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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

The Camera Never Lies, But It Does Fib Just A Bit

Compiled By Staff Writer Dan Web

If you picked up a recent copy of the National Enquirer, you might have noticed that horrid photo of Liza Minnelli.

It was a perfect example, she says, of a picture beings worth a thousand…lies.

“Do you know that they took that awful picture they used of me in the Enquirer and ran it through a computer?” the 50-year-old entertainer told the Advocate magazine. “You know how they can make you look beautiful? They can do the exact opposite, too.”

Minnelli admits, though, that she hasn’t been at her best lately. And she includes a warning.

“A few people should look up the word ‘menopause,”’ she explained. “It gives you enormous mood swings, which nobody told me about.”

Loose talk

Howard Stern on the planned movie version of his book “Private Parts” (on TV’s Extra): “I am predicting this will be the biggest box-office gross of all time. It’ll gross everyone out.”

Somewhere, a girl named G-L-O-R-i-i-A is smiling

Van Morrison turns 51 today.

For this group, the situation is the same as it ever was

Talking Heads Jerry Harrison, Tina Weymouth and Chris Frantz are heading out on the road, but the group’s most visible member, David Byrne, is not. And he doesn’t think they should use the name without him. “Like it or not, the band was identified with my voice and my style. People will get confused,” Byrne told Time magazine.

R-E-S-P-E-C-T, and you can bet it wasn’t free

Just listen to the dress job that fashion designer Saul Bostwick did for Aretha Franklin so that she could attend President Clinton’s 50th-birthday party. “She wanted it strapless,” Bostwick told Newsweek magazine. “Do you know what an engineering feat that is?”

Of course, those may be the only movies she’s being offered

Here’s a quote to warm a movie producer’s heart. “I wasn’t afraid for my safety,” said actress Lara Flynn Boyle of the difficulties of filming in tough neighborhoods. “I’d rather take a bullet than not make a movie.”

They’re probably just good friends who love sunbathing

More on that Monaco royal item involving Princess Stephanie’s husband, former bodyguard Daniel Ducruet, and a naked woman at a French Riviera pool-side. The Italian magazines Eva Tremila and Gente identified the woman as 26-year-old Fili Houteman.

Might as well have reporters writing with quill pens

Even before it has aired, the CBS sitcom “Ink” has been pulled off the fall schedule. The show, produced by and starring marrieds Ted Danson and Mary Steenburgen, was set to premiere Monday, Sept. 16 at 8:30 p.m. The problem: Well, this is a show set in a New York newsroom in which reporters still use typewriters - whatever those are.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: 2 color photos

The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Compiled by staff writer Dan Webster