VIDEO & TVRecord Orders: Nine days before...

VIDEO & TV

Record Orders: Nine days before it hits the stores, Walt Disney Home Video’s “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” on Monday had already received a landmark 27-million advance retail orders. If the retailers’ predictions are right, the video should quickly break the previous record set by another Disney release, “Aladdin,” which sold more than 24-million copies in six months. That record bested yet another Disney video, “Beauty and the Beast, which sold 22-million copies. The first shipment of “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” arrives in stores on Oct. 25; Disney hopes to fulfill all advance orders before Christmas.

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Canine Classics: PBS has announced plans for a new kids’ series, “Wishbone,” designed to instill a love of literature in young children. The program follows Wishbone the dog, a live Jack Russell terrier, whose imagination lands him in the middle of signature scenes from such classics as “Oliver Twist,” “The Odyssey” and “Romeo and Juliet.” The half-hour series, to be produced by Big Feats! Entertainment, is expected to premiere on public television next fall.

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Kudos: The Emmy-winning CBS series “Picket Fences” today picks up another honor--a PASS (Prevention for a Safer Society) Award from the National Council on Crime and Delinquency. The annual New York awards recognize efforts in TV, advertising and broadcast journalism that further public understanding of crime control and prevention issues. . . . The American Women in Radio & Television’s Southern California chapter will honor “Days of Our Lives” star Deidre Hall and radio executive Erica Farber on Friday with its 1994 Industry Awards during a ceremony at Beverly Hills’ Hotel Sofitel Ma Maison. . . . Actress Joan Collins will receive the Associates for Breast Cancer Studies’ first Entertainment Industry Humanitarian Award on Friday during the group’s annual “Salute to Hollywood” fund-raiser at the Beverly Hilton.

MOVIES

Cuban Epic: Samuel Goldwyn plans to distribute “The Lost City,” an epic drama about Cuban politics directed by and starring Cuban-born actor Andy Garcia (“When a Man Loves a Woman”). Set in late 1950s Havana, against the fall of the Batista government and the emergence of Fidel Castro, “The Lost City” is written by Cuban author Guillermo Cabrera Infante. Production is scheduled to begin next fall.

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Film Symposium: Creative Artists Agency, International Creative Management and the William Morris Agency, usually fierce competitors in the Hollywood talent business, have united to sponsor “The UK/LA Symposium on Film,” a public discussion of British and American Cinema and their roles in the international market of the 21st Century. Taking place at Sony Studios at 7:30 tonight, the symposium is part of the citywide UK/LA Festival.

CLASSICAL MUSIC

Symphony on Radio: Radio station KUSC-FM (91.5) and its affiliates will broadcast the Long Beach Symphony Orchestra’s 1994-95 season in a six-concert series beginning Oct. 28 at 8 p.m. with Brahms’ Symphony No. 2, Ravel’s “La Valse,” and Bartok’s posthumously-completed “Viola Concerto,” with violist Paul Neubauer as soloist. Future concerts, which will feature intermission interviews with guest artists and the symphony’s music director JoAnn Falletta, will air on Dec. 9, Feb. 10, March 31, April 28 and June 9.

POP/ROCK

Twitty’s Estate Sold: Fans, collectors and family members bid more than $1 million for the belongings of the late country singer Conway Twitty over the weekend, snapping up everything from cars to Christmas decorations at a three-day auction at Twitty City, a Tennessee complex where the entertainer and his family lived. There were buyers for all 3,000 of the items offered, with Twitty’s widow spending nearly $80,000 on a car, jewelry and a jukebox. But three of Twitty’s children from an earlier marriage refused to buy any of their father’s belongings. They had fought to stop the auction ordered this year by a Sumner County judge as a result of a family feud over disposition of Twitty’s estate. Twitty died June 5, 1993, after a blood vessel burst in his abdomen. He was 59.

QUICK TAKES

Actress Jodie Foster is set to star in Warner Bros.’ “Contact,” an extraterrestrial movie based on astronomer Carl Sagan’s book. Principal photography is expected to begin late next summer. . . . Twentieth Century Fox will premiere its “Miracle on 34th Street” remake on Nov. 15 at New York’s Radio City Music Hall. The film will be accompanied by a 30-minute live stage show featuring scenes from “The Radio City Christmas Spectacular.” . . . NBC has ordered an additional 11 episodes of its hit hospital drama, “ER,” bringing the total number of episodes to 24, two more than the usual full-season commitment. . . . Parodymeister “Weird Al” Yankovic, who performs at the House of Blues on Wednesday, will be at Sunset Boulevard’s Tower Records tonight at 6 to sign autographs and celebrate the release of his new four-CD boxed set, “Permanent Record.”