October 28, 1993

Five days before New York votes, it seems increasingly likely there will be no televised debates between the two top rivals for mayor. Page B9.

President Clinton's struggle to overhaul the health care system entered a new and treacherous phase today. Act I could be summarized by the images and ideas of a red, white and blue health security card, an impassioned First Lady and the generally accepted notion that the country needs a better health care system.

In its new proposals to pry open automobile trade with Japan, the United States Government is seeking especially to promote sales to Japan of American-built cars and trucks. The effort is being made despite wording in the recent trade framework with Japan that any steps to open the market must benefit other countries as well. In the proposals, which were presented last week, the United States called for "prompt, substantial and sustained" increases in sales not only of foreign automobiles generally but also specifically of American vehicles. Also, the United States wants to promote exports of cars made by the Big Three -- not those made on Japanese assembly lines in the United States.

George M. C. Fisher's decision today to take on the challenge of running Eastman Kodak sent shock waves today through Motorola Inc., the company Mr. Fisher has led through a period of explosive growth and record profitability. "I just read about it on our E-mail," said one Motorola corporate officer, referring to the electronic mail message that alerted him to the news late this afternoon. "I was stunned." So, he said, was the senior Motorola official he was talking to on the telephone when he read the message.

SIR JOHN GIELGUD is surrounded by echoes and reverberations from his past. A long afternoon's conversation in his baronial home flows from Kenneth Branagh to Sarah Bernhardt, doubling around two world wars and crisscrossing a lifetime in the theater. With his precise, vivid memory, he carries with him the history of the English theater in the 20th century. The actor's fifth "King Lear," in a radio production directed by Kenneth Branagh, is scheduled to be broadcast by the BBC on April 14, Sir John's 90th birthday. Other plans are afoot to honor him that day, including a tribute at the Haymarket Theater in London, all of which he has actively discouraged: "I said, don't celebrate. If I can manage to go on working, it's much more interesting. One of the things one does enjoy in old age is being able to make excuses not to do things you don't want to do."