PASSAGES: Talk Dies, An Olympic Sting

By Stephen M. Silverman

01/22/2002 at 12:23 PM EST

SILENCED: Talk magazine, the general-interest monthly launched two years ago by former Vanity Fair and The New Yorker editor Tina Brown, 48, ceased publication on Friday, as it was preparing to ship its March issue, "our best ever," Brown said on Monday morning's "Today" show. She said ad projections for the year made continuation impossible, and admitted that the magazine's star-studded launch party (everyone from Madonna to the Clintons gathered on Liberty Island in New York Harbor for the first issue's debut) "may have been too big of a bang" . . . DIED: Actress and writer Carrie Hamilton, 38, the daughter of Carol Burnett and the late Joe Hamilton (who produced 1967-'79's "The Carol Burnett Show"), succumbed on Sunday to lung cancer that had spread to her brain. Hamilton, who had struggled with drug addiction, and her mom, 68, recently had collaborated on a stage adaptation of Burnett's best-selling 1986 memoir, "One More Time." The show, called "Hollywood Arms," is still due to premiere in Chicago in April . . . NAMED: Scheduled to appear at the upcoming opening ceremony of the Olympic games in Salt Lake City on Feb. 8 will include Sting and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, reports The Washington Post. Others set to perform: the Dixie Chicks, LeAnn Rimes, Robbie Robertson and cellist Yo-Yo Ma. Go, Yo . . . RECOVERED: Conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh, 51, told his radio audience Monday that an ear implant, put in last Thursday, has partially restored his hearing. The host, who is said to have 20 milion listeners per week, went deaf last year due to an autoimmune inner-ear disease. As he was quoted by Reuters, "You adapt to it, as you have no choice, but you ought to try it."