CELEBRITIES : `TOUCH' DOESN'T SLAM CHURCH, SCHRADER CLAIMS.

Byline: Marilyn Beck and Stacy Jenel Smith

Filmmaker Paul Schrader does not anticipate a backlash from religious groups over his Friday-opening MGM ``Touch'' film, despite the fact that it takes an irreverent approach to its tale of a young priest who has the power to heal - and whose body emulates the wounds of the Crucifixion.

``Touch,'' from the Elmore Leonard novel, stars hot actor Skeet Ulrich (``Scream'') as the priest, Bridget Fonda as his love interest (that's right), Tom Arnold as head of a Catholic fundamentalist organization, and Christopher Walken as a fake faith healer trying to capitalize on the priest's gift.

``It's a secular movie ... a comic fable. I was not trying to reach for spiritual feelings,'' says Schrader, whose past run-ins with religious controversy include being at the center of a firestorm of complaints for writing the screenplay for ``The Last Temptation of Christ.'' He adds, ``I never saw this as an attack on the church.''

Schrader notes, ``I consider `Light Sleeper,' which I made a few years ago, with Willem Dafoe and Susan Sarandon, more of a spiritual movie than this. It's ironic; my movie about drug dealers is spiritual, and my movie about a stigmatic isn't.''

Schrader's back in more familiar (dark, criminal) territory with ``The Antagonist,'' on which he just started production in Canada with Nick Nolte as a small-town cop and James Coburn as his vicious, violent father.

The big-screen scene

It sounds as though Sandra Bullock's famed sunshiny quality will be coming up against a lot of emotional clouds come April, when she's set to begin filming ``Hope Floats'' in Austin, Texas, with Forest Whitaker directing. According to sources familiar with the script, the drama will have Sandra playing a character who's despondent and has extremely low self-esteem - following years of an unhappy marriage that ends when she discovers her husband's long-time affair with her best friend. She goes home to her parents with her young daughter - with whom she's also having problems - to try to start life anew.

The film, which certainly gives Bullock an acting challenge, is said to have been a major point in her deal with 20th Century Fox to make ``Speed 2'' for the studio. ``Speed 2'' is due for release on the Fourth of July, and the stakes on that picture are enormous, not only for Fox - which is reportedly laying out $104 million-plus for the feature - but for Bullock, whose ``In Love and War'' with Chris O'Donnell has proven a box-office disappointment.

On the bright side

``Single Guy'' Jonathan Silverman is keeping his chin up about his series being ousted from its prime Thursday night time slot. The show goes on hiatus for a few weeks at month's end, then will return ``and try to conquer Wednesday nights,'' as Silverman puts it. ``We're glad we're being kept on during the all-important sweeps,'' Silverman says. Among the ``Single'' sweeps goods we can expect to see: on Thursday's episode, his character gets a promotion and a new office and thinks everything's going wonderfully at his job - until he discovers his mom (Suzanne Pleshette) is having an affair with his boss.

Don Rickles will be introduced on the Feb. 20 ``Single Guy'' as the father of Sam (Joey Slotnick). Silverman notes that his family and the Rickleses have been friends for a long time. In fact, Jonathan's father, Rabbi Hillel Silverman, is flying out to L.A. from Connecticut next month to perform the marriage ceremony for Don's daughter, Mindy, and her fiance. As far as Jonathan's much-discussed nonnuptial state with his love Annalee, all he has to say is, ``We have no plans, nothing has changed.''

Show' em the money

Superproducer Dick Wolf was outspoken about what he considers the industry ``virus'' of actors' salary demands back when his ``New York Undercover'' leads, Malik Yoba and Michael Delorenzo, went AWOL from their set in a pay/creative-control dispute last year. (They backed down in the face of a lawsuit.)

So ... how does he feel about the ``Seinfeld'' cast mates now asking $1 million per show? ``I don't think they'll get it, but they'll end up a lot happier than they are making $125,000 an episode,'' says Wolf. ``Funny. Half of them play unemployed people, don't they?'' He also notes, ``They're making their demands known far in advance, which is a lot different than not showing up for work. And their level of success is so overwhelming there is at least some understandability to their demands, outrageous as they may be.''

As for Malik and Michael, who complained bitterly that they were vilified in their ``Undercover'' battle, Wolf says, ``Things have calmed down and everybody is in a professional modality - and we have a couple of episodes coming up that are real barn burners, including one that has to do with the assassination of Martin Luther King.''