ANGELOU'S NOT WORRIED ABOUT FILM'S WHITE WRITER
Poet Maya Angelou, who directed the upcoming film "Down in the Delta," says some people had qualms about the project because the film was written by a white Southerner."One of the actors said to me, 'I don't like this white boy because he doesn't know our culture,' " Angelou, who is black, told the Los Angeles Times. "I said, 'Don't worry about it -- I know our culture.' "
Angelou said she worked so well with Georgia-born Myron Goble that she wants him to write her next film, an adaptation of James Baldwin's play "The Amen Corner."
Angelou has directed short features and documentaries for TV, but this is her first time at the helm of a big-screen film.
Due out at Christmas, "Down in the Delta" stars Alfre Woodard as a Chicago mother who rediscovers her roots in the South.
N.Y. MAYOR THINKS ANNAN HAD A 'KNEE-JERK' REACTION
New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani says he is offended by U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan's criticism of Donald Trump's plans for a skyscraper near the United Nations.
"That was sort of a knee-jerk reaction to criticize the city," Giuliani was quoted as saying in the Daily News. "I would suspect that if I had a knee-jerk reaction just to criticize the U.N. without checking, he would be offended by that."
Giuliani's comment came after Annan was quoted as saying that Trump's planned 72-story apartment tower would cast a "colossal shadow" over the East Side of Manhattan.
"As someone who lives and works in the neighborhood, he's concerned that the building might be out of scale," Annan spokesman Fred Eckhard said.
The mayor said he was most angered that Annan "never bothered to check" how the city approves skyscrapers before making his comments.
WONDER GATHERING HONORS FOR HUMANITARIAN EFFORTS
Stevie Wonder is gathering honors for his humanitarian work.
Rutgers University announced Friday that it will confer an honorary doctor of fine arts degree on the singer-songwriter in May, and he is to receive the MusiCares Award as 1999 Person of the Year at February's Grammy Awards.
Wonder "is deeply committed to humanitarian causes and, through his music and activism, works toward peace, respect and understanding," the university said in a statement.
Wonder recently performed a concert in Italy to benefit children maimed in war.