Having played his share of straight roles on short-lived TV series, Jason Bateman doesn't mind taking a gay part if it means he'll enjoy a steadier paycheck.
"I've got a lot of gay friends — it's never been something that really bothers me," he assured reporters while out promoting CBS's new gay guy-straight guy roommate comedy, Some of My Best Friends (debuting Wednesday, Feb. 28 at 8 pm/ET). "And as far as having any hesitations to play a gay character, I didn't have any of those either."
Bateman's sitcom is based on the 1997 indie film, Kiss Me Guido, an Odd Couple-esque farce about a gay writer named Warren who shares an apartment with Frankie, a macho schlub from the Bronx. While the show initially shared the movie's name, CBS balked for fear of offending Italian-Americans. So the title was changed to the silly-sounding Me and Frankie Z before finding its current, more generic incarnation.
"The gay thing is just a springboard
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Last week, kindergarten teacher Megan, 26, was among the sexy singles rejected and ejected by the men of Temptation Island. Now the sweet-schoolmarm-
turned-tantalizing-temptress sits down with TV Guide Online to reflect on her fateful foray to Belize, and how it's affected her "real life" back in Los Angeles.
When Megan wasn't kissing Kaya or huddling in a hammock with Andy, the coquette often mused on why the island lads were so intrigued by her profession. "A lot of men have a strange attraction to schoolteachers," she chuckles. "It reminds them of when they were young and they had a crush on their teacher. Or maybe it's a mommy thing for guys, too."
One would think that schooling studs in the ways of pleasure on national TV might harm Megan's career as a children's educator. Fortunately, moonlighting as a Temptation tease — one of her dates did rather uncharitably label her a "whore" — hasn't impacted her day job. "Teachin
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When Saturday Night Live sacked Joan Cusack in 1986, after just one season on the series, she entered a dark period. "It was horrible," the actress recently told reporters while out promoting her new ABC Tuesday night sitcom What About Joan? (premiering March 27 at 9:30/ET). "But actually, then I did Broadcast News and there was one scene in it where I got fired. [Director James L. Brooks] said to me, 'Have you ever been fired?' I hadn't thought of it like that — that I had been fired — and it was horrible. But it was great [for the movie]."
Cusack claims she doesn't recall the reason SNL gave for her dismissal. "I'm sure they said, 'It's not about you... You did a great job. It's just not in the stars,'" she muses. "I don't remember what they said, but I think the show is great now. There's great women on it and it's funny.
"It was a really weird year, the year we were doing [SNL]," she continues pensively.
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Cybill Shepherd's recent ejection from the low-rated Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus proves daytime drama isn't found only on the soaps. A talk show hostess hasn't been so frostily fired and replaced since The View's Barbara Walters bumped Debbie Matenopoulos off the couch in favor of Lisa Ling. Brrr!
Mars/Venus executive producer Charlie Cook waxes cryptic about the show's reasons for turning a cold shoulder on Shepherd. "I think that Cybill brought an incredible amount of life experience to the show," he hesitantly offers TV Guide Online. "She's a woman who's been in wild relationships... a number of relationships. She covered the bases [as a host], but I think the single-topic talk show and the single host is perhaps limiting. What we wanted to do was get more of the Mars out there."
That means more of a male perspective — for those who haven't read John Gray's bestselling series of self-help boo
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In Ed's sassy, self-confident schoolmarm Molly Hudson, Lesley Boone, 32, has a role she can be proud of. Unfortunately, the plus-size actress didn't always have it so good. In the early '90s, she launched her acting career on the short-lived Fox sitcom Babes — and immediately got that sinking feeling.
"The premise of the show was three heavyset sisters living together in one small New York City apartment," Boone tells TV Guide Online. "At first, I was quite offended by the scripts. It was gratuitous humor. It wasn't savvy and smart." Thoughtfully, she adds, "You know, I was a baby when I did that. I don't regret doing that job; it taught me a lot, good and bad. But after the series ended, I was pigeonholed and I couldn't get out. Every role that came my way was the poor, pathetic fat girl who didn't have a life — I didn't want to portray that."
