People

By Josh Tyrangiel

NOT AMORE

Columbus Day and Yom Kippur fell on the same day this year, but the few bona fide Italian icons who portray those in desperate need of atonement were not celebrating. Cast members of HBO's THE SOPRANOS were disinvited from riding in New York City's Columbus Day parade following protests from Italian-American groups. "The Sopranos is guilty of damaging the image and character of an estimated 20 million Italian Americans by using their religion, customs and values in a violent and immoral context," claims the coalition, which recently named show creator David Chase "Pasta-tute of the Year" for egregiously trading on his Italian heritage. Egregious wordplay apparently honors that heritage. Actor Vincent Pastore, known as informant character Big Pussy, says the cast was not planning to march in character. "We were [in the parade] before we were Sopranos. We're actors; we just get on the float." Sadly, since Yom Kippur is a solemn occasion, the cast didn't celebrate that day with a parade either.

GOOD OLE COUNTRY HUMOR

A storm has been brewing in Nashville over just who is country and who ain't. The two fronts converged at last week's Country Music Association Awards, where the contemporary DIXIE CHICKS took home four trophies while traditionalists George Strait and Alan Jackson won the Vocal Event category for Murder on Music Row, a duet that condemns country's pop trend with lines like "The almighty dollar and the lust for worldwide fame slowly killed tradition and for that someone should hang." Spooky. Making light of it all is a song called I'd Give My Right Nut to Save Country Music, sung with deadpan earnestness by C.M.A. Single of the Year winner LEE ANN WOMACK and the lesser-known Ray Driskoll. "It's really meant as a gag," says Nut co-writer Jim Beavers. "We don't take sides; we just think the song's really funny." To promote the song, Driskoll pretended to undergo an orchiectomy at a Nashville radio station. Not so funny.

FATHER FLANAGAN MEETS MIA FARROW

She may be the Queen of Nice, but ROSIE O'DONNELL seems to have higher ambitions than royalty. Like sainthood. Claiming that she's "sick of all the crap" that goes along with being host of a daytime talk show, O'Donnell tells the November issue of Ladies' Home Journal that she plans to quit her highly profitable show when her contract runs out in 2002 so that she can concentrate on facilitating adoptions. O'Donnell, who has four adopted tykes of her own, recently opened a Rosie Adoptions office in New Jersey, and she already claims responsibility for 39 adoptions, including one for former Charlie's Angels star Kate Jackson. Says Jackson: "I call Rosie my son's 'angel mom,' because God used her as the conduit to bring him to me." Those angel puns never get old.

STARTING AT GUARD IN BILL BENNETT'S NIGHTMARE...

Most basketball players' rap albums end up in the discount-record bin for one very good reason: a colossal lack of talent. The good news for Philadelphia 76er ALLEN IVERSON is that according to rumor, he can rap. The bad news is his lyrics make Eminem look like John Denver. Iverson, 25, reported for 76er training camp last week and found himself surrounded by reporters who wondered just what the All-Star guard meant by "Come to me with faggot tendencies/ You'll be sleeping where the maggots be" and other lyrical nuggets that treated gays and women somewhat unkindly. Iverson, whose debut album is scheduled for a February release, at first refused comment but soon canted. "If individuals of the gay community and women of the world are offended by any of the material in my upcoming album, let the record show that I wish to extend a profound apology." Iverson's contrition, however, was not profound enough to compel him to remove the offending lyrics from his album.