To: O.J. Simpson You scumbag and coward. You should have shot yourself in the Bronco--Coward! Responding to this letter, written by a self-described ``average middle-aged housewife,'' Simpson wrote, ``I want to state unequivocally that I did not commit these horrible crimes.'' He added, in a book published last Friday, that he would have jumped in front of a bullet for his dead ex-wife Nicole--or a train, for that matter. The thin volume, the issue of a fat-figured deal ($1 million), is a brilliant sliver of disingenuousness called I Want to Tell You and subtitled My Response to Your Letters, Your Messages, Your Questions.
Published on a day Judge Ito's court was not in session, the book took the baton from the recessed murder trial for one more lap in the nastiest relay in memory and succeeded in 1) giving the defendant a one-sided word with the world without the unpleasantness of cross-examination or any of the other tethers of jurisprudence; 2) restocking the larder against legal fees, the meter running like it is; and 3) stealing the thunder from another book brought out--there are no coincidences--just days before. This one, Raging Heart, is a work from the other side, written with the approval and cooperation of Nicole Brown Simpson's family.
Still to come: The O.J. Simpson Story, the movie the Fox network will aerate television with on Tuesday, after delaying the broadcast until a jury was sequestered--as though it mattered. The film, as shocking in its revelations as an old calendar, stars Bobby (China Beach) Hosea as O.J., Jessica (One Life to Live) Tuck as Nicole and David (The O.J. Simpson Story) Roberson as A.C. Cowlings. The docudrama opens with the Simpson kids' Akita, Kato, looking to fetch help back to the site of the carnage, the most suspenseful moment of the whole thing. Faithful to the public record, it is pretty flat all around.
On the other hand, the sensational aspects of Raging Heart would have given it a few days' tongue life if not for its collisional debut with Simpson's own offering. Written by journalist Sheila (Amy Fisher: My Story) Weller, the book draws on interviews with about 80 friends and relatives of the couple to present details you'll probably wish you hadn't learned; for example, Nicole was a lip-gloss woman from way back. The book says, `` `Please take that off her,' Denise Brown told the mortician, indicating the pasty dark red lipstick he had applied to Nicole's mouth. All the Brown sisters huddled around as the mortician did as he was told With a little sigh whose understated sorrow covered a lifetime of closeness, Denise handed Nicole's clear lip gloss to the mortician. Then she signaled for the viewing-room doors to be opened.'' A little later, as the casket goes down into the earth, Weller has O.J. coming on to a friend of Nicole's at the graveside.