PEOPLE

By Belinda Luscombe

BODIES OF WORK

In a more innocent time, it was considered a satisfying and well-rounded enough career simply to be a celebrity personal trainer. But nowadays a trainer is barely worth the price of a second-hand Soloflex if he or she doesn't have a book. And not just any old fitness book. A book whose life-changing properties are attested to by A-list celebrities. Last year Cindy Crawford did the honors for Radu Teodorescu. This year MADONNA is endorsing Ray Kybartas' Fitness Is Religion. "Whether we're doing wind sprints uphill or sun salutes in my living room, the goal has been much more about peace of mind than having a perfect body," she says. And noted muscleman STEVEN SPIELBERG is singing the praises of Jake Steinfeld's Power Living by Jake, which is more about getting a life than about getting a trim waist. (Chapter titles include "Flex Your Imagination" and "Go for the Goal.") The director, or "Wiels," as Steinfeld calls him, gushes on the cover, "Jake has been a very positive influence in my life." It takes strength to lift all those Oscars.

TIME TO STOP ROMAN?

ROMAN POLANSKI, who these days may be more celebrated as a fugitive from the U.S. justice system than as a director, opened his musical version of Dance of the Vampires in Vienna last week. But in America a drama of a different sort unfolded after it emerged that Polanski's lawyer had had yet another meeting with the Los Angeles D.A.'s office, sparking a rumor that he was cutting a deal to allow the director of Chinatown to return to America. The 20-year-old warrant issued for Polanski's arrest is still in effect. He fled to Paris, fearing he would have to serve serious time for having sex with a 13-year-old girl. But Polanski's friend and producer Thom Mount says he asked the director about the talk of a return and "there's no truth in it whatsoever." In any case, the D.A.'s office says there will be no deal unless Polanski surrenders, at which time a judge will decide his sentence. Meanwhile, the girl in question, Samantha Geimer, now 34 and a mother of three who lives in Kauai, Hawaii, says she has long felt he should be able to come back: "It has always been O.K. with me."

SEEN & HEARD

The pathways of diplomacy must be trod with care. It's customary when visiting the Golden Temple, the Sikh's holiest shrine in the Punjab, to remove one's shoes. However, Queen Elizabeth, who will visit the Indian temple later this month, is not a barefoot kind of gal. So a compromise has been reached. The Queen will wear white socks.

New plans are also afoot at Elizabeth's youngest son's movie-making enterprise, Ardent Productions. Prince Edward's company has signed a first-look deal with Corbin Bernsen, mainly known as the sleazoid attorney in L.A. Law. This deal, however, is for Bernsen's hitherto unheralded writing output. The Prince gets first refusal on Bernsen's screenplays.

A STRETCH FOR BILLY

How dull life would be if the old height-sight gag had never been invented. This time it's BILLY CRYSTAL and GHEORGHE MURESAN (you can just call him George) who are making it tough for the cameraman to get a two-shot. Crystal and the Washington Bullets b-baller star in My Giant, a comedy about a venal theatrical agent and his discovery, the Romanian monastery caretaker with a gift for Shakespeare whom he discovers and drags back to America to get into the movies. Since Muresan doesn't speak much English, let alone Shakespeare, the two worked together for months before shooting, with Crystal recording Muresan's part on cassettes and the center listening to his lines on the bus between games. "I was like Jiminy Cricket, jumping up and down on his shoulder and in his head," says Crystal. It worked--maybe too well. Laments Crystal: "I ended up fighting for my life in every scene."