First Brother on Tour

Add Roger Clinton to the list of people on the circuit in the growing seminar business.

For $29 a person, audiences in Los Angeles can hear President Clinton’s brother in July discuss “Growing Up and Overcoming the Obstacles of a Dysfunctional Family.”

The course promises that Roger Clinton will “talk about his struggle to get out from under his brother’s long shadow” and other hurdles the rock musician faced in overcoming his problems with drugs and the law.

“It can be frustrating to have an overachieving sibling. Especially when that sibling becomes the President of the United States,” reads the description in a catalogue for the Learning Annex, which is sponsoring the seminar.

The catalogue says Clinton will talk “candidly about his famous family and what it was like to grow up in the Clinton clan,” and will also reveal “inside stories” of the President and First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton.

On-Ramp to a Bonus

Companies use any number of methods to calculate executive bonuses, but Time Warner Inc. Chairman Gerald M. Levin may have one of the most unusual: his contribution to the much-touted information superhighway.

The proxy statement for Time Warner’s annual meeting this week lists several “qualitative goals” company directors set in determining Levin’s bonus.

One includes “playing an effective role in the public debate concerning government policy and technological standards relating to the ‘information superhighway.’ ”

We Really Do Like You

It’s one thing to call off a deal, but another to also “indicate” you are still friends.

In scrapping merger plans between their two theater chains last week, Cinemark Chief Executive Lee Roy Mitchell and Cineplex Odeon CEO Allen Karp said in a joint statement: “Mr. Mitchell and Mr. Karp indicated that they continue to hold each other and their respective companies in the highest regard.”

New Joan Rivers Opportunity

How do you say “cubic zirconia” in Russian?

Shoppers in Russia have been used to standing in line at stores to buy everything from meat to shoes.

Now a company called Factory Direct Sales Associates says it wants to launch a television home shopping venture in Russia later this year as an alternative.

The company says home shopping will allow Russians to “be in the red without the red tape.”

Briefly . . .

That’s satisfaction: Economists at Minneapolis bank Norwest Corp. note that the Rolling Stones came out $2 million ahead by negotiating a March concert in Tokyo in yen rather than dollars. . . . The “Whole Life Expo” convention next weekend in Pasadena includes a “Massage Environment” where those attending are encouraged to “schedule a short session between lectures.”