Insiders and sources are talking (anonymously, of course). The groundswell is swelling: Paramount, which recently fired its golden boy Tom Cruise for his alleged weirdness, is gunning to have Brad Pitt replace Tom in the role of Main Studly Guy in the next installment of the “Mission Impossible” dynasty. At least, that’s what various reports say that various other reports (in London’s Daily Mail and the Evening Standard) are saying.

Brad apparently would not play Tom’s Ethan Hunt character.

“They’re set on Brad taking over as a gutsy new head operative who puts together his own unique team of specialists,” an anonymous insider tells the Mail. (Ethan would be retired off to some sunny isle with his new wife.)

Paramount, the reports say, is being real gutsy by offering Brad $39 million for the flick, which would make Angelina Jolie’s beau the highest-paid actor in the history of thespianity.

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NUPTIALS DON’T STICK

In a hearing Tuesday, a Macomb County (Michigan) Circuit judge referred the never-ending Eminem-Kimberley Mathers divorce to a mediator.

The couple’s marriage, which lasted all of 82 days (it was more intensive than extensive, you see), was the ill-fated couple’s second go-around with each other.

Marshall Mathers III, who was first wed to Kim from 1999 to 2001, filed for divorce back on April 5. The couple have one daughter, Hailie Jade, 10.

Lawyers for both sides say they’re working toward an amicable settlement.

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BOOK CHAT 1

J.R.R. Tolkien’s son Christopher Tolkien has finished finishing an unfinished book his father started writing in 1918, the BBC reports. “The Children of Hurin,” which features some of the same elves and dwarves that people “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy, took Christopher some 30 years to complete.

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EXTENDING USHER

Grammy-winning R&B megastar Usher, who has conquered theater in a Broadway production of “Chicago,” has extended his conquest by two weeks. The “You Make Me Wanna” singer, who has received some very favorable reviews for his role as Billy Flynn, will make you wanna through Oct. 14.

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BOOK CHAT 2

Prepare your livers (and stock up on the Chianti), Hannibal Lecter is coming back. The New York Times reports the well-spoken, professional gentleman, whose unorthodox culinary tastes and habits have led to so much persecution and prosecution (and lots of dead bodies), will be released Dec. 5 in the new tome “Hannibal Rising.” This time, novelist Thomas Harris will examine Hannibal’s no-doubt halcyon childhood, the tender, formative years he suffered through from ages 6 to 20.

Rather see the movie? It’ll be out a few weeks later in February and will star Frenchman Gaspard Ulliel.

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PAPA’S A RAZZI?

Joe Simpson, it seems, has put the “Papa” back into Paparazzi. According to Radar Online, the man who helped create and shape Jessica and Ashlee Simpson has become a gossip image provider through an exclusive deal with wire service WireImage, which will have papa snapping photos of his own girls at functions, on holidays, and “in other putatively private moments.” (What else would a protective father do?)

The deal effectively shuts out a gaggle of starving pro photogs, not to say it just sounds creepy. Neither Joe nor WireImage responded to Radar’s requests for comment.

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AWARD TO ROMAN

The European Film Academy will present Roman Polanski, 73, with a lifetime achievement award for his “impressive contribution to the world of film” (though not for his 1977 conviction for statutory rape of a 13-year-old girl). The genius director of “Chinatown,” “Rosemary’s Baby” and “Repulsion,” who jumped bail and fled to France to avoid prison, will be lionized in December at an academy do in Warsaw.

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EUROPA, EUROPA

The MTV Europe Music Awards, Nov. 2 in Copenhagen, which celebrated Hans Christian Andersen’s 200th birthday in December, will be hosted by living fairytale Justin Timberlake.

MTV said Tuesday that the Red Hot Chili Peppers were nominated in four categories, while Madonna, Shakira, Nelly Furtado, Christina Aguilera, Kanye West and Muse had three noms each.

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BODY CHAT

Because it’s important to teach the young’ns to accept who they are, Scarlett Johansson, who’s sinfully a-smoulder as a former prostitute in “The Black Dahlia,” says she has no neurotic body issues. She loves herself (almost as much as I).

“I’m curvy – I’m never going to be 5’11” and 120 pounds. But I feel lucky to have what I’ve got,” she tells InStyle magazine. Scarlett said she’d love to switch jobs with President Bush for a day: “I could probably get some things done in the Oval Office.”

Scarlett, 21, also said that, some day, she may share her 5’3″ of voluptuosity for life: “Of course, I want to get married, but I’m way too young.”

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ELISABETH CONTRA ROSIE?

“She is crying every day.” (And it’s not for world peace.)

Thus says an unnamed source to the New York Daily News about “The View” co-host Elisabeth Hasselbeck’s offstage activities. Even though she and Rosie O’Donnell maintain smiley-faced solidarity on-screen, the source says, the conservative – and not very loud – E.H. can’t deal with Rosie’s loud outspokenness and liberal views.

And yet, Rosie’s rep tells the Daily News the gals are bosom buddies: “Elisabeth was at Rosie’s house this weekend with her daughter, Grace.”

“Ratings are up 59 percent,” she said.

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ESZTERHAS INSANITY?

Hollywood’s “90s bete noir Joe Eszterhas, who made gazillions for writing such deconstructive analyses of the psychosexual dynamics of rich people as “Basic Instinct,” “Jade” and “Sliver,” is trying to adapt his one very fat box-office turkey, “Showgirls,” into a musical, TMZ.com says.

Sure, this is the film that made a punchline out of Elizabeth Berkley, who reached new depths of vacuousness in her turn as a ditzy and dumb would-be dancer, but I’ll wager the Paul Verhoeven-helmed flick will someday be recognized as the postmodern masterpiece it is.

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(Philadelphia Inquirer wire services contributed to this column.)

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(c) 2006, The Philadelphia Inquirer.

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AP-NY-09-19-06 1940EDT