Tina Brown Rips Rosie

Now we know who won’t be taking over Rosie O’Donnell’s chair on ABC’s “The View.”

When asked Thursday whether she’d be interested in the job, Tina Brown said, “Oh, I’m not trying to turn into some barrel-chested, loud-mouthed …” Trailing off into the roar of laughter from the crowd, she followed, “Sorry about that, Rosie.”

The British columnist, editor and celebrity journalism pioneer stopped by Nathan’s of Georgetown on Thursday to promote her new book, “The Diana Chronicles” in an interview with saloon owner Carol Joynt, part of the restaurant’s “Q&A Café” series.

“We’re left with these hopeless wannabes,” said Brown of recent Los Angeles jailbird Paris Hilton. “Diana is gone, and people want something that’s not about Britney Spears’ [nether regions].”

She told Yeas & Nays that the book is “flying off the shelves at Barnes and Noble.” Teasing its content, she classified Dodi Fayed, Princess Diana’s last boyfriend, as a “useful summer fling … slightly hopeless,” while calling the royal family’s social scene somewhat “hellish.” British Prime Minister-to-be Gordon Brown wasn’t spared either: Tina Brown coined him “a rather grim public figure.”

Brown’s off-the-cuff pot shots were received with laughter and smiling faces from the crowd, but it wasn’t all fun and games — she spoke seriously about the grave situation Diana found herself in. “She was a deeply wounded animal.”

This isn’t Brown’s first crack at the late British royal icon’s tale of woe. In 1985, just one year after she moved into the head editor office at Vanity Fair, her article “The Mouse That Roared” hit the newsstands as one of the first pieces to challenge the fairy tale romance between Prince Charles and Princess Di. The paparazzi “were terrible to her,” Brown told us before the luncheon. “The photographers used to shout four-letter words at her to get a reaction.”

Later on Thursday, Brown was the guest of honor at a book party at the Northwest D.C. home of Democratic doyenne Beth Dozoretz.