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TUBE TALK It's a good thing, maybe: a made-for-TV biopic of Martha Stewart. NBC is developing the project, based on '','' the current bestselling bio of the domestic goddess by Christopher Byron. The book paints an admiring picture of Stewart's rags-to-riches business success while offering a much less flattering portrait of her personal life; expect the movie to be less cutting and ''more tongue-in-cheek,'' NBC tells Variety....

Here's a hint for ''Becker'' fans who watched Monday's season-ending cliffhanger and wondered how Ted Danson's character might choose between new neighbor Nancy Travis and diner owner Reggie (longtime cast member Terry Farrell), both of whom declared their feelings for him: he's not picking Reggie. CBS announced that Farrell won't be returning this fall, citing a ''new creative direction'' as the reason for her departure after four years. It's not clear whether she quit, was written out, or had some lingering tension after she and the rest of the show's supporting cast sicked out for higher wages last summer. Maybe she can follow the lead of another former ''Star Trek'' babe, Jeri Ryan, and get a job on ''Boston Public.''

REEL DEALS ''Spider-Man'''s James Franco may be suiting up for combat duty. The actor, who played Spidey pal Harry Osborn, is in talks to costar with Benjamin Bratt in ''The Great Raid,'' a World War II docudrama about Gen. Douglas MacArthur's secret 1945 raid on a POW camp in the Philippines to free 500 American prisoners sentenced to death. John Dahl (''The Last Seduction'') is to direct....

Absent from the screen for two years (since her daughter Ella was born) Annette Bening will return to movies in the new Disney remake of ''Freaky Friday,'' its 1977 mother-daughter body-switch comedy that starred Barbara Harris and the young Jodie Foster. The film marks a departure for Bening, known for roles in explicit, mature fare like ''The Grifters'' and ''American Beauty''; at last, here will be a movie her four kids by husband Warren Beatty can watch.

HEALTH WATCH David Schwimmer had an unfriendly experience in a New York hotel bar early Tuesday morning when he was hit in the head by a flying cocktail glass. The occasion was a party at the 60 Thompson Hotel for The Pet Shop Boys; the glass-thrower had apparently been harassing both Schwimmer and PSB singer Neil Tennant. But she hadn't aimed the glass at Schwimmer but at the woman next to him; the sitcom star was merely collateral damage. The bleeding Schwimmer went to Lenox Hill Hospital's emergency room and got two stitches above his hairline; the woman went to jail....

All four members of Alien Ant Farm were hospitalized Wednesday in Spain after an early morning bus crash that killed the band's driver. The hard rockers, best known for their cover last year of Michael Jackson's ''Smooth Criminal,'' were on their way from Luxembourg to Lisbon, Portugal, when their bus driver, a 26-year-old British man whom news reports identified only by the initials C.H., rear-ended a parked truck on a highway in Navalmoral de la Mata, 125 miles west of Madrid at around 2:20 a.m. Guitarist Terry Corso suffered a broken ankle, bassist Tye Zamora a foot injury, and drummer Mike Cosgrove just scrapes and bruises. All three were treated at a Navalmoral hospital and released, but singer Dryden Mitchell remains hospitalized with a neck injury. Six other crew members were also injured, one critically. The band canceled dates in Lisbon and Madrid that were to end its 10-city European tour, as well as a show this Saturday in Washington, D.C.

BABY TALK It's a boy for the once-ubiquitous Jenny McCarthy and her husband, director John Asher (Showtime's ''Going to Calif ornia''). The former ''Singled Out'' host gave birth to Evan James Asher, 7 pounds, 13 ounces, on Saturday. It's the first child for McCarthy, 29, and Asher, 31, who've been married since 1999.