Love those legal mercenaries. The scene-New York`s acrid palimony trial between Sandra Jennings and actor William Hurt, who voluntarily pays $65,000 annually in child support for their son but refuses her demand for $5 million in alimony. Jennings` lawyer Richard Golub abruptly stops his onslaught of questions and complains that Hurt`s lawyers are ”interrupting my rhythm, and rhythm is everything.” The badgered actor, trying to score a point, says,
”Get your rhythm right.” Retorts Golub promptly: ”You got your rhythm right when you made Alex, didn`t you?”
NO GALLO`S HUMOR, PLEASE In California`s San Joaquin Valley, whining among the brothers Gallo finally may be at an end. A federal judge has ordered youngest brother Joseph, 70, to quit marketing ”Joseph Gallo Cheese” because it infringes on the trademark of his two winemaking brothers, Ernest, 80, and Julio, 79. Said the victors` lawyer: ”They never wanted to go after their brother.” But with a $1 billion empire at stake, there was no room for another big cheese.
FAME-IT`S ALL RELATIVE LaToya Jackson, apparently not satisfied with baring her relative charms for Playboy, is poised to profit anew from brother Michael`s fame. She has delivered the manuscript of ”LaToya: Growing Up in the Jackson Family” to Putnam publishers for January publication-supposedly much to her family`s regret. ”They tried to talk me out of writing the book, and when they couldn`t, they kept wanting to know what would be in it. They`ve really put a lot of pressure on me,” said LaToya, 32, claiming that her addition to celebrity literata will fill in Michael`s blanks-and, of course, boost her career as an aspiring celebrity.
NOTHING LITE ABOUT THIS After a six-year fight, harassed Vietnam veteran John Beverly of Waterloo, Wis., has been awarded $85,700 in worker`s compensation after judges expressed revulsion at unrelenting torment from coworkers at Milwaukee`s Miller Brewery Co. ”Such callous behavior is not merely reprehensible, but a disgrace,” said administrative law judges Randall Kaiser and Nancy Schneiders. What happened is that coworkers, upon learning that Beverly suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder (loud noises send him hurtling to the floor) decided to have ”fun” at his expense. Soon heavy equipment began dropping in his vicinity, along with popping beer bottles, milk cartons-even firecrackers in the company cafeteria. Seized by fear after months of torment, Beverly finally was hospitalized. The judges, rejecting brewery contentions that working conditions hadn`t worsened Beverly`s disorder, noted contrary testimony from six psychologists and psychiatrists, including one from the brewery. Said the judges: Beverly`s colleagues ”preyed upon this startle reaction apparently for amusement or perhaps outright cruelty.” Beverly, 42, has been unable to work since 1983.
JOYCE BROTHERS MOURNS ”God makes sure no tree ever reaches the sky,” said bereaving psychologist Joyce Brothers, writing in People that losing her husband of 39 years provides an unwelcome reminder that ”the point of love must be loss as well as love.” After husband Milton died of cancer last year, Brothers said, ”I understood what it meant to feel like nothing made a difference any more.” There even was a moment when she almost committed suicide. ”If I had known for sure that I would have killed myself, I might have done it, but I wasn`t sure I wouldn`t spend the rest of my life maimed.” Still struggling with widowhood, Brothers said she misses laughter and giggling. ”You miss that more than anything else. Sex is not something you miss. . . . ”