It was clearly a rude homecoming for Amy Carter, 13. Returning from a vacation in the Virgin Islands ahead of her parents to start school, Amy and her Secret Service men seemed a-sea at the baggage conveyor in Atlanta's International Airport. As the terminal emptied out, it became clear that Amy's bag had been lost on the commercial flight. After four years away in Washington, was she happy to be going back to school in Plains? Replied Amy forlornly: "I don't know anyone there."
Hi, Mom!
Michael Brandon (né Feldman), now 35, left Brooklyn in his early 20s for L.A.—with two shopping bags for his belongings. Soon he was starring in movies like Lovers and Other Strangers and dating Kim Novak. Later he was married to Lindsay Wagner for 2½ years and starred in A Change of Seasons. But none of that stopped Michael's mother, Miriam, from firing off letters to Johnny Carson. Explains Brandon: "She wanted him to put me on the show so she could see that I was eating right."
New Heights
"Lots of nice things happen to us when we fall in love," observes Dr. Joyce Brothers. For one thing, she claims, "Love can make us up to two inches taller." It may be that love stimulates the pituitary gland to produce a surfeit of growth-inducing hormones, explains Dr. Brothers, citing medical research. But it must be true love, she warns would-be Goliaths: It's not possible to fool Mother Nature. "If you're playing Don Juan," she says, "the body knows it, and it doesn't work."
Street Theater
What does it take to lure sculptor Louise Nevelson, at 81 the grande dame of New York's art world, to a party? Years ago she spent evenings with avant-garde composer John Cage "listening to the banging of the water pipes" in his garret. More recently, after a macrobiotic dinner, Cage's roommate, choreographer Merce Cunningham, asked Nevelson to come watch the traffic outside their window. Nevelson accepted. After all, says Cunningham, "It's a lot more interesting than TV."
Foot Fetish
Lisa (Yanks) Eichorn was supposed to star with Gene Hackman in the upcoming comedy All Night Long—but she was abruptly replaced by Barbra Streisand. The other day Lisa spotted Streisand at L.A.'s Phanny's Fudge eatery and wanted to let her know there were no hard feelings. She told Barbra how much she admired her, etc., but never got to identify herself. Apparently thinking Eichorn was just another fan, Streisand reacted, the chagrined Lisa reports, "by going back to tying her shoes."
Furthermore
•When a Detroit sportswriter asked Joe Namath what other football players have become national sex symbols, Broadway Joe came up with Burt Reynolds. "I mean among pro players," said the writer. "What do you mean?" Namath replied. "They used to pay good at Florida State [where Reynolds played college ball]." "Just a joke," Joe added hastily.
•New York's Charles Hamilton gallery expects a canceled check for $50, signed by Ronald Reagan in 1948, to bring $2,000 at its March 5 auction. Why so much? It's made out to the liberal Americans for Democratic Action and, says Hamilton, "He wouldn't give them five cents now."
•Diane Ladd, who angrily pulled out of playing Belle on TV's Alice after 16 episodes, claims that she wasn't given enough lines. "I noticed I was being asked to carry the tray of instruments," she says, sounding like something out of M*A*S*H, "while other people got to do the surgery." Which is maybe another way of saying that she, the producers and star Linda Lavin didn't exactly keep each other in stitches.
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
