Billie Piper, Secret Diary of a Call Girl
Billie Piper is a nice girl who follows her instincts, for better or for worse. That's how the British actress, who'll be familiar only to Doctor Who fans and close followers of the U.K. tabloid press, came to play a high-class hooker in Showtime's controversial new series, Secret Diary of a Call Girl (Mondays at 10:30 pm/ET).
"It's not a shock-factor thing for me," says Piper. "I just thought about playing the part and what it meant emotionally, as opposed to, 'I'm going to get my t--- out.' You can't tell a story of that nature without showing the truth. I wanted it to be really honest."
It may well be Piper's honesty, coupled with the fact that she's grown up in public, that has led her to become a U.K. tabloid target. She's moved out of London to a country cottage in West Sussex because of persistent paparazzi hound
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John Barrowman, Torchwood
One day John Barrowman may come to resent the kids waiting outside his door for a photo with their hero, Capt. Jack Harkness of the new sci-fi sizzler Torchwood (premiering Saturday, Sept. 8, at 9 pm/ET, BBC America). But not yet.
"I wanted to be an actor," he says, sitting on the couch of his apartment overlooking the bay in Cardiff, Wales, where Torchwood is shot. "Celebrity has come with that, and I'm absolutely loving it. I love signing autographs!"
If anyone spotted Barrowman in America right now, he'd be as likely to get a catcall as an autograph request — he's probably best known for playing a spoiled rich guy in Darren Star's short-lived Central Park West. But if Torchwood has the same impact in the U.S. that it's had overseas, he may find himself signing autographs from Wales to Wisconsin.
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Jennifer Morrison, The Murder of Princess Diana
The television gods who control casting have made Jennifer Morrison a very famous young woman. But those who control wardrobe haven't been quite so kind. As Dr. Allison Cameron on House, she gets weekly screen time modeling a lab coat. Now, as she steps into the role of a journalist in Lifetime's TV-movie The Murder of Princess Diana (premiering Saturday, Aug. 25, at 8 PM/ET), she's got the costume blues again. Welcome to Paris 1997, a time of turbulence, tragedy... and high-waisted jeans.
"The high-waisted jeans are really not my thing!" Morrison groans. "It makes me look like I have a belly that I don't!" Of course, they don't make her look like she has a belly at all, because she doesn't. But with blonder hair, a sleeveless blouse and a tote bag, '90s-style Morri
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