FOR a man so used to the limelight during his sports and acting careers, O. J. Simpson must find it hard to be little more than an extra in his own trial.
As Court TV junkies will know, the defendant sits in the background, impeccably attired in business suit, and usually out of focus since the cameras are trained on the attorneys. Occasionally, the camera will zoom in to catch Simpson rolling his eyes, either at the 87th mention of the bloody glove or from indigestion at the thought of how much it's all costing him.
Unless Simpson eventually takes the stand - which his attorneys don't view as the wisest of moves - the former football legend will have spent almost a year as the main character in a daily soap opera without speaking a word.
Yes, he has finally been upstaged. The trial has a potential cast of thousands, but a few stand out as sure-fire Emmy nominees. There's defence lawyer Johnnie Cochrane, seemingly an expert at one-gloved clients, since he represented Michael Jackson during the child-abuse controversy.
Then there's lead prosecutor Marcia Clark, who only has to curl her hair at a different angle or change her lipstick colour for the tabloids to brand her a sex vixen. In fact, Ms Clark's life is more made-for-TV-movie fodder than the man she's trying to get locked up.
A former dancer, and married once to a professional backgammon gambler who ended up getting shot in the head, she is now being sued for custody of her two children by her second husband. It's a good plot, and Ms Clark has some great lines.
Last week, she begged Judge Lance Ito not to keep the court in evening session because she needed to look after her children, and every news programme in the nation went nuts doing special reports on the issue of working mothers. Proof, finally, that life mirrors art.
