All four candidates in last fall's presidential election probably agreed on one thing--that there is too much sex in movies," says James Toback, director of films like Two Girls and a Guy and Black and White, both of which contain controversial sex scenes. "My question is, what movies are politicians talking about? They are outraged by something that doesn't exist." Toback is right.
America's sweetheart has had some sour experiences recently, but she's not one to dwell on anything negative. Here Jennifer Love Hewitt talks about the whole deal with Carson Daly, the stress of her failed TV series, the challenge of getting in touch with grown-up sexuality on the big screen in Heartbreakers and the joy of being cast opposite actors like Sigourney Weaver, Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin.
Like many of her stunning counterparts, James King wants to parlay her modeling career--she was spotlighted as one of fashion's up-and-coming stars in The New York Times Magazine when she was only 16--into Hollywood success.
Stephan Jenkins is the lead singer of Third Eye Blind, a band whose debut album went platinum an astonishing four times, so playing a raucous rocker--opposite Mark Wahlberg and Jennifer Aniston--in a movie titled Rock Star shouldn't be much of a stretch. Coproduced by George Clooney and based on a true story about Judas Priest in a New York Times article, Rock Star is the tale of an ordinary salesman (Wahlberg) who plays in a tribute band when suddenly he's asked to become the lead vocalist of the real band; Jenkins is the leader of a rival cover band. While Rock Star will be his big-screen debut, Hollywood itself is familiar terrain for Jenkins, thanks to his publicly tumultuous, on-again/off-again relationship with Charlize Theron (which, on the day we speak, appears off).
AGE: 19.
BIG BREAK: Not Another Teen Movie, which skewers boppy flicks from The Breakfast Club to the recent pubescent Pygmalion, She's All That. "Basically, I'm the awkward rebel-artist girl who wears glasses and a ponytail and ends up having a bet made about her by the popular boy," says Leigh. Look out for Randy Quaid as her hard-drinking dad, she warns, as well as plenty of "random dancing."
Most of the year Hollywood up-and-comer Jordana Brewster makes a concerted effort not to get noticed, but a girl can't always hide in the shadows.
To prepare for his big-screen debut, Charlie's Angels director McG locked himself into his chalet and pressed play.
She hasn't been on-screen since Deep Impact two years ago, but she's been plenty busy. Here Tea Leoni talks about how she almost lost her newborn baby, why she was so unhelpful as husband David Duchovny's lifeline on "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" and what inspired her to buy porn for the director of her new film, The Family Man.
Hollywood has paraded a dazzling variety of blonde archetypes before us over the decades. They've come brassy and smart-mouthed, stupid and sensual, luscious and deadly. But floating on a lofty pedestal above the sex-on-tap brazenness of other fair types is the sleek, sophisticated blonde whose glacial beauty, poise and apparent unattainability drive celluloid heroes to distraction. Patrician yet purposefully provocative, this blonde is fire and ice personified, a combination of surface gloss, smarts and slow-fire sexuality. She's never without a great string of pearls and a knockout dress, and she can get off a wisecrack as stylishly as she tosses her head. "We're after the drawing-room type, the real ladies, who become whores once they're in the bedroom," Alfred Hitchcock once said. His cool goddess was Grace Kelly, but you may differ and choose your own muse from our tribute to cinema's iceberg blondes.
Quick, cool decapitations are emerging as the chic way to off bad guys on the big screen. Here, our connoisseur of head-lopping cinema, Joe Queenan, discusses which films feature the most fearless head cuts and suggests a few flicks that could have benefited from a noggin chop.
With last spring's Erin Brockovich and the new Michael Douglas/Catherine Zeta-Jones film Traffic, former wunderkind director Steven Soderbergh has delivered on the promise of sex, lies, & videotape.
Michael Douglas is going to remember 2000 for all kinds of happy personal and professional reasons. Here he talks about life with Catherine and Dylan, the two acclaimed films he made this year -- Wonder Boys and Traffic -- and the remarkable career that led to his current peak.
Thora Birch has been in the business since early childhood, and she's been one of Hollywood's most highly regarded young actresses for years.
He mowed down competition like David Schwimmer and Paul Rudd to win the role of Mel Gibson's cocky best friend in the romantic comedy What Women Want.
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