People

By Michele Orecklin

PRODIGAL PRINCE

No wonder Queen Elizabeth II has commissioned four photographic self-portraits to celebrate her golden anniversary as Britain's monarch; the picture of her scandal-plagued family, after all, isn't getting any prettier. Already viewed as somewhat of a rambunctious royal, PRINCE HARRY reportedly had a marijuana and alcohol problem. Last summer, according to the News of the World tabloid, Prince Charles ordered his younger son to spend a day with hardcore heroin addicts at a South London rehab center. It apparently was a ploy to scare the then 16-year-old Eton student straight; sources at St. James's Palace say it worked and that Harry had experimented with drugs only a few times. But the hard-partying prince also reportedly spent too many late summer nights downing pints at a pub near his dad's country home. So, over the recent Christmas break, Harry had to spend all his time with, you guessed it, his family.

AT LEAST THEY DIDN'T CALL HER PERKY

The furor over an ad on CNN suggests that sex cannot, after all, sell everything. Faced with the star power of morning news anchors Katie Couric on Today and Diane Sawyer on Good Morning America, CNN's promotions department went a different route in touting PAULA ZAHN, the new anchor of its own a.m. show. In a spot that aired on the network several times on Jan. 5 and 6, a male voice described Zahn as "provocative, supersmart and, oh yeah, just a little sexy." The last word seemed to be accompanied by the sound of a zipper. News executives said no one on their side had been consulted, nor had Zahn herself. The ad was pulled first thing Monday. Calling the ad a "major blunder," CNN chairman Walter Isaacson said in a statement, "I am outraged, and so is Paula, who has spent more than 20 years proving her credibility day in and day out on the air." Still unexplained is how the network managed to overlook the erotic appeal of Lou Dobbs.

STILL QUEEN

Before she died in a plane crash last August at the age of 22, R.-and-B. singer AALIYAH had already finished shooting her title role as a vampire in a movie version of the Anne Rice novel Queen of the Damned. Some of her lines, however, required further work. The dubbing was due to be completed in postproduction, and as first reported on TIME.com producers decided to keep the role in the family: her lines were provided by her brother Rashad, a musician whose smooth voice resembles his late sister's. As the recently awakened 6,000-year-old mother of all vampires, Aaliyah's character is supposed to sound otherworldly. That makes the introduction of a more masculine voice plausible, according to the studio, which plans to mix the two voices for the final film, set for release in February. Aaliyah (seen in a costume from Queen of the Damned) is being remembered in other ways as well. At last week's American Music Awards, she won two posthumous honors: one for favorite soul/R.-and-B. singer and one for favorite soul/R.-and-B. album.

ACTING OUT

With former President Jimmy Carter apparently unavailable, it fell to former Wonder Years actor Fred Savage to sort out the muddle over a hotly contested election. Savage headed a five-person panel that last week invalidated the November vote that thrust MELISSA GILBERT, left, star of Little House on the Prairie, into the presidency of the Screen Actors Guild. She won the post by more than 1,500 votes after a bitter, mudslinging campaign against VALERIE HARPER, of Rhoda fame. Allegations of ballot impropriety--including the fact that New York SAG members had two extra days to vote and their ballots did not include a signature line--prompted the call for the union to recast its votes in April. Gilbert will retain her post until then. Any more trouble and we're calling the folks from Law & Order.