Acad cracks down on ticket-sellers

GOOD MORNING: The Academy wasn't kidding when it warned members who sell their Oscar tickets that they were risking "severe penalties including expulsion from membership." Monday night, two people who bought tickets from brokers were escorted out of the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion by LAPD officers. They had paid $8,000 and $10,000 respectively for the ducats and were seated in the loge, yet! The tickets had been issued to Academy members who then sold them to the brokers. The Academy knows who the members are, and one will probably be dropped from the rolls, since this is a second offense. The Board of Governors will take up the cases next month and determine appropriate punishment for both. Although the tickets are marked "non-transferable," I wondered how the Academy could recognize a nonmember in the assigned seat. Without divulging the method of security, the Acad's John Pavlik assured me, "We absolutely know who is supposed to be in each assigned seat." Why is the Acad getting so tough? "It's a security issue. If anybody can buy a ticket through a broker, we have no control over who is in the audience," Pavlik said. Further, this year the Acad had to turn away more than 300 Academy members who wanted tickets. I know of a past Oscar winner who was turned away for lack of tickets. And many's the year I have looked out at the audience and seen a well-known headwaiter, as well as a Beverly Hills furrier in choice seats. The awards will be held March 27 next year, and it has not yet been decided whether the 2,500-seat Chandler or the Shrine's 6,000-seater will be the site. In any case, be forewarned -- the Academy means there's no monkey business except for show business.

A ROYAL VIEWER of the awards was King Hussein of Jordan, here recuping after ear surgery. He was so touched by Kirk Douglas' appearance, he sent a congratulatory note and invited Douglas to visit him in Jordan. Douglas will accept the royal invitation "as soon as I get over my current tsoris," he said ... Hussein was also touched by the appearances of Polish Holocaust survivor Gerda Weissman, who spoke after the win of HBO's "One Survivor Remembers," and Miep Gies, the heroine of winning docu "Anne Frank Remembered." She helped shelter the Frank family. Hussein invited the Wiesenthal Center's Rabbi Marvin Hier to visit him at his convalescent hotel room here Tuesday after the awards. (Hier won the 1981 docu feature Oscar for "Genocide," narrated by Elizabeth Taylor and Orson Welles, you recall). The monarch reminded Hier he was promised a membership card for the Center's Museum of Tolerance following his visit there with the rabbi last year along with four of Hussein's children. So Hier brought membership cards plus identification pins to the king at the hotel. In turn, the King gave Hier a copy of a touching letter his 9-year-old daughter, Princess Rayah Hussein, had written following the assassination of Israel's Prime Minister Rabin. She called Rabin "the greatest peace maker." Hier was most moved, as was I ... The King invited Rabbi Hier to come to Jordan, too, to help create a museum of tolerance over there -- tolerance for all religions. "I'm going," said Hier ... And heading to Jordan today is Paramount's ambassador of goodwill, A.C. Lyles, who was invited to visit by Prince Abdullah Beni Al-Hussein, who recently visited Hollywood -- and Paramount, where he did a walk-on, a "Star Trek: Voyager" seg.

IT'S A FIRST for Oscar-winning composer Elmer Bernstein: a gangster film, Walter Hill's "Last Man Standing." But then again, Bernstein's done everything from his award-winning "Thoroughly Modern Millie" to "To Kill a Mockingbird" to Michael Jackson's "Thriller" musicvid. Today at 11:30 a.m. on Hollywood Blvd. between La Brea and Sycamore, Bernstein gets his star on the Walk of Fame, flanked by stars of music pals Jay Livingston and Ray Evans and Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller. The latter pair's "Smokey Joe's Cafe" musical legiter, now in its 450th performance on B'way, will soon have companies heading to Australia, London and a national company in addition to the N.Y. ... From Chasen's to Mr. Chow's -- that's part of the transformation of the well-known beanery's site on Beverly Blvd. to the new Beverly West Square previewed Wednesday night for neighbors and others concerned about the plans. The $35 million development, a two-story mall, will include three of Mr. Chow's eateries, while he told me he will continue to operate his established BevHills eatery. There'll also be a Noah's Bagels, Super Crown bookstore, Long's Drugs and Ralphs market, among other businesses. It was a unique party at Chasen's, not a drop of food or drink to note its departure. The same developers are pouring $105 million into a Westwood development that includes 4,600 theater seats. Neighbors in this area as well are objecting to the increased traffic. Further homeowners meetings are scheduled. Would Dave Chasen have approved? I don't think so ... Add performers Gloria Estefan, Pete Townshend and Tony Rich to April 28's VH1 Honors.