THE BUSINESS

explain this... Happiness is a part called Hamlet. Whoever plays the prince, wins a prize Laurence Olivier (1949) Jonathan Pryce (1980) Mel Gibson (1990) Stephen Dillane (1995) Ralph Fiennes (1995)

On the very same day last week that presenter Carol Vorderman was told she'd been bounced from Tomorrow's World thanks to her appearance in a soap powder advert, she also received a letter from Auntie telling her that she couldn't present an educational series later this year. Why? For the same reason the BBC gave for removing Vorderman from TW - possible confusion between commercial activities and the "investigative" nature of her TV stints (highly likely): "It's the fact that this sort of product could be the subject of a journalistic piece... the investigative nature of the programme must not be brought into question."

Vorderman is fuming. "I have presented eight education series for the BBC before and never, never have these matters been mentioned.

"The proposed series is not investigative in any form. It was an information series, pure and simple. There was never any question of me washing my keyboard in soap powder while demonstrating CD-Rom."

Gary Rhodes, the BBC chef and star of the Tate & Lyle commercials, makes his "educational" programmes for the very same department. One rule for the boys and another for the girls?

The remake of the Clare Booth Luce comedy, The Women, is bogged down in rewrites. The last try - impeccably PC - stiffed, so it's back to the catty original. Moans an interested party: "We took out all the so- called sexist jokes. Now we've put them back in again." Unaltered is the casting: Meg Ryan remains the poor wife role first played by Norma Shearer and Julia Roberts plays Crystal, the bitch goddess who once saved Joan ("I never laid a hand on those kids!") Crawford from box-office exile.

That bbc gay series finally has a name - Gaytime TV (groan anytime you want to). Producer Neal Cromby says, "We would call it Gaywatch but David Hasselhoff would sue the ass off us."