ACTOR'S PROBATION REVOKED OVER DRUG TEST

Actor's probationrevoked over drug test
LOS ANGELES -- Actor Tom Sizemore's probation in a domestic abuse case involving former Hollywood madam Heidi Fleiss was revoked Thursday because he failed to complete a drug test.
The judge allowed Sizemore to remain free pending an evidence hearing Nov. 8.
Sizemore, 42, who has appeared in such films as "Black Hawk Down" and "Saving Private Ryan," was sentenced in October to six months in jail on misdemeanor charges of physically abusing Fleiss during their two-year relationship.
Authorities said Sizemore refused to provide a urine sample for a drug test at a probation office last month. "He simply walked out," prosecutor Robert Cha said.
Sizemore's attorney said the actor passed a test at his drug counselor's office that day, but he declined to take a test at the probation office because an officer he didn't recognize wanted to search him and he feared the results might be tampered with.
"I have every reason to believe him when he tells me that he is clean," attorney Michael Rovell said.
Authorities still are deciding whether to file charges against Sizemore in connection with his Aug. 11 arrest at his West Hollywood home, where police said they found drugs.
The drugs "belonged to somebody else and were planted," his attorney said. He did not elaborate.
Miss Universe issuddenly skirtless
SYDNEY, Australia -- Hundreds of people turned out to see Miss Universe strut her stuff on the catwalk. They weren't expecting to see this much of her.
Australian rugby league cheerleader Jennifer Hawkins, who was crowned Miss Universe earlier this year, was at a Sydney fashion show Thursday when a skirt she was wearing unraveled from around her waist and slipped to the floor.
As spectators gasped, 20-year-old Hawkins giggled and rushed backstage.
"I was walking along in a Bora dress and the bottom just came off," she said later in a television interview. "It was just a pity I wasn't wearing better panties."
New 'King Kong'adds depth to ape
WELLINGTON, New Zealand -- Peter Jackson first tried to film "King Kong" at 13, using a cardboard model of the Empire State Building, a bedsheet painted with a New York backdrop and his Super-8 camera.
Now 42 and with three Academy Awards to his credit, the director of the celebrated "Lord of the Rings" trilogy is ready to shoot a star-studded, multimillion-dollar remake. The Universal Pictures movie is due for release in December 2005.
Among the major changes Jackson promises from the 1933 original -- which was remade the first time in 1976 -- will be greater character development, particularly for Kong.
"He's a very old gorilla and he's never felt a single bit of empathy for another living creature," Jackson said.
So a lot of thought has gone into exploring what would happen if there were a relationship between an old, brutalized gorilla and a young woman.
"You introduce this other person into his life which initially he thinks he's going to kill and then he slowly moves away from that and it comes full circle," he said. "That's what we're exploring and its really fun to go into that psychological depth with it."
Today's birthdays
ABC Radio commentator Paul Harvey is 86. Actor-comedian Howard Morris is 85. Actress Mitzi Gaynor is 73. Singer Merald "Bubba" Knight (Gladys Knight & amp; The Pips) is 62. Actor-comedian Damon Wayans is 44. Singer Dan Miller ("Making the Band") is 24. Singer Beyonce Knowles is 23.
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