Stars Salute Real-Life Triumphs of the Handicapped

--The movie Academy Awards are not due until April, but several actors turned out for the first Academy Awards for the Handicapped. Susan St. James, Loretta Swit, Jennifer Savidge, Jean Stapleton and Robert Fuller were among the celebrities scheduled to be in Boston to help the National Academy for the Advancement of the Handicapped congratulate 15 winners chosen from among more than 300 nominees. One recipient was Marie Balter of Massachusetts, who earned her doctorate after a 20-year struggle with mental illness. She was portrayed by Marlo Thomas in the movie “Nobody’s Child.” Another winner, Kevin Degens, 30, of Michigan, overcame handicaps from cerebral palsy to raise nearly $10,000 for the Michigan Heart Assn. by riding more than 200 miles in bike-a-thons. The lone California recipient was D.C. Parks of Bakersfield, and the youngest, Kamah Hittle, 8, of Massachusetts, was honored as an accomplished violinist and the youngest ever to play with the New England Conservatory String Training Orchestra. She has severe rheumatoid arthritis.

--A New York judge gave the brush to a $10-million lawsuit against Johnny Carson and NBC, filed after the entertainer told a barrage of dentist jokes in response to Melville dentist Michael Mendelson’s complaint about Carson telling this joke last April: “Imagine dentists going out of business. I haven’t been so happy about a group disbanding since the Gestapo.” Mendelson sued after the “Tonight Show” host countered with: “Lighten up, Michael Mendelson,” and more jokes, such as: “There are only two groups of professionals that spend their working days watching water go round and round in a little bowl--dentists and men’s room attendants.” Carson called dentistry “an honorable profession dating back to the Spanish Inquisition” and said the only phrase more feared than nuclear war was root canal . State Supreme Court Justice William McCooe, in rejecting Mendelson’s suit, called the jokes “gross exaggerations intended for comedic effect.”

--Minnesota’s candidate in the Miss USA pageant has been accused of shoplifting a swimsuit, scarfs and hairpieces from a mall. Authorities said Sue Bolich could get up to a year in jail and a $3,000 fine if she is convicted of gross misdemeanor theft. Bolich was released after being booked, and formal charges are expected Monday. The pageant is in March.