Basinger Instinct

By RICHARD CORLISS

Sam Goldwyn used to say that "a verbal agreement isn't worth the paper it's written on." Last week a Los Angeles jury found differently. It ruled that actress Kim Basinger (912 Weeks, Batman) had breached an oral contract when she backed out of a commitment to star in the film Boxing Helena, and ordered her to pay $8.9 million in damages to the producers, Main Line Pictures.

Hollywood was shocked by the price but not by the verdict. "This is an oral town," notes one veteran agent, "a town of relationships." You take a lunch, you shake a hand, you make a movie.

Boxing Helena is a thriller about a surgeon so obsessed with a woman that he amputates her limbs and puts her in a box. After Madonna backed out of the title role, director Jennifer Lynch discussed it with Basinger. Lynch assured the actress that the nude scenes would be tasteful: "I wanted to photograph her like a work of art."

Lynch never got to do that. Basinger exited, and Main Line's Carl Mazzocone had to return the $7.6 million raised on the star's name. Her replacement, Twin Peaks' Sherilyn Fenn, could lure only $2.7 million. "I'm not a $100 million corporation that they don't want to screw with," Mazzocone says. "I'm just a little independent." For now, he is a rich little independent.

Basinger's lawyer, Howard Weitzman, insists no deal was consummated. "When you want to do a project," he says, "the dance begins. The jury thought the dance was already over. But Kim and the producers had not settled on the pay- or-play part of the deal." If they didn't yet have to pay, why should she have had to play?

The immediate effect of the jury's decision will probably be more detailed memos and CYA (cover your ass) letters. "I'm going to be much more conscious of the words," says the veteran agent. " 'Love you, babe' will take on a new meaning."

With reporting by Janice C. Simpson/Los Angeles