Tim Allen

Who else but Barbara Walters could bring us:L * Julia Roberts calling husband Lyle Lovett's hair "normal."* Whitney Houston saying women womenized her husband Bobby Brown -- but he himself wasn't a womanizer.* And Tim Allen talking about menstrual cycles and saying how he'd really like to be a woman.And all in the same show? If it's a sweeps ratings month, this must be a "Barbara Walters Special" at 10 tonight on WJZ (Channel 13).Say what you will about her, Walters gets the big ones. And she almost always asks them the questions everybody wants asked.

HOLLYWOOD -- Celebrity voice-overs have become a central part of the animation business, changing the ways studios today promote and market their family movies.Not only did Tom Hanks and Tim Allen receive "over scale" salaries for reprising their roles in "Toy Story 2," they're also the first stars to get their names above the title in all print advertising for the coming Thanksgiving release from Walt Disney Pictures and Pixar Animation Studios."There's no denying that when you have Tom Hanks and Tim Allen, two of the big stars around, it's a huge plus for us," said Richard Cook, chairman of Walt Disney Motion Pictures Group.

Early yesterday, about 130 Baltimore-area business executives gathered in a hotel conference room to discuss "Homicide: Life on the Street," the new Tim Allen movie, "For Richer or Poorer," and Oprah Winfrey's latest film endeavor, "Beloved."They weren't actually fans; at the breakfast meeting organized by the BWI Business Partnership at Linthicum's Doubletree Guest Suites Hotel, story lines and stars were of secondary interest.The main issue was money: how to bring more film crews -- and the dollars they spend -- into Maryland.

Whether you're watching or not, it is hard to escape the trial of the century, for television keeps salting its series with links to the O.J. Simpson case.* "Between Mother and Daughter" (4 p.m.-5 p.m., WJZ, Channel 13) -- Another drama special for young people raises the issue of breast cancer from a teen-ager's point of view (like last week's ABC "Afterschool Special").In this "Schoolbreak Special," A.J. Langer ("My So Called Life") plays a 16-year-old who faces her mother's (Lindsay Crouse)

Another day, another mega-merger.But this time, the mother of all mega-mergers: Citicorp and Travelers Group, combining under one umbrella as the inventively named Citigroup Inc. It's a deal valued at more than twice that of any previous corporate marriage - at last count, $80 billion and rising.Yes, $80 billion - truly an unfathomable amount of money. So, in the interest of fathoming, we got out our calculators, and figured out that for $80 billion you could:* Give each of the estimated 76 million baby boomers a cool $1,052 apiece to ease that Social Security crunch.

Jill has a great job offer in Indiana, and Tim is leaving his cable show, "Tool Time," over what the TV industry likes to call "philosophical differences." Will the Taylors really leave their home in Detroit and Wilson and Al and all their other friends?That's the premise of tonight's 90-minute series finale, as "Home Improvement" signs off after eight years near the top of the Nielsen ratings with one of the most successful runs in sitcom history. As flimsy as the finale seems at times -- Tim (Tim Allen)

Eight seasons was plenty for ABC's "Home Improvement," says series co-star Patricia Richardson."I think it's absolutely the time" to stop, said Richardson, who plays Tim Allen's wife on the popular sitcom, which ends its run Tuesday on WMAR, Channel 2. "I always had a really hard time the last couple of years knowing where to take the characters. The hardest thing about a sitcom or a long-running series is that the characters can't really grow very much, because if they do, there's no show, you lose conflict."

IT'S 2 A.M., you're standing on a shaky ladder with a screwdriver in one hand and screws between your teeth, and you start to wonder. How did this happen? Why am I up here installing this light fixture instead of someone who knows what they're doing?Some of the answers can be found in "Do It Yourself: Home Improvement in 20th Century America," by Carolyn M. Goldstein (Princeton Architectural Press and the National Building Museum, 1998, $17.95). The book traces the origins of these impulses on the part of ordinary people to take up tools and tackle some "home modernizing" project to the turn of the last century, when the Arts and Crafts Movement made manual labor fashionable.

With Maryland as its backdrop, local livestock as comedic props and a handful of area residents in split-second cameos, "For Richer or Poorer" opened to applause and cries of "Hey, that's me!" in theaters around the state this weekend.Shot primarily on farms and in towns in Carroll and Harford counties, the movie -- starring Tim Allen and Kirstie Alley as a wealthy New York couple on the run from the Internal Revenue Service who end up hiding among the Amish -- has turned a national spotlight on the picturesque Maryland countryside.

What's worth watching tonight? You tell me -- because you already know. The actual first round of what's been pumped up by the media as Tonya Harding vs. Nancy Kerrigan is televised today. Whether either ends up contending for a medal, with the finals coming Friday, is oddly secondary to how they will stand up (or fall down) against one another. It's overly hyped, it's a bit unfair to the other competitors, and it's virtually required viewing.* "The 1994 Winter Olympic Games" (7-9 a.m., 8-11 p.m., WBAL, Channel 11; 1-6 p.m., TNT)