People: Jan. 20, 1986

• Share

Her pals call her Fergie. But really, Princess Fergie will never do. Still, Sarah Ferguson, 26, is the latest lass to catch the fancy of Prince Andrew, 25, and this has Britons wondering whether Randy Andy is finally over Blue Koo Stark and is now serious about fairer Sarah. Friends whisper that he still carries a torch for the soft-porn film actress. Last week, however, the royal tittle-tattle was all about Ferguson's visit, at Queen Elizabeth's invitation, to Sandringham for a week-long New Year's house party. She was first spotted with Andrew last June at Ascot, and they have been known to make the London nightclub scene together. The Queen and Prince Philip are reportedly delighted that their second son is dating a proper Sloane Ranger and member of the British upper classes. But will all that royal family pressure back the single-minded Andrew off?

"They don't like you," Anglican Bishop Desmond Tutu told demonstrators outside the South African embassy in Washington. "They say you are Communist inspired. That means you are effective." The Nobel Peace prizewinner was starting a three-week, coast-to-coast tour of the U.S. to raise money, and it was only natural that he should join the demo, which has been going on intermittently for more than a year and on this day featured the singing of the folk group Peter, Paul and Mary. The rally left Tutu in obvious good spirits. "We will be free. There's no doubt about that. We don't say if," he added. "We say when, when, when."

The film might have been retitled Too Hot to Handle. In 1984, three days before British Director Adrian Lyne (Flash-dance) was scheduled to start 9½ Weeks, its original backer, Tri-Star Pictures, decided to pass. Eventually, MGM/UA took a chance, despite rumors that some kinky scenes of the obsessive love affair between Kim Basinger and Mickey Rourke would mean an X rating. But last week word came that 9½ Weeks will hit theaters in February. Will the final edited R version live up to the flick's overheated reputation? Well, it seems that Lyne's cooler instincts prevailed. "I wasn't anxious to make an art film to be seen by 15 people in Greenwich Village," he says. "I wanted to get the couple in Ohio who will argue about the picture on the way home." For sophisticated world travelers, though, there is talk that the European version will be a tad more explicit.

He was a terror on the basketball court, but these days Wilt Chamberlain is something of a pussycat. The onetime N.B.A. champion has joined 13 other celebrities--including former President Jimmy Carter, Elizabeth Taylor and Ray Bradbury--who allowed their tabbies to pose for the 1986 Purina Cat Chow Celebrity Cat Calendar in exchange for a donation to the charity of their choice. "They are my kids," says Chamberlain of Zip and Zap, his two domestic short-hair kittens. "They give one a feeling of calmness." Then he meows, "Maybe Patrick Ewing should get a cat."