People in the News for August 15, 1997

Friday, Aug. 15, 1997 | 11:35 a.m.

A tearful model who says she was engaged to millionaire playboy Dodi al Fayed before his reported fling with Princess Diana flashed a sapphire engagement ring Thursday and announced a lawsuit seeking $440,000, legal costs and other damages because he dumped her. Kelly Fisher, a tall, slender brunette with short, Princess Diana-style hair, dabbed her eyes throughout the Los Angeles news conference while her attorney, Gloria Allred, denounced Fayed, an international jet setter who produced "Chariots of Fire." Allred said Fayed "betrayed (Fisher) and has humiliated her in the eyes of her friends and family." The suit contends Fayed offered $500,000 to Fisher, who has appeared on the covers of Elle and W magazines, to shift her career and spend more time with him. In the meantime, wedding plans for Di and Dodi are not in the works, reports Britain's The Spectator. "It took her a long time to get out of a loveless marriage," columnist Taki Theodoracopulos wrote, "and she's not about to jump into another."

Do the sports thing

Spike Lee is used to directing celebrities. But for the filmmaker's latest project -- a 30-second commercial featuring "The Stars of Hockey" -- he oversaw a group of dancers dressed in giant yellow, star-shaped costumes that dance around the head of a hockey player who has just taken a hard hit on the ice. The commercial, which promotes the National Hockey League, will debut Sept. 22 on the Fox Sports Network. "I was intrigued by it," the 40-year-old Lee, who also directed "Do the Right Thing," told the Associated Press. "The challenge we will have in doing this campaign is to make the game more appealing to persons who are not hockey maniacs." Let's hope it works: He's already agreed to produce nine additional spots for the network.

And the winners are ...

Oprah Winfrey, who can turn a book into a best seller overnight, has made a list of the top 10 books that changed her life, including "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" and "In Cold Blood." Books became the talk show queen's passion and were her best friends during a difficult childhood, she says in the September issue of Life Magazine. "Reading and being a 'smart girl' was my only sense of value and the only time I felt loved." Winfrey, who started a book club on her show "to get this country reading again," also lists 'The Color Purple" and "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings" among her favorites.

Compiled by Lisa Ferguson

archive