The Brit Who Went Up in Marketability

Sometimes there is such as thing as good bad publicity.

Orders for a home video starring Hugh Grant, the British actor recently arrested for allegedly having sex in his car with a prostitute he picked up in Hollywood, have jumped 30% in just days, said Atlantic Entertainment, the distribution arm of Atlantic Studios Corp.

“Our Sons,� starring Grant, Julie Andrews and Ann-Margret, is about two mothers and their gay sons. Grant plays a man whose companion, played by Zelijko Ivanek, is dying of AIDS.

A poll by on-line entertainment magazine Mr. Showbiz shows that more than two out of five people are now more likely to see Grant’s upcoming film “Nine Months� than they were before the actor’s arrest.