An Industry Murder Mystery

It’s the third time out for former KNBC-TV Channel 4 anchorwoman Kelly Lange, whose previous works, “Trophy Wife” and “Gossip,” established her in women’s commercial fiction. Not quite as “denim-to-diamonds” as a Danielle Steel oeuvre but easily as slick in the pacing, “The Reporter” does not stray far from Lange’s oft-chosen premise: When a rich, powerful and deeply loathed man (picture Sansabelt pants, white guayabera shirt) is murdered, all eyes turn to a bevy of scorned gals.

Here, in “The Reporter,” Jack Nathanson, an Oscar-winning actor whose glory days are a faded memory, has been shot in the home of his first wife, Debra Angelo, a sort of Italian-style Joan Collins. At the funeral, which is actually attended by Joan Collins, as mourners gather around Nathanson’s Lucite coffin (a detail that novelist Bruce Wagner would envy), we meet our cast. Maxi Poole, the TV reporter of the title, is spouse No. 2. Her money troubles began the minute she married the debt-ridden actor. Nathanson’s current wife, agent Janet Orson, appears suspiciously composed for a grieving widow. Then there’s the Linda Blair-like former child star who was psychologically scarred in the making of Nathanson’s hit, “Black Sabbat,” and, finally, his DJ mistress, who’s got a nasty temper and a penchant for crack (ho-hum).

Lange lays out her thriller with all the sophistication of a game of Clue, albeit one with a dash of industry verite--in particular, a film premiere scene name-drops and tattles nicely. “The Reporter” is an entertaining, if predictable mystery made better by Lange’s 28 years behind the desk.