PRESSING ISSUES Birkhead, Opri (inset) (Photos: Getty Images)

In fact, he tells Radar, it's his former attorney Debra Opri who has tried to strong-arm him into paying an alleged $620,000 debt to her by appearing on an "Oprah-like" show with her and his daughter Dannielynn.

"She won't be happy until I'm sitting on the couch with Oprah and my daughter saying I owe her everything," Birkhead says in an exclusive to Radar. "We'll just go take it to court and see who wins."

The bio-dad of the late Anna Nicole Smith's baby insists he spent thousands in mediation trying to work out a settlement with Opri but that the negotiations came down to him declaring publicly that he owed her everything, including the custody of his daughter. "My child is very healthy and happy, no thanks to her. My DNA tests were ordered into the Bahamas, and she still wants to take all the credit for it."

Opri calls the claim a "ridiculous Larry Birkhead ploy" and denies that she ever tried to get Birkhead to appear on a talk show with Dannielynn. She accuses him of violating the confidentiality of a mediation. "He and his attorney want to make a circus out of this," says Opri, whose original payment deal with Birkhead was based on him being paid for media agreements. On the flip side, Birkhead has filed against her with the Bar Association, saying she's leaked info on his case. Both have spoken to the press to accuse each other of, well, seeking press (often while simultaneously claiming that they try and avoid the press, as both parties have claimed to Radar).

"I lost a lot of time when I didn't have my child. My first job is to be a father," Birkhead tells Radar. Reports of his pending daddy-and-me reality show are overblown, he adds, adding that he's committed to nothing. "I turned down rappin' with the stars [Celebrity Rap Challenge] and some of these things they approached me with," including a slasher flick script, he says, in which "maybe someone would like to have me killed in the first minute or two."

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• Birkhead v. Attorney, the Battle Rages