Autumn Ascendant

BECK Mutations

Why: An avalanche of big albums is coming this season. Courtney Love and her band Hole have a smart, shimmery new CD, Celebrity Skin, out this week. Neosoulman Seal's Human Being is due Nov. 17. Shock rocker Marilyn Manson goes from gloom to glam on Sept. 15; while R. and B. auteur D'Angelo will try to save soul's soul with Voodoo in November. Rappers RZA (of the Wu-Tang Clan) and Ice Cube also have solo releases due in November. And then there's Beck. R. and B., rap, rock, it's all in there. Beck has an old-soul voice, a sweetly naive look in his eye and a reckless simplicity in his heart--as he said on Where It's At, all he needs is "two turntables and a microphone." Yeah, maybe he could be the voice of his generation. His line, "I'm a loser baby so why don't you kill me?" could be nihilistic ad copy for the '90s. But there's a victory in elusiveness. Beck is nobody's symbol, nobody's icon. He sings, "Temperature's dropping at the rotten oasis/ Stealing kisses from the leprous faces" and dares you to understand. Bluesman, hip-hopper, folkie, punk rocker, poet. If Beck is a loser, we don't ever want to win. When: In stores Nov. 3.

JONI MITCHELL RETURNS! AND OTHER GREAT NEWS Ah, the joy of discovery--of finding that new rocker, that voice you've never heard, or of rediscovering an old favorite, back and in fine form...

Welcome... Somewhere between Sade and Portishead, there's Morley, left. Her fine Sun Machine is just out. And watch for Nicole Renee; her self-titled CD, due Sept. 15, has some of the fire and funk of early Prince.

Welcome Back... Two very different reasons to love Canada: Joni Mitchell, left, and Alanis Morissette. Mitchell's cool Taming the Tiger arrives Sept. 29. Morissette's Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie is due Nov. 3.

TOM WOLFE A Man in Full

Why: It's been 11 years since The Bonfire of the Vanities enthralled a considerable swatch of the reading public. Here was a novel that actually portrayed something broader than the private angst of a sensitive hero or heroine. Wolfe the journalist (The Electric Kool Aid Acid Test, The Right Stuff) ladled into his first work of fiction huge portions of contemporary realities: Wall Street shenanigans during the booming '80s, the wretched excesses of the newly rich, racial turmoil, corrupt politicians, a criminal-justice system in free fall. Ever since, the question has been, can Wolfe the novelist do it again? The answer is imminent. A Man in Full is set chiefly in Atlanta and features an aging real estate developer more than a billion dollars in debt and a potentially explosive rape accusation against a black Georgia Tech running back. Get ready for a wild read. When: Publication date is Nov. 12. Books may be in stores a few days earlier.

THOROUGHLY EXAMINED LIVES At least as far back as the days of Plutarch, stories about real people, usually notable if not always virtuous, have attracted an avid readership. Nothing has changed. This fall will see big biographies of:

MUHAMMAD ALI In King of the World, David Remnick, new editor of the New Yorker, assesses the life of the Greatest, particularly his astonishing emergence and self-re-creation during the tumultuous '60s.

CHARLES LINDBERGH Award-winning biographer A. Scott Berg (Max Perkins, Goldwyn) was granted total access to the aviator's vast archives. Berg's Lindbergh portrays the private man behind the public legend.

RUDOLF NUREYEV The Russian dancer's 1961 defection from the U.S.S.R. to the U.S. made headlines. In Nureyev, author Diane Solway looks at his glittering career onstage and his fascinating life behind the scenes.

ANNE FRANK What is there to know about her that she didn't tell us in her famous Diary? A good deal, according to journalist Melissa Muller, whose Anne Frank fills in, through interviews and research, the young diarist's world.

RONALD REAGAN Edmund Morris (The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt) has spent 13 years on Dutch, his account of another Republican President.

IAN MCKELLEN Apt Pupil; Gods and Monsters

Why: To the ordinary moviegoer, Richard II and Richard III might be obscure sequels to Oliver Stone's Nixon biopic. But theater lovers know them as showcases for definitive roles--the stunted man of thought, the malefic man of action--played by Ian McKellen, the prime Shakespearean actor of our time. Now, with leading roles in two ambitious thrillers, Sir Ian, 59, must face the inconvenience of movie stardom. In Gods and Monsters, he is James Whale, the director of Frankenstein, who in his last days seeks a young man to ease his roiling soul. In the Stephen King tale Apt Pupil, he plays an aged Nazi, living incognito in California, who is forced into an uneasy alliance with a curious teenager. McKellen is the soul of pained grace in one film, the spirit of caged evil in the other; but both reveal an actor totally at ease with the camera's stare. Forget, for a second, the march of teen thesps from the WB to the big screen. Ian McKellen is a star of the future. When: Gods and Monsters at the New York Film Festival, then in theaters Nov. 4; Apt Pupil, Oct. 9.