Flashing forward to the present, Boone smiles, "I'd
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After three seasons sans a man, is Will Truman — the eligible gay bachelor that Eric McCormack plays on Will & Grace — finally landing a boyfriend? And of all people, could it be Patrick Dempsey, that adorable geek from such '80s romps as Can't Buy Me Love and Loverboy?
"I'm at the height of my heterosexuality on my honeymoon in Bora Bora and I get a call saying, 'Would you be interested in doing Will & Grace?,'" the actor tells TV Guide Online. "I thought, 'This is really risky.'"
But Dempsey took a gamble — and got back on our radar — by guest-starring as Matt, the TV sportscaster who browsed Will while shopping at Banana Republic last November. And he's back for two more episodes starting tonight. "I go on my first date with Will," he previews. "But [there's trouble when] I'm not upfront about my sexuality with my bosses because I'm af
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After joining JAG hunk David James Elliott to announce the finalists for the third annual TV Guide Awards yesterday, Frasier's Jane Leeves nearly broke into a rendition of "Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves." "Usually the guys on our show get all the nominations and awards," enthused Leeves, who got a nod for Supporting Actress of the Year in a Comedy Series. "This is wonderful. It's really a surprise and very nice."
Daphne's portrayer also told TV Guide Online she expects to be jittery if called up onstage to accept a trophy. "That to me is terrifying, standing up there in front of people and saying things when it's me," she confessed. "If I could do it in character, it would be fine. I think most actors are genuinely shy people... People say, 'That's so weird, how can they act and [yet] be shy?' But you're not yourself. You're reading somebody else's w
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Many pay lip service to the Golden Globes as a valuable
early predictor of Oscar winners, but according to the
stars strolling down the red carpet last night, everyone
really just comes to dress up and party down. "I haven't
been before," Catherine Zeta-Jones told TV Guide
Online. "It's my first time, but my husband tells me
it's a real hoot." Standing protectively by his young
bride's side, hubby Michael Douglas (Wonder
Boys) added: "What's really nice is it's one of the
only places that television and movies come together.
You don't have the usual elitism and separation [between
the two], and so you get to see a lot of your fellow
actors that you haven't seen in a while. It's a lot of
fun because there's food and wine being served, and the
whole place has got a loosey goosey feel that makes it
much more pleasurable than some of the other events."
Not far in line behind Zeta-Jones was her brunette
doppelganger, former Law & Order
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Since well before their famed Scottish fantasy wedding, Madonna has played the supportive helpmate to Snatch director Guy Ritchie. Ever brazen, she allowed herself to be photographed wearing a sexy, black Dolce & Gabbana T-shirt emblazoned with his film's suggestive title. The Material Bride also contributed one of her pop standards, "Lucky Star," to the Snatch soundtrack. "I thought I was going to get given a deal [on the song]," Ritchie jokes to TV Guide Online. "I got no deal."
But seriously folks, Madonna's hubby — with whom she shares an infant son, Rocco — has little to kvetch about. "It can be a pain," Ritchie says of the media spotlight on his marriage. "There's very little true stuff I've read about myself. Some of it's funny, some of it's not. But we couldn't be happier. We're having a magnificent time, we had a magnificent wedding and we're all very happy."
Madonna is hardly the only big name celebrity with a hand
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Tonight, Jack & Jill fetch a pail of hope as the fledgling twentysomething drama — which stars Amanda Peet and Ivan Sergei as the titular heartthrobs — kicks off a second season in Felicity's regular timeslot. (Felicity returns with six new episodes in the spring.) Though WB chief Jamie Kellner admits bankrolling the midseason replacement was an expensive gamble, he thinks it's worth the risk.
"I don't look at it as pressure on the show," the exec tells TV Guide Online. "The good news is that the time period is hot, the lead-in show [Dawson's Creek] is hot and their flow into Jack & Jill is good. Creatively speaking, we have generally seen a 'sophomore bounce' in most of our shows — they take a step-up in the second season. So my guess is the audien
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