People

By Josh Tyrangiel

TRYIN' TO THROW HIS ARMS AROUND THE WORLD

Harvard students are notoriously insecure about their alma mater. Ask where they go to school, and they'll usually respond, "In Boston." Follow up with "Where in Boston?" and they sheepishly admit, "Uh, Harvard." But for one shining moment last week, Harvard had reason to be proud, as BONO gave the school's class-day address. "My name is Bono, and I am a rock star," he announced to a crowd of 15,000 (including Al Gore), who giddily bathed in his mojo. The 20-minute speech mixed star anecdotes with stories from Bono's Third World debt-relief tour, which he described as "a surreal crossover act, a rock star, a Kennedy and a noted economist crisscrossing the globe like the Partridge Family on psychotropic drugs." By the time Bono called incoming Harvard President Lawrence Summers a "nutcase and a freak"--he meant it as a compliment--many students were chanting and exhibiting signs of deep Elvis, proving you can bring cool to Harvard, but nothing can make Harvard cool.

Plinko Forever!

BOB BARKER celebrated his 30th anniversary as host of The Price is Right last week by signing a five-year contract extension. "I signed a five-year contract last time, and I didn't think I'd finish it," says Barker. "My brother said, 'By the time you finish this one, you'll be 104!'" Barker, actually 77, is still taping new shows four days a week, knocking down 86% of his putts in the Golf Game and rooking poor innocents on the infernal Plinko board. "That's not true. Yesterday I had the all-time winner on Plinko--won $23,000. Plinko can be pretty expensive, though no one's ever won $50,000. If they did, of course, that would mean bankruptcy." He also remains an eager participant in the recruitment and hiring of the show's spokesmodels, known as Barker's Beauties. (Two were hired last week, presumably as an anniversary present.) "Oh, I take an active role in hiring. I wasn't gonna let anyone else have all the fun." That's in the contract, right? "In large print."

WHO'S AFRAID OF NICOLE KIDMAN?

Zelda Fitzgerald may have aced her on the flat-out-crazy part, but few literary women of the 1920s were as miserable as Virginia Woolf, who ultimately drowned herself to get rid of the voices in her head. That doesn't bother NICOLE KIDMAN, who has donned loads of makeup and a dour countenance to play Woolf in an adaptation of Michael Cunningham's The Hours, due out at the end of the year. "I'm having a lot of fun," says Kidman. "The theme of The Hours is the way in which Woolf's writing Mrs. Dalloway affects other women in other time periods, and as an actor playing her, it's kind of affected me in the same way. I'm not contemplating suicide, though," she adds in a reference to any recent news you may have heard about her personal life. "It's not that serious." The Hours co-stars Julianne Moore and Meryl Streep, though the three actresses never appear in the same scene. That doesn't stop Kidman from espousing proper Streep reverence: "Just to be in a movie with Meryl Streep is a lifelong dream."

Two Ladies From Verona

At least boxing is consistent. The men's version is fraught with sleaze, and--hey! so is the women's. LAILA ALI, 23, scored a majority decision over JACQUI FRAZIER-LYDE, 39, last Friday night in Verona, N.Y., in what was billed as the next chapter in the Muhammad Ali-Joe Frazier feud but was actually a fight between two women who are very bad at boxing. True, both fighters came in undefeated: Ali had crushed 48-year-old grandmother Marjorie Jones; Frazier-Lyde had whupped a 19-year-old who turned tail when she saw Frazier charging. The fighters exchanged violent blows, but the night's big thrill came when Smokin' Joe arrived to give his defeated daughter a hug. Muhammad Ali had a previous commitment to attend something classier--a NASCAR event.