Journalist, Author & Syndicated Columnist
J.R. Richards quit college to be in a band. His parents weren’t disappointed. “I was a music major, and there’s not much you can do with that other than teach or conduct,” Richards said, calling from his record company’s Hollywood digs. “I couldn’t envision myself doing either.”
Jason Gedrick’s career is red hot. The actor who claims that girls weren’t interested in him in high school now has a file devoted to him on America Online, where cyber fans lovingly dissect the merits of his acting, hobbies and, uh, other attributes.
The Smashing Pumpkins have an open invitation from the producers of “The Simpsons.” Should the Chicago-based supergroup ever decide to stop the music, they are welcome to join the cartoon’s cast.
“People are so preoccupied with the way they look, and looks are just a small aspect of any person,” Ben Chaplin, 26, said, having high tea at the Ritz-Carlton. “In my eyes, women who are smart and funny and confident have always been the most attractive ones. They just have this air about them that makes you want to be with them. I think there are plenty of women who are beautiful on the outside and lost on the inside, and their beauty ultimately isn’t nearly as interesting.”
The Jesus Lizard is about the last band anyone expected to sign to a major label. But seven years after its inception, the exhilarating hard-core alternative band has jumped to Capitol – home of the Beatles.
Writer-director David O. Russell looks a lot like Ben Stiller, who stars in Russell’s latest picture, “Flirting With Disaster.” The physical similarity hasn’t been lost on the director of the critically acclaimed “Spanking the Monkey.” “I wouldn’t say that that’s why Ben got the part,” Russell said earlier this month during a lunch interview at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel downtown. “But yes, it’s come to my attention that there is a likeness between the two of us.”
“Leaving Las Vegas” co-stars Nicolas Cage and Elisabeth Shue each won top acting honors at the Chicago Film Critics Awards Monday night at the Park West. But best picture recognition went to Ron Howard’s “Apollo 13.” Shue made no attempts to hide her pleasure at winning and said that growing up with three brothers (including Andrew Shue of “Melrose Place”) made trophy collecting a competition in her household.
It wasn’t until recently that the five young actor/filmmakers who made the clever and hilarious “Bottle Rocket” learned that their producer, James L. Brooks, hated their first presentation to him. “I asked Jim, `So, what did you think of that reading we gave?’ ” said co-writer and co-star Owen Wilson, 27, one of three brothers involved in the project. “He said, `It was the worst one I ever heard in my whole life.’ ”
Jackie Chan’s stunt man has the easiest job in film. All of Chan’s action films are full of dangerous free falls, explosions and rapid-fire kung fu fighting, but the stunt man doesn’t have to participate in any of them. Chan insists on doing all the stunts himself and uses his stunt man more as a double. “I believe all the people who come to my movies buy tickets not to see the double,” said Chan. “They want to see me do everything, which is why I do all my own stunts. My double does things like run from a car into a store.”
Jackie Chan isn’t the only Asian actor ready for the big screen. After decades of being relegated to roles playing houseboys or, worse yet, losing roles to Caucasian actors made up to look Oriental, actors of Asian descent finally are getting their time on the big and little screens in America. Heck. Even the all-American hero, Superman, is played — on TV — by Dean Cain, who is part Japanese.