J. Low

TUBE NEWS Another reality stunt NBC has in mind is to revive ''Fantasy Island'' as a nonfiction show. Producers would fly civilians to a tropical resort and attempt to grant their (presumably not too racy) fantasies, with hopefully unpredictable results. There won't be any Tattoo shouting, ''Da plane! Da plane!'', but NBC does need a host and hasn't ruled out Ricardo Montalban. For his part, the 80-year-old Montalban suffers from debilitating back pain, but when ABC revived the series three years ago, he told TV Guide he'd be happy to play Mr. Roarke again. ''I would have to work with a walker or a wheelchair, which would be kind of more mysterious,'' he said then. ''With this character, Roarke, I think it wouldn't be too bad. He's guiding the whole thing with his mind, anyway, not with his body. So I could do it.'' Malcolm McDowell won the role then, but since that revival lasted only a few episodes before dying a low-rated death, it's doubtful that he's on NBC's short list....

MTV has its glass-front studio in Times Square and its daily ''Total Request Live'' shot against the backdrop of the everyday circus in midtown Manhattan. Now, sister channel VH1 is planning to build its own streetfront studio for a daily show, but instead of playing in traffic in New York, the channel is going Hollywood. Originally, it had sought a location on the heavily foot-trafficked Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica, but now it's looking at the new Hollywood & Highland complex on Hollywood Boulevard, which is also the site of the Kodak Theater, the Academy Awards' new home.

CAPITOL CHILL In the wake of warnings about another possible terrorist attack this week, Boyz II Men acted not II manly by bowing out of a ceremony at a Washington, D.C., public school. The Tuesday event was an educational initiative called ''Songs of the Century,'' highlighting 365 classic songs from the 20th century, headed by ''Over the Rainbow.'' The Recording Industry Association of America, the record labels' chief lobbying group, was the sponsor of the event, and acknowledged that the R&B quartet canceled due to ''travel concerns.'' Less afraid to fly to D.C. was 85-year-old ''Gone With the Wind'' star Olivia de Havilland, who attended a fundraising dinner last night at the French embassy.

Speaking of ''GWTW,'' the heirs of its producer, David O. Selznick, are suing Turner Entertainment (which, like EW.com, is an AOL Time Warner company), which owns the film. The plaintiffs, who have a 5 percent stake in the film, argue that Turner owes them $10 million from profits ''GWTW'' earned during the 1990s. With its revenues over the last 62 years adjusted for inflation, it's the most successful movie of all time, so no one who owns a piece of it will ever go hungry again.