MY MOTHER THE SLAVE, MY BROTHER THE SKINHEAD How did Tolstoy put it? All happy families are on TV; all unhappy families are in movies. In autumn movies, anyway. Here's a six-pack of serioso films that bend the laws of relativity.

BELOVED Jonathan Demme directs Toni Morrison's story of a former slave (Oprah Winfrey) and her brooding brood.

A SIMPLE PLAN A wad of hot money tests the brotherly love of Billy Bob Thornton and Bill Paxton. Director: Sam Raimi.

ONE TRUE THING Renee Zellweger tends ailing mom Meryl Streep in a merciful drama from Carl Franklin.

A SOLDIER'S DAUGHTER An eccentric American family in Paris: Kris Kristofferson stars for director James Ivory.

AMERICAN HISTORY X Two brothers (Edward Furlong, Edward Norton) flirt with neo-Nazism. Tony Kaye directs.

LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL Roberto Benigni's prizewinning tragicomedy of an Italian Jew and his son in a Nazi death camp.

KERI RUSSELL Felicity

Why: If a woman is going to be a movie star, it's often said, the camera must love her. On television that's not the case. The little, pallid screen doesn't require that luminescent quality and usually doesn't display it to very good advantage. This is one reason why the arrival of Keri Russell on TV is so remarkable. Playing a college freshman in a new drama on the WB, Russell has an unusual lightness and naturalness. Of course, she is very pretty, and she is a fine actor as well, but these attributes count for only so much. What Russell also has is grace, a touch of bliss that falls from the heavens, and that gives her a savory presence rarely seen in this mundane medium. As for the show itself, it is far more likable than its demographic neighbors, Dawson's Creek (teens) and Ally McBeal (twentysomethings). The danger is that expectations for it have risen too high, making it the most eagerly anticipated new series of the season. But Russell herself is mostly the reason for this, thus viewers are unlikely to be disappointed. When: Debuts Sept. 29 at 9 p.m. E.T.

AND AS THE BROADCAST NETWORKS SINK SLOWLY IN THE WEST... Each fall brings tremendous excitement and anticipation about the networks' new shows. Except this fall. Not even network executives can muster enthusiasm over a generally weak season that threatens to accelerate the erosion to cable.

ABC After a miserable showing last year, ABC has nowhere to go but up. The Hughleys, which Chris Rock is producing, is one of its stronger new sitcoms.

NBC Seinfeld is gone, E.R.'s price has soared, and NBC just hopes to hold its ground. Trinity, a drama set in Hell's Kitchen, is its least formulaic new entry.

CBS Desperate to attract young men, CBS paid dearly to bring back the NFL. It has also scheduled atypically macho shows like Buddy Faro and Martial Law.

Fox Trying to find a sitcom to match its tremendous successes with dramas and animation, Fox brings us Costello. It's going to have to keep looking.

UPN A show about Abraham Lincoln's butler? That's The Secret Diary of Desmond Pfeiffer. UPN seeks a broader audience, but this is an odd way to attract it.

The WB Aside from Felicity there's Charmed, a surprisingly fun drama with Shannen Doherty as a witch. Watch too for the little noticed but intelligent Hyperion Bay.

JACKSON POLLOCK A Retrospective

Why: Pollock is the totemic figure of modern American art. After his death in a car crash at 44, in 1956, he became famous in a way that no American artist had been before (or has been since)--a sacrificial hero to some, an overblown dauber to others. His influence lies like traces of DNA through 40 years of subsequent painting. With this show--the first Pollock retrospective since 1982, in Paris--curator Kirk Varnedoe is bound to unsettle some settled views. "Jack the Dripper," as the press christened the artist (in his studio, left, with wife and fellow artist Lee Krasner), is unlikely to keep looking like an apostle of pure abstraction. More likely we will see him as, among other things, the last heir to a tradition of epic American landscape that stretches back to the early 19th century. When: Opens Oct. 28 at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.

THE PEOPLE'S CHOICE Vermeer was a blockbuster at Washington's National Gallery in 1996. But for many art lovers, the true Dutch master is Vincent van Gogh. The largest exhibition of his works to appear outside the Netherlands in 25 years opens at the gallery Oct. 4.

Visitors expected: Up to 500,000 Advance reservations: Nearly gone by last week Notable features: Three works never seen in the U.S. Souvenirs: Everything but his ear

RENEE FLEMING A Streetcar Named Desire

Why: Andre Previn has conducted symphony orchestras throughout the world, composed scores for Broadway (Coco) and Hollywood (Bad Day at Black Rock) and even written a dryly witty autobiography (No Minor Chords: My Days in Hollywood). Now he's finally got around to his first opera, a three-hour-long adaptation of Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire, commissioned by the San Francisco Opera. Previn, who turned 69 in April, knows he's leading with his chin--nearly all the great opera composers of the past got started in their 20s or 30s--so he has taken out a classy piece of flop insurance: superstar soprano Renee Fleming is singing the role of Blanche Dubois. "Of course it's inhibiting to make an opera out of so famous a play," he says, "but even if you don't like what I've written, I think it's safe to say you'll love Renee." When: The premiere is Sept. 19.

