Never mind those Curtiss Helldiver fighter planes circling the Empire State Building in “King Kong.”

The real threat to Broadway’s big ape may be those vicious drama critics.

They strafed the $35 million spectacle, which opened Nov. 8 and is by far the most expensive show of the season. The 20-foot-tall puppet got its due — and it is a remarkable creation — but minor things like, oh, the script and score, got clobbered.

Can this wounded beast limp along until the Tonys?

Word is there aren’t plans to close “King Kong” anytime soon, though it’s an open secret that other shows are circling the Broadway Theater, wondering when it will be back on the market. January and February can be pretty cold, even if your leading man is covered in fur.

But “Kong” is blessed with deep-pocketed producers, the Australian firm Global Creatures. One of its shows, “Walking With Dinosaurs,” grossed millions of dollars.

Global Creatures spent nearly 10 years developing “King Kong,” and sources say the company is fighting for the show. What a source calls an “aggressive” television campaign began this week, and the footage of Kong is impressive.

Kong will also put in an appearance at Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade next week which, with its millions of viewers, does move tickets.

The hope is that “Kong” can trample its bad reviews and go straight for tourists who now make up nearly 65 percent of the Broadway audience.

“We did not go into this naively,” a production source says. “I don’t think we ever thought the critics would be on our side. But we’ve got a great title and the big guy delivers the goods.”

The problem is the expense. “Kong” grossed a little more than $900,000 last week. But with a running cost north of $700,000, that’s not a big profit. Earning back $35 million is a tall order.

Global Creatures has another, infinitely more promising show headed to Broadway: “Moulin Rouge,” which earned raves over the summer in Boston.

Days after it opened, there were rumors it would come to Broadway this season. But Global Creatures didn’t want to compete with itself, so “Moulin Rouge” won’t get here until the summer.

The Broadway crowd doesn’t think much of “King Kong,” so don’t look for many Tony nominations in the spring. But there is a sense that the show got a raw deal from the Times, which reviewed “Kong” in the form of a dialogue between the paper’s critics, Ben Brantley and Jesse Green. They tried to out-Addison DeWitt each other, though neither came up with anything as good as the zingers in “All About Eve.”

Their one-two punch ticked off a lot of theater people.

“It’s bad enough to get a lousy review from one of them,” says a veteran producer not involved in “King Kong.”

“But to get dumped on by the two of them is excessive.”

Another producer calls the dialogue of dish “vile,” adding, “It’s beneath the paper.”

Carping about critics gets producers absolutely nowhere, but I haven’t seen people this agitated about press coverage in a long time.

The Broadway League may issue a formal complaint. Pointless, but producers have to let off steam somehow.

“Celebrity Autobiography” was always a hoot at off-Broadway’s Triad Theater, where first-rate actors read excerpts from third-rate celebrity memoirs. The writing in these books was so bad and the narcissism so thick, the actors didn’t have to push too hard to bring down the house.

Richard Kind killed with a “straight” reading of “Vanna Speaks” by Vanna White: “Once while turning the letters in the middle of a round, my belt broke and nearly fell off. But I just held on to it and kept flipping those panels.”

I’m happy to report that “Celebrity Autobiography” is back, this time on Broadway. Beginning Nov. 26, the show will be in residence four consecutive Monday nights at the Marquis Theatre. Performers include Lewis Black, Alec Baldwin, Rachel Dratch, Susan Lucci and Mario Cantone.

Go and have a blast.

You can hear Michael Riedel weekdays on “Len Berman and Michael Riedel in the Morning” on WOR radio 710.