People

Coppola8217;sdream

A jury awarded 20 million compensation to director Francis Ford Coppola in his lawsuit against Warner Brothers studio for thwarting his plans to make a live-action version of Pinocchio. The jury also said that Warner Brothers had acted 8220;with fraud and malice8221; when it claimed that it owned the rights to the film project. 8220;Needless to say, Mr Coppola is very gratified in being able to tell his story,8221; said Coppola8217;s lawyer Robert Chapman after hearing the verdict. 8220;The jury found that Warner Brothers interfered with his project and stopped him from making the film we all should have been allowed to see,8221; Chapman said. A Warner Brothers spokesman said the studio would appeal. 8220;Warner Brothers and Coppola8217;s representatives believed there was an agreement to develop Pinocchio, which Coppola unilaterally terminated despite having signed an employment agreement, having begun to work and having been paid,8221; said the spokesman. Coppola, who had asked for 23 million, accused the studio of stealinghis copyright to the script.

The lost ally

Trevor Rees-Jones, the sole survivor of the crash that killed Diana, Princess of Wales, has asked the French police to widen their inquiry into the role played in the accident by staff at the Ritz, the Paris hotel owned by his former employer, Mohamed Al Fayed. The formal request, which Rees-Jones is entitled to make as a civil plaintiff in the case, seems to signal a definitive break between the former bodyguard and Al Fayed, whose son Dodi was also killed in the August 31 crash, and could lead to a claim for criminal or civil liability against the hotel. Rees-Jones, aged 29, resigned from his job with the multi-millionaire Harrods owner in April, but has until now said nothing to contradict his former employer8217;s claim that the tragedy was caused by the behaviour of pursuing photographers rather than by the driving of Henri Paul, the Ritz deputy security chief who was drunk at the time. Rees-Jones8217;s French lawyer, Christian Curtil, said he had filed aformal request with the investigating magistrate in charge of the case, Herve Stephan, asking him to widen the probe of Ritz staff to shed more light on discrepancies in the evidence gathered.

Castro8217;s recipe

Cuban President Fidel Castro said on Thursday that socialism remains the only viable economic model in the world, but that armed struggle is not the way to achieve this. 8220;A change in the world can only be conceived of as a global change,8221; Castro told a group of Latin American economists at Economia 8217;98 in Havana. 8220;In this world, at this moment, there is no alternative model8221; to socialism. The Cuban leader also admitted to trying to foment armed revolution throughout Latin America during the 1960s. But he said the way to socialism in today8217;s world by taking advantage of economic crises. 8220;The number one weapon will be crises,8221; he said. During the turbulent years after Cuba8217;s revolution, Castro said his government had tried to stir up revolutions throughout the hemisphere with oneexception. 8220;The only place we didn8217;t try to foment revolution was Mexico,8221; he said. In the rest of Latin America, 8220;without exception, we tried,8221; Castro said.

Model child

Supermodel Christie Brinkley gave birth to a baby girl, publicist Fran Curtis said. Sailor Lee Brinkley Cook was born in New York, weighing 3.51 kg. The proud papa is architect Peter Cook. Brinkley, 43, has a three-year-old son, Jack, with ex-husband Richard Taubman, and a daughter, Alexa Ray, 12, from her marriage to pianoman Billy Joel.

The wedding8217;s on

Miss America 1997 Tara Dawn Holland says gossip that her wedding to US Representative Jon Christensen of Nebraska was off is merely a rumour. 8220;No cold feet, no questions,8221; said Holland, who said plans for the November 21 wedding are still on track. 8220;If they know us, they know that8217;s not even a question.8221; The wedding, which will be in her hometown of Mobile, Alabama, will be a small and private one for family and close friends. Exactly what they8217;ll be doingafterward isn8217;t clear, however, since Christensen lost his bid for the Republican gubernatorial nomination in May. He had given up his seat in the US House of Representatives to run for that office.

CNN unsupported

CNN television has retracted its controversial allegations that the US military used sarin nerve gas during a Vietnam war mission to kill American deserters hiding in Laos. CNN said its story about the Operation Tailwind mission, which appeared jointly on its new flagship programme and in Time magazine under the bylines of April Oliver and Peter Arnett, 8220;cannot be supported8221;, and offered a full apology to viewers. CNN8217;s retraction came after it hired a leading libel lawyer, Floyd Abrams, to investigate the sarin story. It was challenged by former military and government sources almost immediately after it was broadcast less than a month ago. CNN8217;s military consultant, Major-General Perry Smith, called the account 8220;sleazy journalism8221; and resigned. CNN was attacked by Vietnam veterans,many of whom pointed out that its owner, Ted Turner, is married to the anti-Vietnam war campaigner Jane Fonda. The volte-face will bring into question the positions of Oliver, the producer in charge of the investigation, and Puliter Prize-winner Arnett, who was the principal reporter.