Believe Him, Buddy, You’re Going To Love It

Eddie Murphy has had his big-screen hits, such as “Beverly Hills Cop” and “48HRS.”

He’s had his misses - “Harlem Nights,” “Boomerang,” “The Distinguished Gentleman.”

And he never knows quite what to expect.

“I’ve had movies that I thought, ‘Oh! This is it! This is going to be the one! They’re going to line up around the block to see this!” Murphy, now starring in “Vampire in Brooklyn,” told the “Extra” TV show. “And it comes out and I’m like, ‘They didn’t like that?”’

For what it’s worth, he predicts a hit with his remake of the 1963 Jerry Lewis comedy “The Nutty Professor,” which will be released next summer.

“It’s really a funny picture,” Murphy says. “I can’t wait for Jerry Lewis to see this. He’ll be pleased with it.”

Loose talk

Critic Anthony Lane, on “The Scarlet Letter” (in The New Yorker): “What is the point of Demi Moore? … (the) film is, in the words of the opening credits, ‘freely adapted from the novel by Nathaniel Hawthorne’ in the same way that methane is freely adapted from cows.”

Getting too old to party? Oh, no, no, Nanette!

Nanette Fabray turns 75 today.

It goes well with her distinguished cross

Sultry Sharon Stone has joined the aforementioned Mr. Lewis as a recipient of France’s highest award for artistic merit, the medal of the Chevalier of Arts and Letters. Recalling her role in “Basic Instinct,” the French minister of culture told Stone: “Your game, your presence, your physique, troubling and captivating, have given you a special place in our cinema fantasyland.”

Joe’s just sitting on the top of his pay

“Basic Instinct” screenwriter Joe Eszterhas, who also penned the scripts for “Showgirls” and “Jade,” will receive a whopping $2.5 million from Universal for “Blaze of Glory,” about the relationship between soul singer Otis Redding and his manager.

So she’s, what, getting a graduate degree?

Entertainment Weekly reports that Sidney Poitier will star in a CBS sequel of “To Sir, With Love,” this time set in a tough Chicago school. And while they’re also looking for British singer Lulu to reprise her role as Poitier’s favorite student, the producer assures: “There won’t be a rap version of ‘To Sir, With Love.”’

Suppose they can get Kato to play himself?

Elsewhere in movieland, George Clooney, the hunky heartthrob of television’s “ER,” has signed a $3 million deal to play the title role in the upcoming film version of “The Green Hornet.”

At least Hugh understands the comedy part

And Hugh Grant is interested in portraying Nick Leeson, the freewheeling trader who faces forgery and fraud charges in the billion-dollar Barings Bank collapse, in a proposed cinema rendition. Sir David Frost, who hopes to produce the film, called it “a modern morality tale” that would have “flashes of comedy.”

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: 2 Color photos

The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Compiled by staff writer Rick Bonino