People: Feb. 17, 2003

THE KING OF POP ISN'T THRILLED

It's official: It's no longer fun to make fun of Michael Jackson. ABC's 20/20 aired a two-hour British documentary about Jackson last week depicting a bored, isolated neurotic who feeds his baby through a veil and who looks like a skull with a 5 o'clock shadow. It's enough to make you feel sorry for the guy, if it's possible to feel sorry for a zillionaire pop star who admits to having "slept in a bed" with minors. Jackson has filed a complaint with Britain's Broadcasting Standards Commission saying the film implies he is "guilty of inappropriate behavior with children." The winner in all this? ABC, which scored its highest Thursday-night ratings in six years.

SUPERHEROES WANTED

Even though Ben Affleck has donned Daredevil's horns, directors are finding it a slog to get A-list stars to play comic-book crusaders

Three actors have already played Batman in the movies. With Insomnia director Chris Nolan taking on the franchise, will Guy Pearce, star of Nolan's Memento, take the cape?

Brett Ratner, slated to direct the next Superman movie, is trying to coax Jude Law into taking the role. The sticking point? Law isn't sure he wants to sign on for three movies.

Ashley Judd used her exit claws, so Warner Bros. offered Catwoman's tights to Nicole Kidman, who, confusingly, played Batman's girlfriend two Bruce Waynes ago.

They Have Pop Tarts in Russia Too

Last week the teen pop duo t.A.T.u. hit No. 1 on the British singles chart, the first Russian band to do so, with the moody dance track All the Things She Said. Their gimmick? They're cute, they wear skimpy schoolgirl outfits, and they make out with each other. It's unclear whether Lena Katina, 18, left, and Julie Volkova, 17, are lesbians or just attention hungry, but nobody seems to care: the single has gone to No. 1 in Spain, Austria and Italy, and--don't look so superior--their album is swiftly moving up the Billboard charts in the U.S.

FROM BAD TO VERSE

The beloved American poet Sylvia Plath COMMITTED SUICIDE IN 1963 after her husband Ted Hughes left her for another woman. What better way to commemorate this tragedy than by cashing in with a movie starring Gwyneth Paltrow? But Plath's daughter Frieda Hughes is outraged by the film, Ted and Sylvia. She has refused to allow the movie to quote from Plath's poetry, and she has written a poem of her own about it: "The peanut eaters, entertained/At my mother's death, will go home,/Each carrying their memory of her,/Lifeless--a souvenir./Maybe they'll buy the video."