SHOW BIZ — NEWS, NOTES AND TRENDS ON L.A.’S ENTERTAINMENT INDUSTRY

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It’s not just ABC that’s benefiting from the success of “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?”

Host Regis Philbin has become a fashion trend-setter with the matching shirts and ties he wears in prime time.

“People are going into the stores, even women, and asking for the Regis Philbin look,” said Brian Boye, fashion director for DNR, a fashion trade journal. “He’s given the neckwear industry a shot in the arm.”

Not surprisingly, Philbin is cashing in on his newfound status as a fashion plate. He’s made a deal with Phillips-Van Heusen involving a line of shirts and ties dubbed the Regis Philbin Collection that will be in stores just in time for Father’s Day.

Buyers don’t have to be millionaires to afford the look. A monochromatic shirt and tie set will retail for $77.50. Sold separately, shirts range from $39.50 to $50, and ties go for $38 to $45.

Philbin is outfitted by Beau Brummel in New York City for the ABC show. While his ties and shirts have generated some topspin for Philbin, the combination is not new and has been sported for several years by others in the public eye, most notably Matt Lauer of NBC’s “Today” show, who wears shirts and ties by Italian designer Zegna.

Philbin, however, has a much larger audience in prime time, where “Millionaire” is the No. 1 show.

“What Regis is doing is not new,” Boye said. “But it is new for mainstream America.”

Perhaps the spread of the Regis look is startling because it’s usually women not men who try to copy the fashions they see on television. And Philbin’s role as a fashion hipster may be surprising for another reason as well.

“For someone in his 60s to become a style icon is an interesting development,” Boye said.

First came TV movies based on show business themes. Now E! Entertainment Television is doing an entire series about the biz.

“Hollywood Off Ramp,” its 26-week anthology series, can be seen on Monday nights at 10 p.m.

“It’s really the logical extension of a strategy to broaden and diversify our original programming at ‘E,'” said Greg Brannan, executive vice president of programming at the network. “It’s programming that fits our niche.”

Among the stories on “Off Ramp” will be tales about a sleazy gossip columnist who gets a chilling payback for his work; a woman who takes revenge on her producer brother; and the star of a series of slasher movies who turns out to be a real serial killer.

What makes the programming so bold is that anthology series have a history of failure. So does Hollywood fare. Fox’s sitcom “Action” was a major flop last fall.

“Fox has a different threshold of success than most cable networks,” said Brannan. “I’m not sure ‘Action’ would have failed on ‘E.’ But we are not going to shy away from a show because of a network’s experience. We are not too concerned about what seems to be conventional for our business.”

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