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TV Week's TCA blog attended the press conference for Men In Trees, a show on ABC's fall schedule starring Anne Heche as a relationship guru who swears off men, only to find herself stranded in Alaska and surrounded by the incorrigible critters! (We give it six weeks.) One brave TV critic soldier gingerly broached the subject of Heche's tinfoil-hat-wearing past:

He started gently, asking for a "status report" on how Ms. Heche was "doing."

"It seems like you're totally ... ," he paused, searching for the most respectful word.

"Sane?" Heche suggested.

"Sane," he confirmed, with more than a little relief that Heche herself had said it.

"I'll let myself speak for myself," she said confidently. "Obviously I'm sitting up here with a group of incredible people.

While the wording may seem unusual, rest assured that for Heche, allowing "herself to speak for herself" comes only after having made great strides in the sanity department. As recently as the Seven Days and Seven Nights press junket, for example, the actress would respond to every question by insisting on having "her people" speak for her; then, following a series of bizarre tongue clicks and eye rolls, she'd begin to channel the raspy, smoker's tones of "Linda," the highly protective "publicist" who lived inside her head.