PRE-`AMISTAD' REST FOR SPIELBERG.

Byline: Marilyn Beck & Stacy Jenel Smith

Steven Spielberg and his wife, Kate Capshaw, are taking off on a 10-day holiday, his last chance for leisure before he starts directing ``Amistad'' next month, most likely with Morgan Freeman and Matthew McConaughey in the starring roles. Spielberg is not planning on doing promotion for the NBC airing of his ``Schindler's List'' movie next month. We're told that after spending nearly two years passionately promoting the theatrical release of the epic and working with survivors of the holocaust, Spielberg feels he's all talked out on the subject for now. Some of those survivors will be giving interviews in conjunction with the NBC broadcast of the haunting drama.

The inside track

Garth Brooks reveals he is in the early planning stages for a live TV concert extravaganza at summer's end in New York's Central Park. He doesn't know yet whether it will air as a pay-per-view offering or appear on nonpay TV. Meanwhile, the man who boasts record sales of more than 61 million (second only to the Beatles) is contemplating getting a new album out by next yuletide. Maybe. ``If it's ready, fine. If not, it won't be rushed.''

Peabo Bryson is wrapping his latest album, a project he says will remind people ``that I'm a musician and composer first - they think I just jotted down a few lyrics when I say I wrote a song. The music on this album has given me an opportunity to stretch, play guitar and be a real musician as well as a singing artist.''

Bryson took time out from working on the tentatively titled ``Love Is Blind'' CD to guest on an episode of Robert Townsend's ``The Parent 'Hood,'' that airs Feb. 16. In the segment, Wendell (Faison Love) takes a job driving a taxi and ends up driving Bryson to his concert date. ``I leave my cell phone in the taxi and he chases me down,'' says Bryson. ``I invite them all to the program, and it's really about the trauma they go through trying to get into the show.''

The videoland view

Morgan Fairchild, who plays the mother of a 17-year-old runaway in NBC's Feb. 3 ``Into the Arms of Danger'' TV movie, says she was thrilled when she was offered the part because, ``I had spent the last few years trying to get out of the stereotype of playing the vixen bitch.''

Says Fairchild, who starred on NBC's ``Flamingo Road,'' and spent last year making ABC's daytime ``The City'' soap, ``I had a hard time getting anyone to envision me without makeup. `Into the Arms of Danger' was a dream. I play a suburban mom. I get to wear jeans and sneakers and very little makeup - it was exactly what I was looking for.'' What is she doing next? She's looking - and does have a development deal with ABC.