2 Old Articles

American Topics - Herald Tribune

By Arthur Higbee

Published: SATURDAY, JULY 11, 1992

In New York, JFK Jr. For the Prosecution

When John F. Kennedy Jr., an assistant district attorney in New York City, conducted his most recent prosecution, the jurors included a New York Times reporter, Charles Strum.Mr. Strum described Mr. Kennedy as "tall, handsome, square-jawed, square-shouldered." He added, "Mr. Kennedy's articulation, in a pleasant but unremarkable baritone, had been a bit halting in jury selection. But his opening statement was clear and his direct examination of three police detectives and a police chemist was to the point."

After seven hours of deliberation the jury brought in a verdict of guilty against one Venard Garvin for peddling heroin. "The district attorney's office was unable to provide a score card of Mr. Kennedy's success rate in his three years on the staff," Mr. Strum reported. "But this victory was at least his second. In the first, the defendant was found asleep in his victim's apartment with her jewelry in his pocket."

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The New York Times

Flim; Bimbo? Sarah Jessica Parker Begs to Differ

By MICHAEL SPECTER

Published: September 20, 1992

Sarah Jessica Parker has a bit of a bimbo problem.

Not that she is one, but the notion certainly has gained some currency lately. And much to her surprise, Ms. Parker, who has been a professional actress for most of her life, finds she gets a kick out of it. Up to a point.

"Look, it's offensive, O.K.," she said, beginning to weave through a rambling five-minute defense of her blooming fame, her professional choices, even her sex life. "I have spent my entire life in the theater, working every day all the time. Without stop. I never used to audition for babe roles, it was such a waste of time. But I have to say if you had ever -- and I mean ever -- told me five years ago the word bimbo would be in a sentence with my name, I would have laughed."

She isn't laughing now. The 28-year-old Ms. Parker is white hot this summer, starring with Nicolas Cage and James Caan as the luscious but well-behaved second-grade teacher who manages to drive both men over the edge in "Honeymoon in Vegas." The actress, best known for her role as a geeky high school nerd in the cultishly acclaimed, short-lived television series "Square Pegs," has just finished filming her first action adventure feature, "Three Rivers," opposite the big screen's ultimate anti-nerd, Bruce Willis.

But it was last year that she won the trifecta, appearing as an assistant district attorney in the ABC series "Equal Justice," winning raves Off Broadway as the sensitive daughter of an intellectually driven Holocaust refugee in Jon Robin Baitz's "Substance of Fire," and pulling off the libidinous star turn of the season as SanDee, the double-jointed store clerk who performs one of modern cinema's most memorable trouser alterations in Steve Martin's "L.A. Story."

For publicity, however, all that paled compared to the event she describes as "the Kennedy fiasco." She had met John F. Kennedy Jr. last year at the theater. And he asked her on a date. More than one, actually. She says she enjoyed them -- and him -- until she realized he "was a public domain kind of a guy."

"We would go places where there wasn't a soul around, and the next day I'd see pictures of us there in the tabloids," she said over lunch near her apartment in Greenwich Village. Although she is now seriously involved with the actor Matthew Broderick, she admits she is still slightly dazed by the Kennedy experience.

"I have been a semi-public person since 'Annie,' " she said of the lead role she played as a child in the Broadway musical. "But I never had any idea what real fame was until I met John. He's a nice man, but for God's sake, I feel like I should apologize for dating him. It has become the defining factor in the person I am.

"It's pathetic," she said, mostly in jest but partly in fear. "When I die, they are going to say, 'Oh, yeah, Sarah once dated John Kennedy.' "