O.J. Passes On Reality Show, But...

Contrary to widely circulated reports, O.J. Simpson said Thursday he won't be the star of a reality television show, but might consider becoming a news commentator for actor Robert Blake's murder trial.

"I have no plans in any way to do a reality show even though people have approached me about it," Simpson said in a telephone interview from his Miami home. "I'm not looking to do anything. I don't have agents out there looking for something for O.J."

Simpson said he's been contacted about a reality show that would chronicle his day-to-day life but he's not interested.

"There's no plans in the Simpson family to have any cameras coming in our house," he said.

But Simpson said he knows where the new reports came from: He's aware of video footage shot during his travels to a series of hip-hop concerts in 2001 and 2002.

"To be honest, this footage would get pretty boring," he said. "Maybe for a half-hour it would be interesting but not for a series."

He said the videos show him arriving at airports, signing autographs and talking at hip-hop concerts.

"I had a lot of fun," he said. "We were welcomed everywhere. But this was not meant to be shown anywhere except as rebuttal to those who say I'm a pariah."

Urban Television Network Corp., a Fort Worth, Texas, satellite and cable channel, and Miami production company Spiderboy International said they're planning to create 13 one-hour episodes of the show using archived footage of Simpson.

"We've got everything done, the reality show is coming," Spiderboy founder Norman Pardo said Wednesday. But Simpson's lawyer said he hadn't been contacted about it.

Urban America has about 70 affiliates and reaches 22 million households.

As for commenting on the Blake case, he said TV outlets have contacted him, but he declined to name them.

"I'd love to do it," he said. "I think I have a lot of insight. I don't know if he's guilty or not but I know there's no such thing anymore as innocent until proven guilty."

Blake is accused of murdering wife Bonny Lee Bakley in Los Angeles in 2001. He's free on $1.5 million bail and is scheduled for trial in October.

Simpson, a football Hall of Famer, was tried and acquitted of murder after the 1994 slayings of ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman, but a civil jury later held him liable and ordered him to pay the victims' survivors $33.5 million. He hasn't worked since then because any money he makes could be seized to satisfy that judgment, which remains largely unpaid.

"I'm well aware of my situation," he said Thursday. "I didn't commit the crime and I don't think these people deserve anything. I'm not putting myself in a position of having to give them anything."