Kim Basinger Must Go Courting

Kim Basinger has some explaining to do.

A Los Angeles judge has ordered the Oscar winner to appear at a hearing on Oct. 4 for allegedly ignoring court orders to let ex-hubby Alec Baldwin visit the dueling actors' 10-year-old daughter, Ireland.

Superior Court Judge Robert A. Schnider said Basinger, 52, could face contempt charges if she doesn't turn up before Court Commisioner Maren E. Nelson to address allegations that the actress kept her estranged ex from seeing the girl, violating his visitation rights.

The latest hitch in what has become a knock-down, drag-out custody battle began after Baldwin, 48, filed a motion claiming his former missus failed to inform him on several occasions that she would be out of town for work, thus denying The Hunt for Red October star an opportunity for Ireland to stay with him at his L.A. residence until Basinger returned.

Baldwin also accused Basinger of disregarding the judge's orders following a June 2004 trial that resulted in the two sharing legal custody. He says that the L.A. Confidential star should have told him when Ireland had hurt herself and required medical attention. (No word on her injury, but the girl is reportedly well now.)

"Certain orders require her to inform him of certain matters affecting their child," the actor's attorney, Vicki Greene, told E! Online.

Basinger's lawyer, Neal Hersch, did not return a phone call seeking comment. But he told the Associated Press that the charges were "northing more than continued harassment."

"These allegations are specious and Kim looks forward to her vindication," he said.

Greene asserted that her client filed a motion with the court because under California law, if one party violates a court's order, it's up to the other party to make sure that order is enforced.

"From Alec's perspective, he would prefer she would obey the court order, but if she violated the court order, this is a request to order her to comply," Greene said, adding that the court will take testimony and evidence at the October hearing.

After seven years of matrimony, the couple split in December 2000. Basinger filed for divorce a few months later, citing irreconcilable differences.

The divorce became final in September 2002, but by then, tensions between the actors boiled over and they began trading jabs at each other in court papers as they worked out custody details.

Nelson has been monitoring the warring factions to make sure both live up to the visitation arrangements originally set in 2004, when they called a truce and agreed to split parenting chores.

However, things heated up again this spring when Baldwin was granted three extra visitation days with Ireland after the girl came down with strep throat and couldn't make a scheduled trek to New York, where Baldwin lives most of the year.

In June, Nelson ordered The Marrying Man, his ex and their daughter to each undergo a psychological evaluation to find out whether Baldwin was attempting turn their little girl against her mom, or the other way around--that Basinger had a "pathological need" to turn Ireland against her father--as Baldwin's camp asserted in court papers filed.

The ex-couple has found time to squeeze in some work between court dates.

Baldwin has roles in Martin Scorsese's The Departed, the Robert De Niro-directed The Good Shepherd and the quirky indie drama Running with Scissors, all due out later this year. He's also playing a ball-busting TV executive in NBC's new fall comedy 30 Rock.

Basinger, meanwhile, recently turned up in theaters opposite Michael Douglas in The Sentinel. She next stars in the romantic tale The Mermaid Chair, which premieres Saturday on the Lifetime cable channel.