Make it Simple, Dah-link

When Zsa Zsa Gabor, queen of carats, goes for her day in court Monday, don’t expect to see her swathed in her usual get-up of diamonds and furs. Gabor tells Listen she is going to dress in basic black and pearls. “I’m going to wear my black Donna Karan. She’s been my favorite designer for the last year, you know, dah-link, her clothes fit me so well.” The Karan black wool wrap-around style is one of many by the same designer that Gabor says she buys in Palm Beach and wherever she finds them on sale. “I love to buy things on sale,” she confesses. As for accessories, she says she will stick with her pearls, and as an afterthought, maybe will add a rose, but not a hat. “My hair will be done beautifully by Michael Disney,” she says. (He has a salon in Los Angeles.) That’s a switch from her regular, Julius Bengtsson, who also styles Nancy Reagan’s hair. It sounds as if he’s been busy. “If I waited for him, I’d be doing it myself in the bathtub,” Gabor says. She hasn’t made any wardrobe plans beyond day one of her court appearances.

Arsenio Goes Italian

Get ready to see Arsenio Hall in nothing but custom-tailored, double-breasted Italian suits when he hosts his talk show on Channel 13 this fall. Along with the debonair suits by Canali, the genial host will turn up in zippy accessories that range from lapel pins, wide ties and tie clips down to “beautifully patterned socks,” says Sami Dinar, whose Beverly Hills’ menswear store is responsible for Hall’s new sartorial image.

Mystery Designer

Superstars Oscar de la Renta, Bill Blass and Adolfo hit the road a dozen times a year to hype their collections nationwide. And then there is Linda Allard. Hardly anybody recognizes her name, even though her high-profile client list includes newswomen Mary Alice Williams, Deborah Norville, Tawny Little and Tritia Toyota, all of whom probably think of her as Ellen Tracy--the label she designs for. In her first Southland store emergence in about a decade, at Bullock’s, Allard kept a low, low, low profile. But Listen heard enough about her to compile a thumbnail sketch, which ought to please her silent silent majority fans (wholesale sales are a walloping $150 million per year, she says.) Allard joined the Ellen Tracy company in 1962; five years ago her name went on the label alongside the fictitious Tracy. Fortysomething, she is single (“Basically my life style revolves around my work.”), a benefactor of the American Ballet Theatre and she spends weekends in Connecticut. Current airplane reading material: “Solitude” by Anthony Storr.