Take One

Joan Collins, who threatened to leave Dynasty during a salary dispute last summer, is again saying the Carrington clan may have to learn to live without Alexis. “I have one season left,” says Joan, still miffed that Dynasty overseer Aaron Spelling refused to give her a raise from a reported $50,000 per show. “After that I think I will want to produce.” Having worked behind the scenes on Sins (her CBS miniseries which will air in February), Joan says, “I think I’m a damn good producer, actually…if I have a lot of help.”

Maybe Joan the producer will hire Linda Evans, who apparently is having a rough time on the Dynasty set. First, Linda’s character, Krystle, was taken hostage (it was Alexis who was supposed to be kidnapped, but when Collins boycotted the set during the salary dispute the script was rewritten). Now, it seems, Krystle will be kidnapped again. Evans, shooting physically grueling scenes that take place during her captivity, is said to have burst into tears after one take and said, “You may as well kill off Krystle.” A portent of plot twists to come?

Joan probably wouldn’t want to hire Antoinette Giancana, the 50-year-old daughter of the late mobster Sam Giancana. Antoinette makes a cameo appearance in the coming NBC movie version of her 1984 autobiography, Mafia Princess. The small part was offered after a dispute with the producers, whom Giancana claims reneged on an agreement that would have made her a star. “Who better to play me?” demanded Antoinette. “Susan Lucci,” answered the producers, who had already cast the soap opera actress. Giancana threatened to go to court, but she calmed down after she was given a walk-on part as a guest at the Mafia princess’ First Communion. Still, she declared, “I’ve been shafted by Hollywood rat finks. My public wants to see me.”

Cindy Pickett, who sported a modest ’60s bob through most of ABC’s now defunct series Call to Glory, is changing her hair style, not to mention her image. In the black comedy film Men’s Club, co-starring Roy Scheider, Stockard Channing and Treat Williams, Pickett plays a disturbed platinum blonde. And it’s goodbye to Glory’s “pointy bras,” says Pickett. In one scene I wear nothing but pearls, shoes and earrings.”

Sophia Loren, who begins shooting for a feature film called Leaving Home with 12-year-old son Edoardo later this month, plans to film another movie in New York next spring, followed by a four-hour TV mini-series….

“Better a good commercial than a bad movie,” declares Peter Falk, who became the TV pitchman for an Italian workers’ co-operative supermarket chain. His fee: a very bourgeois $370,000. Why did he take the part? Concedes Falk, “I don’t have boats. I don’t have airplanes. But I do have a beautiful house, and the money is useful.”

Promotional copies of the new Miami Vice LP, featuring songs by Tina Turner, Glenn Frey and Phil Collins, got MCA Records of Canada in trouble with Canadian authorities. Attached to the album, which was sent to Canadian deejays, was a plastic bag containing a white powder. Nothing illegal—just a few grams of sugar. MCA was told to cease and desist. It did and so ended what could have been the first episode of Toronto Vice.

Joel Grey expects to reprise his Tony-winning role in a special Broadway run of Cabaret next year, in honor of the show’s 20th anniversary. Producers reportedly are talking to Twiggy about playing Sally Bowles, whom Liza Minnelli immortalized in the movie….

The new video version of rocker Jeff Beck’s newest single, Ambitious, features a mass audition of would-be video rockers. Among the lineup of supposed unknowns, expect to see Donny Osmond, Abby (Falcon Crest) Dalton, former Trapper John, M.D. star Christopher Norris, Herve (Fantasy Island) Villechaize and Herb Alpert.