SHORT TAKES : Hogan Sick of ‘Shrimp on Barbie’

SYDNEY, Australia —  Paul Hogan, star of the “Crocodile Dundee” films, threatened today to sue tourism authorities if they did not withdraw his 6-year-old TV advertisements promoting Australia as a holiday destination.

Hogan, in a letter to a newspaper, complained that the Australian Tourist Commission had overused the actor’s “shrimp on the barbie” commercial in which he invited North Americans to vacation in Australia.

He said the commission had reneged on a verbal agreement that there would be “no cheap-looking ads (and) no endless repetition of the same old commercials.”

Last week, the authority announced that Greg Norman, the world’s No. 1 golfer, would take over from Hogan as the principal promoter of Australian tourism.