MOVIESFellini Suffers Stroke: Celebrated Italian film director...

MOVIES

Fellini Suffers Stroke: Celebrated Italian film director Federico Fellini was in guarded condition in a hospital in Rimini, Italy, Tuesday after suffering a stroke. He is 73. Dr. Massimo Pieratelli, who is treating Fellini, said that the director “is currently partially paralyzed in his left leg and left arm,� but that “there is absolutely no (threat) of Fellini’s life being at risk.� He said Fellini, who underwent an operation on his aorta earlier this year, was in good spirits and able to talk to doctors. The director received a special Oscar for lifelong achievement last March.

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Miramax Battles Ban: Miramax Films co-chairmen Harvey and Bob Weinstein have vowed to work to overturn a Chinese ban against “Farewell My Concubine,� the 1993 Cannes Film Festival winner scheduled for U.S. release by Miramax this fall. Calling the government ban “blatant suppression of artistic freedom� and noting that it contradicts the country’s efforts to secure the 2000 Olympics under the slogan “A More Open China Awaits the 2000 Games,� the Weinsteins said that Chinese officials questioned the film’s depiction of prostitution in China, as well as scenes of political persecution during the Cultural Revolution.

TELEVISION

More on Marilyn, Bobby: Tonight’s “Marilyn & Bobby: Her Final Affair� on USA Network may not be the last Monroe/Kennedy movie. Thirty-one years after their purported hush-hush affair, Marilyn and Bobby are popping up all over town: Dino DeLaurentiis is developing Michael Korda’s Monroe-Kennedy opus, “The Immortals,� for a theatrical movie. HBO has a Bobby/Marilyn movie listed for development, which an HBO insider said would be produced by Marvin Worth (“Lenny�). And 20th Century Fox is reportedly preparing a movie based on the “Marilyn� biography by Donald Spoto. So why the interest? “Because of all the new information that’s come out,� said “Marilyn & Bobby� co-executive producer Jeffrey Auerbach. “The story of their relationship couldn’t have been broached before. And it barely can be told now. The Kennedy family is sure not to like it.�

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‘Sinbad’ in Trouble?: Fox has postponed the scheduled August premiere of its new “Sinbad� show starring the comedian of the same name. Instead of Aug. 26, the show will premiere Sept. 16 at 8:30 p.m. Fox officials said that after seeing the pilot, which was produced by Walt Disney Television, they decided that the show needed reworking. The show stars Sinbad as a swinging bachelor who becomes a foster parent to two children.

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‘MacGyver’ Bomb Charges: A French mother is suing the head of France’s state television, charging the network’s airing of the U.S. series “MacGyver� led her son to build a bomb that killed him. Marine Laine’s suit says her son Romain, 17, copied a technique used by the action hero, filling a bicycle handlebar with a lethal mixture of common ingredients. The device exploded, killing both the boy and a friend.

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Flight Talk: Americans truly like the way Oprah Winfrey talks. At least that’s what 2,000 folks asked who they’d most like to sit next to on a long airline flight said. Following Winfrey on the independent survey’s Top 10: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Ross Perot, Connie Chung, President Clinton, David Letterman, Dan Rather, Hillary Rodham Clinton, Madonna and Boris Yeltsin.

DANCE

Farrell Off Payroll: Suzanne Farrell, former principal dancer of New York City Ballet and the longtime muse of the late George Balanchine, will no longer receive a salary and health benefits from the company. A spokeswoman said Tuesday that fiscal pressures alone accounted for the decision, but New York dance circles are speculating about challenges to the authority of NYCB Ballet Master in Chief Peter Martins, Farrell’s frequent dance partner. Farrell, 47, joined the company in 1961 but had not held a specific position since her retirement in 1989.

QUICK TAKES

* Madonna is lining up other pop stars to join her on an HBO concert of Broadway songs that she will produce next spring. A spokeswoman said Rod Stewart hopes to sing a number from “My Fair Lady,� and the Material Girl herself is thinking about doing “I’m Just a Girl Who Can’t Say No� from “Oklahoma!� . . . Sidney Poitier, Della Reese, Danny Glover and Harry Belafonte were among those at Monday night’s opening of the weeklong National Black Theatre Festival in Winston-Salem, N.C. The event, billed as the world’s largest festival of black theater, features 30 black American theater companies in 82 performances. . . . Peter Gabriel’s tour bus rear-ended a dump truck on a Florida highway Monday, injuring six members of his entourage. Charges were pending against the bus driver. The singer was not on board.