The Deal Report

MOVIES Hope Davis, you are the best! Loved you first in 1998’s Next Stop Wonderland, loved you more recently in American Splendor and The Secret Lives of Dentists. Love that you’re now signed to appear opposite Gwyneth Paltrow, Jake Gyllenhaal, and Anthony Hopkins in Proof, Miramax’s adaptation of Broadway’s hit drama. Rock on, Hope Davis, rock on!… Jessica Biel, you aren’t so bad yourself. Excited to see you in the upcoming Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake, but even more intrigued to hear that you are set to star in the third Blade film, Blade: Trinity, and that you’ll play a vampire killer named Abigail. No mercy, Jessica Biel, no mercy!… Ray Liotta, great job in Narc, man. What a performance. Good luck playing a sociopath opposite Willem Dafoe in Control, a creepy thriller that Matt Dillon was originally supposed to star in.

TELEVISION Topher Grace, now you’re making the big bucks. Congrats on agreeing to appear on That ’70s Show through 2005, and for locking down around $250,000 — $300,000 per episode. That’s what our man Ashton Kutcher earns. Well done, Topher Grace!

BOOKS Jessica Lynch, at last your story will be told. Knopf paid you and big-time ex — New York Times writer Rick Bragg in the neighborhood of $1 million for a book about your POW experience in Iraq earlier this year. We look forward to reading I Am a Soldier, Too: The Jessica Lynch Story in mid-November…. Lil’ Kim, what’s this crazy talk about your writing a novel? We know it’s sort of autobiographical, but no word so far on who’ll publish it.