‘Sex’ star takes role as soccer mom

New York — “Sex and the City” co-star Kristin Davis may return to TV not as a desperate housewife, but a highly curious one.

Davis will star in an ABC one-hour pilot tentatively titled, “Soccer Moms,” reports Hollywood Reporter. The potential series centers on two suburban housewives who team up as private investigators.

A publicist for Davis confirmed the agreement Tuesday.

If picked up, the show would be ABC’s second foray into the secret lives of seemingly domestic women. The network’s “Desperate Housewives” has been one of the season’s biggest hits.

Davis, 39, played Charlotte York on “Sex and the City.”

Second woman accuses Cosby of sexual assault

Philadelphia — A California lawyer says she has told Montgomery County, Pa., investigators who are probing sex allegations against Bill Cosby that the entertainer drugged her and tried to force himself on her about 30 years ago.

Tamara Green, a longtime criminal and civil lawyer and former fashion model, said she decided to tell her story after Cosby’s lawyer and the Montgomery County district attorney publicly cast doubt on a former Temple University women’s basketball executive’s allegations that Cosby drugged and groped her at his Elkins Park, Pa., mansion last year.

The Philadelphia Daily News usually withholds the identity of alleged sexual assault victims, but Green said she wanted her name used.

Cosby’s lawyer, Walter Phillips Jr., denied Green’s allegations. He would not answer questions about her story.

Castor has said his office would decide this week whether to charge Cosby “or anyone else” in the probe of the ex-Temple employee’s complaint.

Rocketman to promote launch of in-flight satellite radios

Atlanta — Elton John’s frequent flier miles are about to skyrocket.

An image of the globe-trotting rock star will begin appearing this week on 20 AirTran Airways jets to promote the launch of satellite radio at each passenger seat, the company said.

“The traffic controller this morning was calling it Elton One,” AirTran spokesman Tad Hutcheson said Monday.

AirTran, which is based in Orlando, Fla., uses Atlanta as a hub. The airline says the XM Satellite Radio systems will offer more than 100 channels of news, music, weather and entertainment.

The airline wouldn’t disclose details of its arrangement with the 57-year-old entertainer, who has a home in Atlanta and typically commands millions of dollars for corporate endorsements. But AirTran said it planned to give him a 6-foot-long model of a jet and a $50,000 check for the Elton John AIDS Foundation.

Judge dismisses lawsuit over Elizabeth Taylor’s van Gogh

Los Angeles — A judge dismissed a lawsuit by four descendants of a German woman who had sought to recover a valuable Vincent van Gogh painting from actress Elizabeth Taylor.

Taylor failed to review the ownership history of “View of the Asylum of Saint-Remy” before acquiring it more than 40 years ago, the descendants of the late Margarete Mauthner claimed in a lawsuit last July.

The family asked for restitution and the painting, which has been appraised between $10 million and $15 million, contending a sales brochure had warned it was likely confiscated by the Nazis.

A message left Tuesday with Thomas Hamilton, who has represented the plaintiffs, wasn’t immediately returned. A message left with Sally Morrison, a publicist who has represented Taylor, also wasn’t returned.

In 1963, Taylor’s father, Francis Taylor, bought the painting on his daughter’s behalf for $257,600 at a Sotheby’s auction in London.

Rodman ad asks consumers to ‘think ink, not mink’

The resplendently tattooed, multiply pierced and orange-coiffed Dennis Rodman made a splash Monday at New York’s Fashion Week with a new ad for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

Rodman, nude and in profile, appears with the slogan, “Think Ink, Not Mink: Be Comfortable in Your Own Skin and Let Animals Keep Theirs.”

“I’m very against people mistreating animals in any fashion,” he told the Associated Press.

The billboard ad will appear in Hollywood and New York in the next few weeks.

PETA members have joined in Fashion Week since 2003, when PETA presented a line designed by Gaelyn & Cianfarani to draw attention to animal-friendly collections.

Oscar-winning director resigns from film academy

Madrid, Spain — Oscar-winning director Pedro Almodovar has resigned his post at Spain’s Film Academy because of a disagreement over the voting system used to select winners of the Goya Awards, his production company said.

Almodovar, who was a member of the academy for 17 years, quit in December because the number of voters for the Goya, Spain’s version of the Oscars, had been reduced and there was a lack of information about the people casting ballots for the prize, the director’s production company, El Deseo, said Monday.

He won the best original screenplay Oscar for 2002’s “Talk to Her.”