Tattle | Jennifer Love Hewitt fights back

TATTLE WOULD be more than happy to go to the mat to defend

Jennifer Love Hewitt

's curves, but the angry "Ghost Whisperer" is speaking up for herself after Internet pictures of her with cellulite became the object of online mockery. Several Web sites posted the shots, along with some less-than-complimentary comments. TMZ.com, for example, said, "We know what you ate this summer, Love - everything!"

That's cold.

"I've sat by in silence for a long time now about the way women's bodies are constantly scrutinized," Jennifer wrote on her Web site (where numerous fans go looking for photos to scrutinize). "To set the record straight, I'm not upset for me, but for all the girls out there who are struggling with their body image."

"A size 2 is not fat! Nor will it ever be," she wrote. "And being a size 0 doesn't make you beautiful."

(No, but it does make you require ballast in yesterday's wind.)

"What I should be doing is celebrating some of the best days of my life and my engagement to the man of my dreams [actor Ross McCall], instead of having to deal with photographers taking invasive pictures from bad angles. To all girls with butts, boobs, hips and a waist," she wrote, "put on a bikini - put it on and stay strong."

Now that's a stump speech we can get behind, cellulite or not.

Writer's strike update

Count producers Jerry Bruckheimer and Judd Apatow among the Hollywood players who don't expect a resolution to the Writers Guild of America strike anytime soon.

Bruckheimer - whose many movie and TV ("Cold Case," "CSI," etc.) projects have been shut down or postponed due to the strike - said he's not taking sides, but called the timing of the strike unfortunate.

"The problem you have is

they're doing so much negotiating in the press rather than sitting in a room and doing it," Bruckheimer said during an L.A. publicity event for his latest film, "National Treasure 2."

"We're fortunate now because they are talking [but] I think if it breaks off it's going to be a very long strike."

At issue is the revenue generated by the sale and rental of films and TV shows on the Internet, cell phones, and other electronic devices.

"You don't know yet how [the Internet] is going to be profitable. Look at what happened to the music business," Bruckheimer pointed out, about to take a side. "You thought CDs were going to be the thing of the future and all of a sudden iTunes pops up and the record companies are all in trouble, and you have Napster and they're taking everything for free. There are so many things that they don't know that they want to find out what it is first before they start giving away money. So to me it's a little premature to go through all this to a dark area."

(Tattle note No. 1: Bruckheimer may be the most successful movie/TV producer of our time, but . . . CDs were the thing of the future 20 years ago, music artists got paid royalties on CDs just like they were albums and the notion that record companies are in trouble because iTunes is selling music, is silly.)

(Tattle note No. 2: If you call paying someone a residual for work that is being charged for "giving away money," then, yes, one could see why a studio wouldn't want to do that. That, however, is not the case here. As Bruckheimer has probably been "given" millions by Paramount, Disney, CBS and others, you would think he'd want the process to continue.)

Apatow, the writer-director-producer behind movies like "Knocked Up" and "The 40-Year-Old Virgin," is also pessimistic about a quick resolution.

"It doesn't look good right now," he told Tattle's Laura Randall. "If you look at what is being offered by the studios, it's clear that they want this strike to continue and I don't think they're going to get away with it. The writers failed to stand up for themselves with DVDs and felt terrible about it and enough of them will not give up that it will have to be resolved in a reasonably fair manner. I think the writers will still accept a crappy deal, but they won't accept a sh-- deal."

Booze clues

Velvet Revolver frontman Scott Weiland has been arrested - again. TMZ.com says Weiland smacked up his car on an L.A. highway in the early evening of Nov. 21. The police report says he failed a sobriety test and refused to give blood or pee in a cup.

After being booked for "driving under the influence of a drug," he was was released on $40,000 bail.

He'll be back in court on Dec. 13.

* Vivica A. Fox missed her DUI hearing yesterday morning and TMZ.com reports the judge told her attorney she better be properly booked by Dec. 11 or he would order her arrest.

Vivica was arrested in March. How much time does she get?

Tattbits

* On last night's "Extra," "I Am Legend" star Will Smith spoke up for his pal Tom Cruise.

"Tom is one of the greatest spirits that I met," he said. "He dedicates himself to making the world better. And just because our beliefs are different, does that mean we are not allowed to be friends?

Does that mean I need to take out my Bible and club him with it?

"Our twin towers came down because of ignorant religious fundamentalism. I am a student of world's religions and my religion is love."

* During his return to the airwaves yesterday, Don Imus promised to discuss race relations on his new morning show.

"Other than that, not much has changed," he said.

"Dick Cheney is still a war criminal, Hillary Clinton is still Satan and I'm back on the radio." *

Daily News wire services contributed to this report.

Send e-mail to gensleh@phillynews.com