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James Frey's Book Deal Disappears
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" Page Six reports that James Frey's new two-book deal just went up in smoke:

I-MADE-it-up memoirist James Frey's new megabucks book deal has exploded into a million little pieces. Frey had a deal with his current publisher, Penguin-owned imprint Riverhead, for two more books, which was inked just before it was scandalously revealed last month that Frey had fabricated much of his story. The reputed new seven-figure contract included Frey's "first" novel, a "multi-voiced, multi-threaded story of contemporary Los Angeles," slated for publication in fall 2007. But a publishing source told PAGE SIX's Jared Paul Stern that Riverhead decided the author was too much of a liability and has just nixed the deal after much discussion. "That is correct, and we have no comment," Frey's rep says. Earlier this month, Frey's literary agent Kassie Evashevski, who negotiated the deal, dropped him citing "broken trust." Meanwhile, Warner Bros. is re-evaluating its big screen adaptation of Frey's faux memoir A Million Little Pieces. But none of the negativity has had much impact on sales of the book, which recently hit the 3 million mark.

Dalia Gal claims in a lawsuit that Clark's book, "The Second Time Around," recycled the plot, key scenes and characters, and even character names from Gal's screenplay about intrigue in the drug industry. Gal's 2000 screenplay, "Immortalin," was widely circulated in Hollywood, the suit says. Clark's 2003 novel was a hardcover and paperback best seller for Simon & Schuster.

"The substantial similarities between the infringing work and Gal's screenplay are remarkable and can only be explained as a deliberate copying," the lawsuit charges, adding that both works spotlight "a single female journalist's investigation of an elaborate conspiracy plot between two rival pharmaceutical companies to create a miracle drug, [and] a scientist working on the miracle drug [who] disappears," while the scientist's "wife is having a secret relationship with the head of the rival pharmaceutical corporation, and plays a role in the conspiracy against her husband." Recently a federal judge refused to dismiss the suit.

"Before this lawsuit was filed, I had never heard of Ms. Gal and certainly never saw her screenplay," Clark told Lowdown. "Her allegations are blatant nonsense and patently untrue." Simon & Schuster's Adam Rothberg said: "We fully support our author."

But Gal ? whose new novel, "Adonis & Alizade," is a post-9/11 love story set in Manhattan ? is primed for battle. "You shouldn't mess with me or any Israeli," she told me from Tel Aviv. "We have to be tough, because life is tough here."

In addition to groundhogs and valentines, this month traditionally has brought a legal thriller from the hugely popular author. The lawyer-turned-writer has sold an eye-bulging 225 million copies of his books worldwide, thanks to the success of such blockbusters as The Firm, The Partner and The Last Juror.

But not this year. Instead, Grisham, who is not giving interviews these days, is working on his first book of non-fiction. It's still untitled and is expected to be released this fall, says his publisher, Stephen Rubin of Doubleday Broadway. "I have never seen him so happy writing something," Rubin says.

The book is about Ronald Keith Williamson, the second-round draft pick of the Oakland Athletics in 1971. He later was convicted of murder in his Oklahoma hometown, spent 12 years in prison and came within five days of being executed. He was exonerated by DNA evidence and released from prison in 1999. After struggling with psychiatric disorders, he died on Dec. 4, 2004.

The tragic tale has a lot of traditional Grisham elements: small-town Southern setting, a guy wronged, a murder, a trial, imprisonment, exoneration and baseball. Grisham, who was born in Jonesboro, Ark., dreamed of becoming a pro baseball player before attending Mississippi State, then law school at the University of Mississippi.

Just in time for the final three episodes of "Friends," a California appeals court this week reinstated a harassment claim brought by a woman who worked on the hit show as a writer's assistant and claimed that she was subjected to an array of racial and sexual harassment, including enduring sexually explicit comments about the program's female stars. The court decision in favor of plaintiff Amaani Lyle, who worked for "Friends" during 1999, noted that, in depositions, writers and producers acknowledged the use of "sexually coarse, vulgar, and demeaning language in the workplace." But that behavior, the "Friends" crew claimed, was a necessary part of the creative process and helped the show's writing staff to develop better scripts. But that might not explain the crude comments that some writers allegedly directed at "Friends" stars like Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, and David Schwimmer, according to a declaration sworn by Lyle and filed in Los Angeles Superior Court. As seen in the below excerpt, Cox's fertility and love life, Schwimmer's sexual preference, and Aniston's availability were openly discussed in the "Friends" writer's room, according to Lyle. Not to mention how several writers spoke of their secret desire to turn the character Joey (played by Matt LeBlanc) into a serial rapist, discussing "full scenes of how he would rape the women."

These changes in the law appear to be largely collateral damage in a bill intended to address the "dilution" provisions of trademark law. The bill, known as H.R. 683, the Trademark Dilution Revision Act, is otherwise unobjectionable from the perspective of an authors' group.

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Trademarks, including business names, brands, and slogans, are unavoidable and proliferating in daily life. Writers of fiction and nonfiction inevitably incorporate trademarks into their work, sometimes to comment on the particular business using the trademark, but frequently the use is merely incidental to the nonfiction or fiction writer's story ("Tom went to a McDonald's, had a Coke, and waited for the Harley to arrive.").

Just as fair use provisions of copyright law permit writers to make certain uses of copyrighted works in their own works, so do fair use and related provisions of trademark law permit writers to use trademarks in their works. One of the important protections for writers using others' trademarks is section 43(c)(4)(B) of the Lanham Act, which excludes noncommercial and news reporting uses from several types of liability under trademark law. The new law would weaken these protections, exposing writers to greater potential liability for their use of trademarks.

This would needlessly chill expression. The legitimate changes to the dilution provisions of trademark law can be made without changing the exclusions from liability contained in the current law.

But analysts are mixed on whether it can do what Apple's competitors so far have not: Create a serious threat to the Cupertino company's successful iTunes online music and video store. And further, Amazon might be looking to create a portable digital music player to challenge the iPod, which dominates the U.S. market.

The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday that Amazon executives are in "advanced" talks with four record label giants. The paper said the Seattle-based company is exploring the possibility of launching its own Amazon portable digital music player and subscription service offering discounted rates.

"We never comment on rumors and speculation," said Amazon spokeswoman Patty Smith. Apple did not respond to requests for a comment.

It's not the first time Amazon has been rumored to be getting into digital music. In August, reports pointed toward a possible September launch of a similar service, after two years of sporadic negotiations with music executives.