People: Sep. 20, 1999

TWO FOR THE AGES

GREG SMITH is not a mama's boy. The freshman at Randolph-Macon College had a very sound reason for bringing both parents along on his first day of school: he's only 10 years old. The boy wonder was able to complete 10 school grades in three years. This is just as well, as his plans for the future include getting doctorates in political science and biomedical and aerospace engineering, curing cancer, colonizing space and, natch, becoming President of the U.S. The latter shouldn't be a problem as the young frosh has resolved not to let other students "bend [his] morals." While Smith was demonstrating wisdom beyond his years, MANNY HERSHKOWITZ was proving he was young at heart. The 82-year-old made his debut at the U.S. Open tennis championships in Forest Hills, N.Y.--as a ball boy. "I'm in good shape," he reports. "If they invite me back next year, I'll be here."

CLAWS TO MAKE MOM PROUD

Anne Rice's characters exhibit a curious understanding of the term bloodline, but the novelist has been a model, and mortal, parent. So says her son CHRIS RICE, who's entering the hair-raising world of publishing himself. Rice is among the "Hot Pop 30" profiled in Interview magazine's upcoming 30th anniversary issue, all of whom were captured by photographer-du-jour David LaChapelle. Rice began writing when Anne was hospitalized last December after being found to have diabetes. "I had to get my mind off Mom," he says. He showed his novel to his father, who told him, "This is going to change your life." It seems the transformation has already begun.

WILL SHE MAKE HOUSE CALLS?

A mysterious disease seems to have gripped ER. The show's cast keeps finding strange reasons to leave the top-rated series. First, Sherry Stringfield (Dr. Susan Lewis) quit acting for a "normal life." Then George Clooney (Dr. Doug Ross) checked out to make movies with Nicole Kidman and Jennifer Lopez. (O.K., that's not so strange.) Now GLORIA REUBEN, who plays ailing physician's assistant Jeanie Boulet, has declared she will be leaving after this season's first few episodes to hit the road as a backup singer and dancer for Tina Turner. Reuben, whose character usually ministers to patients with failing pulses, says she relishes the idea of playing before a live audience. "My entire reason for getting into the business was to make a mark in music," Reuben claims. "ER was a valuable, profitable sidetrack."

WHEN BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE BREAK UP

WHO: Mannequin CLAUDIA SCHIFFER and magician DAVID COPPERFIELD

WHEN: Earlier this month, after a six-year engagement

RELATIONSHIP'S LEGAL HIGHLIGHT: In 1997 Copperfield filed a $30 million lawsuit against a French magazine that had suggested the union was a fraud

FUTURE DATING PROSPECTS: She was spotted in Majorca with monied British art dealer Tim Jeffries; he was seen at Sean ("Puff Daddy") Combs' Labor Day party with a Chilean journalist said to be a Schiffer look-alike

THE GOOD NEWS: No more jokes about how his best trick was getting her to date him