People talk 12/2/02

Bennett: San Francisco gets plenty of respect

SAN FRANCISCO -- Tony Bennett never expected his signature "I Left My Heart in San Francisco" would be so popular.

"They love it everywhere," Bennett told the San Francisco Chronicle. "You'd be surprised how much they respect that city. I get it everywhere in the world, England, Paris, wherever I play. Internationally, it's the most respected city in America."

Bennett, 76, added it to his act for a show at the city's Fairmont Hotel in 1962, eight years after it was written.

A two-hour special of a show Bennett recently performed at the hotel to commemorate that night was featured on PBS' Sunday schedule.

J. Lo saves the day in new video game

NEW YORK -- Mr. and Ms. Pac-Man, Super Mario and the princess, and ... Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck?

Director Kevin Smith is giving the newly engaged couple a custom-made video game to thank them for costarring in his recently wrapped movie "Jersey Girl," according to the New York Post.

The game, "Jen Saves Ben," features an animated Lopez who must find and rescue Affleck, who has been kidnapped and chained to a warehouse wall.

"J. Lo has to get him back but doesn't know where he's gone," said Brad Graeber of Texas-based Powerhouse Animation Studios, the company that created the game.

As she karate-kicks her way through the game, Lopez must face an animated Smith, who totes a ray-gun, and an evil-robot Matt Damon.

She gets three tries to save her fiance without being killed, and if she succeeds the pair is shown kissing.

The game, modeled after a classic 1980s arcade game, plays a soundtrack of Lopez's music.

Shania Twain may make history -- again

PARIS -- Shania Twain, possibly on her way to becoming the first female singer with three 10 million-selling albums, can afford to be a little contradictory.

"I never burned to perform, and I don't care if I ever perform again," Twain said in a Time magazine interview on newsstands Monday. "I have no need to do that."

A few hours after that October statement, the 37-year-old Canadian was singing her signature ballad, "You're Still the One," with an aspiring singer on "Star Academy," a French reality game show in which amateur singers share a house and vote each other out on the basis of their musical progress.

Twain's pop-country "Come on Over," released in 1997, sold 19 million copies to become the most popular album by a female singer in American history.

Twain and Whitney Houston are the only women to have two albums sell more than 10 million copies each. And Twain's newest album, "Up!" released Nov. 19, sold 874,000 copies in its first week, giving her a good head start toward reaching eight digits for a third time.

'Magic' will speak to Drake students on AIDS

DES MOINES, Iowa -- Basketball Hall of Famer Earvin "Magic" Johnson will speak to Drake University students about living with AIDS. Johnson will speak Tuesday night at Drake University's Knapp Center. The school handed out 4,000 tickets.

"He is probably one of the most prominent individuals who are out there and are speaking on the topic," said Herschel Jackson, the university's director of student activities at Drake.

Johnson helped the Los Angeles Lakers win five championships in his NBA career, which ended in 1991, when he announced he was HIV positive.

Since then he has built an extensive business empire including movie theaters, restaurants, shopping centers and a bank.-- From wire services

Bo Derek, animal- rescue group at odds

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. -- An animal-rights group claims Bo Derek deserves less than a perfect "10" for canceling a speaking engagement at a fund-raising gala less than two weeks after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Pennsylvania-based Mainline Rescue Inc. says it paid the actress a $15,000 advance appearance fee plus $6,402 for two first-class plane tickets for its Sept. 22, 2001, event in Malvern, Pa.

After repeated attempts to reschedule, the charity asked for the money back, but Derek balked, the group claims.

In a lawsuit filed in November, the group says Derek responded that she had already pledged the $15,000 fee to another charity.

"We did explain to her that we needed the money for food and to heat the kennels but it didn't make any difference to her," said William Smith, founder of Mainline Rescue, which places abused animals with new owners.

Derek, who sells a line of pet grooming products and resides in Santa Ynez, could not be reached Sunday through her talent agency or a message left with her sister. In May, she issued a statement saying the group declined her offer to return the money in hopes of scheduling another event.

-- From wire services

Derek's movies include "10" and "Tarzan, the Ape Man."