" after he heard Hatch was seeing someone else.

Boyanowski told police that he went to the house to discuss his "job status" as caretaker for Hatch's son and that Hatch grabbed him by the neck, hit him in the head, kneed him in the mouth and pushed him off the outside stairs, E! Online said.

Boyanowski was treated at a hospital for minor injuries to his lip and neck and released.

Hatch was arrested in April 2000 on a charge of abusing his son, then 9. He was accused of grabbing the boy and forcing him to exercise. The charge was dropped.

Gumbel divorce final

Bryant Gumbel and his wife have finalized their nasty divorce, ending a four-year dispute that included charges The Early Show host cheated with a series of mistresses.

The proceedings, which also involved allegations by June Gumbel that the $5-million-a-year TV star had left her destitute, ended quietly in a Westchester County (N.Y.) courtroom Tuesday. Details of the agreement were sealed.

"Mrs. Gumbel was satisfied that this part of her life is over and she can go on without the concerns she had before," her attorney, Barry Slotnick, said.

Bryant's attorney, Stanley Arkin, did not return a telephone call for comment.

The Gumbels, who were married for 27 years, have two grown children, Bradley and Jillian.

Ryder ill

Winona Ryder left a London hospital Tuesday, but friends remain worried about her health, the Sun of London reports.

Ryder, in Britain filming the low-budget movie Lily and the Secret Planting, was rushed to the private hospital last week, the newspaper said.

Doctors ordered her to stay in bed this week after three days of tests.

"I am not sure what the precise problem was. It was a gastro thing," the movie's producer, Mark Hubbard, told the Sun. "Winona will continue to recuperate at her London hotel. The intention is to start shooting with her again on Saturday."

Ryder became ill two days after she was seen looking shaky and nervous, sweating profusely and chain-smoking during a party for the United Kingdom premiere of The Planet of the Apes .

Downey finds work

Robert Downey Jr.'s first job since his April drug arrest is as the lone performer in Elton John's new video. Premiering today on MTV and VH1, I Want Love shows Downey walking through an empty mansion as he lip-syncs lyrics that include: "I want love but it's impossible/A man like me's so irresponsible. A man like me is dead in places."

John told the New York Daily News that he picked Downey because "he's an incredible actor, and lyrically the song would be perfect for him to interpret. I'm very fond of him."

Warning, 'West Wing' fans

Stop now if you don't want details of the season premiere.

NBC said Martin Sheen's President Josiah Bartlet will open the show's third season by announcing he will run for a second term. Last season's finale ended with Sheen getting ready to address a crowd, presumably to declare whether he would run.

Reality checks

The fallout continues for Paramount Television and its little-watched UPN reality series, Manhunt. Former contestant Jacqueline Kelly, a 36-year-old business consultant, filed a complaint with the FCC over charges that producers misled contestants and manipulated the outcome. Kelly was the first to get booted off the show. The series, which this month, sent 13 contestants on a journey through Kauai while being stalked by three paintball gun-wielding "hunters." Paramount issued a statement saying that parts of the show were re-shot in Los Angeles but that the footage "did not affect the outcome of the show in any way." . . . The WB's reality show Lost in the U.S.A. is the first program casualty of superagent Mike Ovitz's television group shutting down. The WB will show reruns of Ripley's Believe It or Not. Lost in the U.S.A. was to be a reality-adventure series involving a cross-country race among four teams of contestants. Production had begun, but the producers had not selected all the contestants.

Music notes

Severe bronchitis forced Stevie Nicks to postpone two concerts while she gets treatment. The former Fleetwood Mac singer was to perform Tuesday and Wednesday in Los Angeles. Nicks, 53, will have tests and treatment in Los Angeles and hopes to return for a Las Vegas concert Saturday, her publicist, Liz Rosenberg, said. . . . An overture to Shakespeare's Macbeth, pieced together from sketches and another work left by Ludwig van Beethoven, will get its first performance Sept. 20 by the National Symphony Orchestra. . . . Finnish conductor Leif Segerstam will lead the Detroit Symphony Orchestra on its European tour as Neeme Jarvi continues to recover from surgery for a burst blood vessel.

People

French film star Jean-Paul Belmondo, 68, was discharged from Paris hospital after making a "remarkable" recovery from a stroke he suffered two weeks ago, the hospital said in a brief statement. . . . Tony Danza will be the sole host of this year's Miss America Pageant, Sept. 22 on ABC. Danza replaces Donny and Marie Osmond, co-hosts the past two years.

'Music Man' trouble

The non-union touring production of the Broadway revival of The Music Man, set to launch in October in Des Moines, Iowa, and cover 20 cities in 10 months, is catching on with local presenters and causing major consternation at Actors Equity -- so much so that the actors union is urging theatergoers to boycott the show.

The attempted boycott, which has been endorsed by the AFL-CIO and the unions representing film, TV and radio actors, will include tactics such as pamphlets and picket lines at theaters wherever the tour goes. The musical plays the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center in January.

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