The next generation

New York – Like father, like daughter.

Bindi Irwin, the 8-year-old daughter of the late “Crocodile Hunter” Steve Irwin, will star in a wildlife series to air on the Discovery Kids network early next year. The show’s working title: “Bindi, The Jungle Girl.”

Her father, animal lover and conservationist Steve Irwin, died from the poisonous jab of a stingray Sept. 4. Besides Bindi, he left behind her mother, Terri, and 2-year-old brother, Bob.

The show, now in the early stages of production, was originally “going to be a father-daughter thing,” starring the nature-loving duo, Discovery publicist Annie Howell said Monday. “Steve and Bindi were very enthusiastic about doing the show together.”

Steve Irwin will appear with Bindi in scenes filmed before his death, his manager, John Stainton, said in an interview on People magazine’s Web site.

“Some people think that I would be afraid of them, but I’m never ever afraid of an animal,” Bindi said in an interview Monday on ABC’s “Australian Story.”

“I just get excited and some that are dangerous I just think, ‘Oooh! What’s going to happen?’ and things like that.”

Awards are frightful

Los Angeles – Rocker-turned-director Rob Zombie picked up a Chainsaw Award for his horror flick “The Devil’s Rejects.”

The “Killer Movie” award, presented Sunday night to Zombie by Robert “Freddy Kruger” Englund, was part of the first televised “fuse Fangoria Chainsaw Awards” to honor the best films and actors in the horror genre.

Zombie’s wife, Sheri Moon, and actor Bill Moseley won the “Relationship From Hell” award for “The Devil’s Rejects.”

“Saw II” also won two awards, for “Best Butcher” (best villain) and “Looks that Kill” (best makeup).

The awards ceremony was held at the Orpheum Theatre and will be broadcast Oct. 22 on fuse Television.

Waxing political

New York – Country music might seem like a pretty conservative medium, but Tim McGraw is bucking the trend.

“It’s innate in me to be a Democrat – a true Southern populist kind of Democrat. There’s not a lot of those anymore,” McGraw tells Time magazine in its Oct. 23 issue.

“The issues that matter to me are the social safety nets for people, health care, middle-class concerns. We need to take care of the middle class and the poor in our country. The chasm is getting larger between haves and have-nots, and that’s something we need to close down a little bit,” says the singer and star of “Flicka.”

Could that mean a McGraw on an election ticket soon?

“One of these days, if the opportunity’s there, that’s something I’d love to do,” he says. “It’s a high calling to serve the community, and if you can do it, I think you should.”