Stage 26 is White House then and now

GOOD MORNING: Sony's Stage 26 has been doing double duty with its White House sets -- first, for the present-day "The American President" starring Michael Douglas and Annette Bening, then the sets were re-dressed for the "Nixon" presidency. And doing double duty on those sets and pix is David Paymer. In the Douglas White House, Paymer plays counsel to the president, while in "Nixon," he plays Ronald Ziegler, Nixon's press secretary -- at the age of 29. (Paymer's wigged.) The thesp had a 45-minute talk with Ziegler, now a lobbyist for pharmaceuticals. He remains loyal to Nixon and he "cautioned me to be accurate," said Paymer. "I assured him I would do him justice." All the thesps portraying real characters of the Nixon White House "are not impersonators -- but we have their qualities," said Paymer ... Ziegler reminded him that he was "the only one to walk with Nixon from the resident quarters (in the White House) to the Oval Office to ready his resignation speech." Paymer did not tell Ziegler the scene is not in the movie. But there are plenty of other scenes with him. Paymer is also doubling between the "Nixon" set here and the Vancouver location of "Unforgettable" with Ray Liotta and Linda Fiorentino, John Dahl directing. Paymer's a coroner in that one. The thesp has been on a nonstop career boom since his Oscar nomination for "Mr. Saturday Night" with Billy Crystal and his performance as Dan Enright in "Quiz Show" for Robert Redford ... From the sublime to: Those "Dancing Itos" return to "The Tonight Show" Thursday -- this time with guest Charo chorusing with 'em. Saner (?) guests with Jay Leno will include Billy Crystal plugging his "Forget Paris," and George Foreman p.a.'ing his book, bouts and -- ?

MAKING HIS BOW ON THE TONYS is Walter Cronkite, who is also making his Broadway debut in "How to Succeed in Business ..."-- although it's only his voice reading the "Business" book to Matthew Broderick. On the Tonys, Cronkite will present the award for best revival of a play. And Jerry Lewis will devilishly do the honors for the musical revival category. He, of course, is in "Damn Yankees," which was a 1994 entry. In order to start rehearsals of a special medley for the Tonys, Gregory Hines flew here Sunday (taking time from Mother's Day) to work with Nathan Lane, on his day off "Birds of a Feather." The Tony medley: "Songs We Never Sang on Broadway." You can figure some of the tunes the two men will comedy-sing ... Alexander Salkind and wife Jane Chaplin finally won the $ 8.5 million lawsuit against his father Ilya S. over financing of "Christopher Columbus: The Discovery." The case went all the way to the Supreme Court, which let stand an L.A. Superior Court decision that Europe-based Salkind Sr. must answer to a summons. Attorney Elihu Berle of Chrystie & Berle calls the case a precedent, impacting offshore companies doing business in Hollywood. Young Salkind and Chaplin are now readying pix from their Orlando-based Scent Entertainment Co. ... Itimar Rabinovich, Israel's Ambassador to the U.S., visited L.A., dined with Richard Dreyfuss and industryites at Drai's. Rabinovich is also Israel's chief negotiator with Syria ... Secretary of the Army, Togo West, will be in L.A. June 10 to see scenes of HBO's "Tuskegee Airmen" on invite of Bill Cooper. Also to visit WB's WWII Wall of Honor and see sets of "Executive Decision," being filmed with Army cooperation. And, that night, West will be principal speaker at the annual Army Ball at the Century Towers ... Good Scouts: "While You Were Sleeping" exec producer Arthur Sarkissian and 39 volunteer pals winged to Tijuana and, along with the Corazon charity group, built a house for a poor family -- in a 12-hour period ... Siegfried and Roy receive the Liberace Legend Award today -- at the Las Vegas Liberace mansion. Liberace would have been 75 Tuesday.

INTERACTIVITY: Award-winning interactive media director Robert Weaver started "Voyeur 2" this week with his dad Dennis Weaver, Jennifer O'Neill and David Gough co-starring. Philips Media distribs the CD-ROM suspense thriller for Christmas release ... And Kevin McCarthy, Barry Corbin, John Agar and Tanya Roberts star in Access Software's next CD-ROM computer game/movie, "The Pandora Device." Their 1994 "Under a Killing Moon," with Brian Keith, Margot Kidder, Russell Means and the voice of James Earl Jones, sold more than 300,000 copies so far ... Madonna's selling her Mercedes convertible 1969 280 SE, in which she claims she has done "everything"! The Sotheby sale's June 10 in N.Y. ... CAA hosted a reception for L.A. Mayor Richard Riordan in the agency's (BevHills) atrium Tuesday evening. Michael Ovitz made the intro of Riordan, who talked his plans for the future of L.A. ... While George Hurrell's inimitable photos continue on exhibition at the County Museum of Art, a showing of Hurrell's other showbiz photo art is also on exhibit at Jack Rutberg's Fine Arts Gallery on La Brea through June 30 ... Della Reese gets a Pacific Pioneer Broadcasters' toasting May 19 at the Sportsmen's Lodge.