Gary Busey in a zone that's all his own

To some people, he's still Buddy Holly. But to most, Gary Busey is a wack though entertaining reality-TV star -- "Celebrity Rehab With Dr. Drew," "Celebrity Apprentice," "Celebrity Wife Swap."

His latest reality endeavor is "The Busey Zone," an online entity to be launched this month. In fact, he filmed his telephone interview with the Star Tribune for the new site.

"Once you check in, you can't check out," he promises of www.buseyzone.com.

If it's anything like the interview, it will be unpredictable -- a little bit sweet and a whole lotta crazy. Ask the 67-year-old Hollywood personality a question and it's an invitation for him to say something profound (which he then stops to write down), take an off-the-wall tangent or claim he didn't hear because of his hearing aid.

By the by, he will get his ear gear adjusted at Starkey Hearing in Eden Prairie this week before he talks and sings Friday night at a screening of "The Buddy Holly Story" -- the 1978 film that made him famous -- at the Parkway Theater in Minneapolis.

The event coincides with the day Holly died in a plane crash in 1959, flying from Clear Lake, Iowa, to a gig in Moorhead, Minn. Busey can talk about the misjudgment of the pilot who flew the small plane in a snowstorm that frigid night, but he'd rather discuss the movie's screenplay.

"There were things that were left out of the movie that should have been in there, and there were scenes in the movie that should not have been in there," Busey said. "What happened was the screenwriter was manic-depressive. These guys had never made a movie before and someone told me if we change anything, the screenwriter might hurt himself. So when the movie came out, it had such great reviews -- that's the day the screenwriter killed himself. Amazing how life treats you when you don't treat life well."

Busey stopped for a moment so he could write down that last line. It could end up on an album he's co-writing in Nashville with Billy Burnette and Dennis Morgan, a Minnesota native who has penned hits for Barbara Mandrell, Eric Clapton and Aretha Franklin. Rob Fraboni, who has worked with Bob Dylan, the Band and Clapton, will produce.

"We've written five songs together and two of them were over the phone," Busey said of his collaborations with Morgan.

The album will be recorded under the name Gary Busey, not Teddy Jack Eddy -- the stage name Busey used back in the 1970s during a two-year stint as a drummer for piano man Leon Russell and, before that, on a Tulsa TV show.

Russell "wanted me to use Teddy Jack Eddy," Busey recalled. "He's pretty smart. When he went to the premiere with me and Jeff Bridges to see 'The Buddy Holly Story,' he walked over to me in the studio the next day and said, 'I know a star has been born.'"

Busey's next project after "Holly" was "Foolin' Around," filmed in the Twin Cities with Annette O'Toole, Cloris Leachman and Eddie Albert. "We shot at Lake Minnytonka [his pronunciation] and the Pillsbury mansion," the actor recalled. "A beautiful, beautiful place.'

"With Tom Petty, we played 'Rock 'n' Roll Music' by Chuck Berry, and we started backing up on the stage and I started hitting him and he started hitting me and we both went down," Busey reminisced as if it were yesterday. "His head ended up on my stomach with my legs straight in the air with the guitar strap between my legs. Try to pick that up and play it."

On Friday, Busey will try to reprise the fun in Minneapolis with a Holly tribute band.

"It'll be more fun," he promised. "It'll be divine."