By Belinda Luscombe

THAT SCHEDULE IS PRETTY, BABY

So, there's this sitcom that requires a lot of physical comedy and is going to get the most coveted time slot on TV, between Seinfeld and ER. Who could be the star? The answer is BROOKE SHIELDS. Really. While the choice of Suddenly Susan, her first foray into series television, may surprise some, Shields sees it as part of personal growth. "Comedy's very liberating," she says. "It allows you to be less self-conscious and less pristine." The show, about a newly single woman who edits romance novels, debuts in the fall. Shields, of course, is engaged to marry Andre Agassi. She won't say when. Perhaps just before the fall?

PRIMA TIME

For some, age is the advent of the encores. At 70, Russian ballerina MAYA PLISETSKAYA is still dancing (she just performed in New York City; next she's off to Spain). Age has dulled the athleticism that made her one of the Bolshoi's biggest draws (she liked to tap her head with her foot in mid-leap), but she's irrepressible. Plisetskaya told the New York Times, "I still feel the magic. If I have no more interest in dancing, I'll stop."

SEEN & HEARD

Celebrity news' loss is elevator music's gain. John Tesh, whose Rushmore jaw brought gravity to thousands of fluffy stories on Entertainment Tonight, is leaving the show to join an industry he covered. He wants to devote himself full time to composing and playing his bewilderingly popular style of New Age music. His concert tour starts June 14.

When Antonio Banderas and Melanie Griffith fell in love, they demonstrated their affection in ways few could miss. The pregnancy that soon followed made news as well. But the heretofore frenetically expressive couple were married last week in a very private ceremony in London. After all, one ought to maintain some sense of decorum.

HANKS FOR THE MEMORIES

TOM HANKS is too golly-gosh ever to be mistaken for Orson Welles, but he may nevertheless inherit the mantle. Having got a lock on decent-guy-in-difficult-circumstances roles, Hanks is taking a stab at writing, directing and starring in his own movie. He's wrapping That Thing You Do, with (clockwise from top left) ETHAN EMBRY, STEVE ZAHN, TOM EVERETT SCOTT, LIV TYLER and JOHNATHON SCHAECH, the story of a rock band in 1964. (You were perhaps expecting vampires and crack?) "There was a lack of cynicism," says Hanks of that era. "In 1964, everybody still believed in the carousel of progress." Directing has given Hanks a new appreciation for acting. "If you squint your eyes as an actor, it looks like you're on vacation. You're in a trailer, people bring you food any time you want it and you lollygag your way to work." On the other hand, "directing is the hardest work you could possibly imagine." As for the Orson Welles model, he says, "Actually, I'm the new Orson Bean."