We hear about 30 University of Illinois journalism students who already had been excused from class jumped at the chance to help with duties surrounding President Clinton’s speech Wednesday in the Assembly Hall on the Champaign-Urbana campus. Guess the chance to be where the action is outweighs the bad publicity out of the White House. This will be Clinton’s first non-Beltway appearance following his State of the Union address.
Vice President Al Gore will accompany the prez. U.S. Sen. Carol Moseley-Braun also is still scheduled to appear with Clinton at the university since his topic–education–is one of her pet projects. We’re told her appearance is subject to change if “a Senate vote comes up.”
She’s gone: Speaking of change for Moseley-Braun, Lisa Cutler, the senator’s campaign director since November, has quit and returned to the East Coast. Mike Briggs, a Moseley-Braun spokesman, said Cutler left for personal reasons. A Tuesday meeting is set to talk about a replacement. INC. knew Lisa might be temporary. When we asked for a card a few weeks ago, we got one with her name handwritten.
Satire fire: “Everyone wants the monologues faxed,” an exasperated source at NBC’s “Tonight Show” told us. And as far as we know, the requests have been coming from media types and not the White House–though considering the one-two punches Jay Leno’s been delivering, one wouldn’t be surprised.
With David Letterman on vacation, Leno’s been the first nighttime wit on TV with a take on the day’s events (unless you consider “Nightline” host Ted Koppel’s pained intro to a discussion of adultery.) We hear Leno says he “can’t remember anything like this . . . except maybe the O.J. trial.”
Say good night: Figure Vic Damone is on the White House enemy list. We hear the singer, performing at New York’s Carnegie Hall over the weekend, dedicated his final song “to Bill and Hillary” before launching into “An Affair To Remember.”
Star tracks: Organizers have fingers crossed that Barbara Bain (“Mission: Impossible”) who founded the volunteer reading program called Book PALS (Performing Artists for Literacy in Schools) will join CBS’ “Early Edition” stars Kyle Chandler, Fisher Stevens and Shanesia Davis-Williams when the trio launches a Book PALS here with a reading at Jungman Elementary School next month.
Pol watch: Michael Broderick, a deputy commissioner in City Hall for general services, is John Stroger’s campaign manager for re-election as Cook County Board prez. . . . Carolyn Naselli will withdraw from the Cook County treasurer’s race and endorse rival Dem candidate Maria Pappas. . . . Battle for the burbs: Illinois GOP comptroller candidate Harry Seigle swamped Chris Lauzen with a 25-1 vote for the Riverside Township endorsement.
Foreign affairs: We expect Gov. Jim Edgar’s State of the State address Wednesday to have references to Asia because of his visit to India, Singapore and Hong Kong, where his trade mission with state Sen. Kirk Dillard and 20 others crossed paths several times with other VIPs, among them, U.S. Defense Secretary William Cohen, Jeanne Kirkpatrick and Henry Kissinger.
On the mend: The Queen Mother, Queen Elizabeth II’s widely loved 97-year-old mother, underwent hip replacement surgery after a fall Sunday, and on Monday Buckingham Palace called the operation a success.
Passages: Tuesday birthdays: Troy Donahue, 62; Bridget Fonda, 34; Skitch Henderson, 80; Mimi Rogers, 42; Eric Ferguson, 31.
Eat beat: Here’s another old astronaut getting ready for a launch. Jim Lovell and son/executive chef Jay plan a ceremonial ground-breaking Friday for the upscale eatery on Waukegan Road that they’re calling the Lovell Lake Forest Inn and filling with Apollo 13 memorabilia.