LITERARY LIBRETTOS Tennessee Williams isn't the only writer who will be appearing at the opera this season:

MOURNING BECOMES ELECTRA Eugene O'Neill's spin on the Greek myth turns up at the Lyric Opera of Chicago on Oct. 6.

ERIC HERMANNSON'S SOUL A story by Nebraska-bred Willa Cather inspires an Opera Omaha production debuting Nov. 11.

OF MICE AND MEN George and Lennie sing when New York City Opera's rendition of John Steinbeck's novella opens Nov. 7.

TERRENCE MCNALLY Corpus Christi

Why: Serious drama has a hard time getting much attention these days, but one sure way, it turns out, is to have some religious conservatives make a stink about it beforehand. McNally's new play concerns a gay Christlike figure who has sex with his apostles. The plot outline alone was enough to draw criticism and even death threats against the author and the Manhattan Theatre Club, which plans to stage the play this fall. Citing security concerns, the theater abruptly canceled the production in May; then, after a barrage of bad publicity and cries of censorship, reversed itself and said the show would go on after all. Which means McNally (Love! Valour! Compassion!; Master Class; the book for Ragtime) in all likelihood has a hit on his hands. And maybe even, once the political posturing is cleared away, an intriguing new play. When: Opens Oct. 13 at the City Center in Manhattan.

ORIGINAL MUSICALS In the wake of The Lion King and Ragtime, they're enjoying boom times. And not just on Broadway.

THE CIVIL WAR Composer Frank Wildhorn (Jekyll & Hyde) musicalizes the epic struggle in a show making its debut this month in Houston.

PARADE Is a 1915 lynching fit material for a musical? Writer Alfred Uhry and director Harold Prince think so. Previews begin in November.

ELABORATE LIVES: THE LEGEND OF AIDA Another elaborate gamble is Disney's remake of the opera, with music by Elton John, opening Oct. 7 in Atlanta.

JOLSON: THE MUSICAL This tribute to the Mammy singer was a hit in London. Mike Burstyn stars in the U.S. tour, beginning next month in Cleveland, Ohio.

FOOTLOOSE You loved the movie...Oh, you didn't? Well, maybe you'll go for the stage version, which just started a pre-Broadway run in Washington.

GRAND CENTRAL TERMINAL

Why: This 1913 Beaux Arts gem is one of America's grandest buildings. But it had fallen into neglect and clutter. Now architects Beyer Blinder Belle have brought back its luster. They reopened walkways, top right, and restored the ethereal ceiling over the main concourse, left. Upscale businesses like Michael Jordan's steak house, bottom, add new sparkle. When: Official rededication Oct. 1.

HELMUT LANG Fall Collection, Spring Show

Why: The designer, whose reputation was built on clothes of spare Germanic coolness splashed with a kinky technotwist, moved to New York City from Vienna in March. It wasn't long before he had unzipped a few ideas that had the Seventh Avenue establishment agog. First, he showed his entire fall collection in teensy pictures on the Internet, where (the horror!) anyone, not just an elite corps of editors, buyers and fashion insiders, could have a look at them. Now he's moved his spring show, which takes place in the fall, to September rather than waiting (the nerve!) until November after the London, Milan and Paris shows. Calvin Klein immediately joined the rebellion, as did Donna Karan and several others. It's not unusual for Lang to be copied. He's credited with bringing us the stretchy T, rubber dresses and a whole slew of offbeat new materials. For this fall, tired of being the fabric frontiersman, he worked instead with layering--Can he bring capes back?--and unusual forms. His colors--white, black, camel and a zing of lemon--were like him: plain but hip. When: Fall collection in stores now. Spring collection to be shown in New York City on Sept. 17.

GRAY FOR YOUR ANATOMY Storm clouds, very dead leaves, the rocks one passes on long fall walks: who knows what the inspiration is, but this season gray is red hot. Almost any gray will do, from a steely blue to a light fog. Just keep it bleak...and chic.

UNPLAIN JANES If you loved spring's strappy shoes, there's no need to go cold turkey for fall. Move on to Mary Janes, like these tweedy Miu Miu showstoppers.

LONG AND PLEATED The folks at Gucci call this magnificent skirt navy, but it looks iron gray to us. Long, but not flowing, it's a uniform for women with real legs.

FUNNEL NECK Designers are keeping the silhouette soft, so sweaters like DKNY's are big. And loose.

A SPLASH One great thing about gray is that it makes every other hue pop. It works best with one colorful thing, so if you want the wine Bottega Veneta hat, opt for the charcoal scarf.