Whatever gets you through the night

(Correction: Because of a reporting error, an item in the Pop! column in yesterday's Living/Arts section misstated when John Lennon died. He was killed 25 years ago.)

John Lennon fans rejoice. With two important anniversaries approaching -- his 65th birthday on Oct. 9 and the 15th anniversary of his death in December -- a wave of new products is hitting the market to remind us who was the Walrus. But do we need another ''Imagine" DVD featuring ''previously unreleased" material to get to know Lennon better? Or is there already plenty of source material available to define one of rock's most complicated, and deified, icons?

''BACKBEAT" (film)

John is: Witty, handsome, and sensitive. But why, in this 1994 film, does he sound so much like Greg Dulli?

Redeeming factor: A script that has John saying lines like: ''I had a word with van Gogh last night. He said if he could do it all again he'd be down here shaking his bottom to 'Blue Suede Shoes.' I gave him your regards."

''JOHN" (new book by first wife Cynthia Lennon)

John is: Insecure wife-beater who is no help when Cynthia tries acid for the first time.

Redeeming factor: Cynthia fully admits that after Lennon's death, she did get letters from a psychic that Cynthia deemed were messages from beyond. ''It was nice to believe, just for a moment, that he really had sent them."

''LENNON" (musical)

John is: Nine different people, two of them black, four of them women, and one of them the original Rum Tum Tugger, Terrence Mann.

Redeeming factor: After just 49 shows, the critically savaged, Yoko Ono-endorsed production closed in Septem-ber.

''THE LIVES OF JOHN LENNON" (book by renowned rock muckraker Albert Goldman)

John is: Anorexic, bisexual doper who was a bad father, bad driver, and bad musician.

Redeeming factor: Goldman's attack, and the need to refute the image presented, brought together Paul McCartney and Ono.

''JOHN LENNON: LIVING ON BORROWED TIME" ( book by former assistant Frederic Seaman)

John is: Occasionally desperate for sex with wife Ono. ''He said that working always made him very horny" and that he could not wait to ''jump Mother's bones."

Redeeming factor: Seaman, who would be busted for taking Lennon's diaries, satisfies anyone who hates Ono by portraying her as a self-promoting druggie intent on divorcing our hero John.

''JOHN LENNON, MY BROTHER" ( book by sibling Julia Baird)

John is: Out of touch for years, but when he does call, he's as charming as ever.

Redeeming factor: Intent during his house-husband years on learning to cook, he reportedly asks Julia, ''What do you do with your lamb?"

GEOFF EDGERS

Moss's boyfriend detained

The rocker boyfriend of embattled supermodel Kate Moss was detained in a drug sweep over the weekend by British police. Pete Doherty's spokesman said yesterday that the Babyshambles frontman spent the night in jail after a drug raid following the band's concert at Shrewsbury Music Hall Saturday. Doherty, who's 26, has been in and out of drug rehab. British newspapers reported last week that Moss has checked into the Meadows rehab clinic outside Phoenix after pictures of the 31-year-old model doing cocaine in a London studio were published in the Daily Mirror tabloid.

'Idol' winner Fantasia: I'm illiterate

''American Idol" winner Fantasia Barrino (inset) reveals in her memoirs that she's functionally illiterate and faked her way through scripted portions of the televised talent show, which she won in 2004. ''You're illiterate to just about everything. You don't want to misspell," Barrino, 21, told ABC's ''20/20." ''So that, for me, kept me in a box and I didn't, wouldn't come out." The R&B singer, who dropped out of school at 17, says the hardest part is not being able to read to Zion, her 4-year-old daughter. ''That hurts really bad," she said, adding that she's learning to read with tutors.

Aniston, Pitt ask $28m for estate

Jennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt, whose divorce should be finalized this week, have put their Beverly Hills estate on the market for $28 million, the Los Angeles Times reported yesterday. The pad is being sold as part of the couple's divorce settlement. Pitt, 41, and Aniston, 36, bought the 10,000-square-foot, Wallace Neff-designed home for about $13.5 million in 2001 and spent two years refurbishing it. Realty agents told the paper it has a screening room with black leather seating, tennis courts, imported mahogany floors, a stainless-steel kitchen, and an art studio with skylights.

Roy Horn discusses life after attack

Two years after he was nearly killed by a tiger, Roy Horn of ''Siegfried & Roy" says he's able to walk short distances. ''I meditate a lot, but I am constantly in pain," he told the Las Vegas Sun. Recalling the night he nearly died, Horn said it was not his time.

FROM WIRE SERVICES