Who's News Blog

High School Musical starlet Ashley Tisdale celebrates her 25th birthday today. She'll next be seen in the family adventure Aliens in the Attic in theaters July 31, three days after she releases her sophomore album, Guilty Pleasure. A favorite of paparazzi everywhere, Lindsay Lohan turns 23. Her new movie Labor Pains premieres on ABC Family July 19, and although she might not have a significant other to hang with on her b-day (after breaking up with Samantha Ronson), maybe she's getting some hits from her entertaining eHarmony ad. Singer Michelle Branch, who will finally release a new album, Everything Comes and Goes, later this year, turns 26 (check out the video for her new song, This Way, below). NASCAR great Richard Petty is 72, and Larry David, co-creator of Seinfeld and star of Curb Your Enthusiasm, turns 62.

Photo by Kirsty Griffin

This Way

Grammy winner and Matchbox Twenty frontman Rob Thomas released his second solo album, Cradlesong, this week as well as his first live performance DVD. He's also got plans for a two-month national tour beginning in September (click here for a list of dates). Our Reyhaneh Fathieh interviewed Thomas, who is such a Twitter junkie he even Tweeted about their talk. Click on read more and you'll get right to it, and check out a clip of Thomas performing the single Her Diamonds below.

Photos by Andrew Macpherson

Her Diamonds is inspired by a very personal subject: your wife’s battle with an autoimmune disease. Tell me about that.
About six or seven years ago, she was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease, a connective tissue disorder kind of akin to lupus, but luckily not quite as bad as lupus. It’s one of those things that you don’t really get rid of, you just kind of learn how to live with. When you have something like that, it’s always good days or bad days. And the bad days are really, really bad. It has made her really resilient.
 
You have expressed discomfort with celebrity and opening up about your private life. Is it difficult to sing about such a sensitive topic?
There’s kind of a veil between myself and what I’m writing because I’m writing about an emotion. Diamonds, to me, was a little closer, a little more on the money, because there are things in there that came exactly from moments in my real life. It was so weird and hard to get out, but it was so necessary for me, and then once I did it, I had the catharsis of writing that song. It’s not like everybody should hear it because I’m going to be the new [effing] musical therapist, but just because this is a good song.

You’re not in the tabloids every day. If you were, what would we see? 
The only reason I’m not in the tabloids is because I think anyone who doesn’t want to be doesn’t have to be. It’s really easy not to be unless you make yourself so ubiquitous, like Lindsay Lohan. I think even if she moved to Guam, they would follow her at least for a little while.

So you’re saying that Lindsay puts herself in those situations…
Well, she does, and I’m not going to speak ill of Lindsay. Sam Ronson is a really good friend of mine. Just in general, that culture and those people…it starts off, you want to get a little more press, get your name out there, so your publicist calls and says you’re going to be here. All it takes is one night when you’re at that party and you come out blind drunk and fall on the sidewalk or get into a fight. Then you’re fodder and it catches on.

You’re big into Twitter. Which celebrities would you follow?
I think John Mayer is good at trying to use it in a lot of fun ways to connect with his fans. Chris Cornell – most people only see the dark, brooding side of Chris, and it’s really funny when you follow him and you see him talk about his kids and his wife and that he misses them or that he’s in a hotel alone. I think it’s great that he would allow people to get at that side of him. People have different ideas about me. Some people think that I’m a lighthearted, fun guy, and some people think that I’m just a totally dark, brooding guy. They’re both wrong, because nobody I know is that one-dimensional.
 
Who is the best songwriter in each genre of music?
Rap:  Kanye. Well, that’s not true, I have to go with Mos Def. I think Kanye makes the most interesting tracks, but Mos Def is a true songwriter of rap.
Pop: I think [OneRepublic’s] Ryan Tedder is really good.
Rock: Tom Petty.
Country: Willie Nelson.

Niecy Nash (Reno 911) and her Clean House crew have been searching for the messiest house in America and they'll reveal the winner of the not-so-prestigious title tonight at 9 ET on the Style Network. The Clean House: Messiest Home in the Country 3 two-hour special will un-clutter the home of Sharon Baglien (a shopaholic for everything from holiday decorations to on-sale jackets) and her daughter, Brigitte, who has inherited some of her mother’s habits. Messy homes are always fascinating, because, in most cases, the items piling up have significant emotional value to their hoarding owners. Click on the video below to see the Messiest Home auditions that made intern (and self-proclaimed neat freak) Steve Thompson want to cry. Tell us what you think Who’s News readers. Are you constantly wiping down the surfaces of your already highly disinfected house? Or do you wear the stacks of 20-year-old newspapers sitting in your bathtub like a badge of honor?

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen director Michael Bay was in his element Thursday night. He was the main attraction at a special IMAX screening of his new movie at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum's Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Northern Virginia, and not just because he was there to show the film to museum and military folks who had worked on it. (Several scenes involving the new Transformers character Jetfire, based on the Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird plane, were filmed at the museum.) Our T.J. Walter reports Bay also cruised to the venue (near Dulles International Airport) in his own jet, parking it —  loudly — right outside the hangar where the press was waiting.

Transformer 2: Revenge of the Fallen may have gotten mixed reviews, but with the sequel pulling $60 million in box office on opening day Wednesday (and another $28 million and change yesterday), Bay could gloat. “Second biggest opening day of all time, I guess the critics didn’t know what they were talking about.”

Bay talked about the multiple opportunities (Pearl Harbor, Armageddon) that he has had to work the U.S. military. “I have met so many amazing soldiers over the years and I try to portray them in the most realistic way,” Bay said. Also: "In no other job would I ever get to the meet the guy that loads fuel into the space shuttle.”

Photo by Jaimie Trueblood

My Sister's Keeper, the movie based on Jodi Picoult's bestseller, opens today and seeing it is definitely on my weekend agenda. At the urging of other women friends, I read the book a few years ago, so I am eager to see how it is played on screen. Cameron Diaz plays the mother and reporters who saw her at an L.A. press conference for the movie got a taste of what her real-life mothering skills might someday be like. On a panel with two of her young co-stars, Abigail Breslin and Sofia Vassilieva, Diaz joked with the girls but also kept them in line.  Our Nancy Mills was there to see how it all played out. Click on read more for Nancy's full report.

Photos by Sidney Baldwin

     Picoult's book is about genetic planning and Diaz plays the mother of three, but her laser-like focus is on her middle child (Vassilieva), who is dying of leukemia.  She will do anything to save this child.  She goes so far as to have a test tube baby created with the same genetic make-up so that this new child (Breslin) can donate platelets, bone marrow and possibly a kidney to lengthen her sister’s life.  When Breslin’s character hires a lawyer (Alec Baldwin) to sue her parents for control over her own body, it’s a wake-up call.
     Vassilieva, 16, who plays Patricia Arquette’s eldest daughter Ariel on the TV series Medium, is virtually unrecognizable in the film because her head is shaved.  Nevertheless, she still manages to display her lively spirit at least part of the time.
     And in front of reporters, she was irrepressible.  “When we first started filming, I was very similar to Ariel,” Vassilieva said.  “I was a very serious person.  I was comfortable with myself and trying to do well at school.  But taking off from this character, I was able to see outside what I knew myself to be.  I learned to have fun and not care and screw up.  It was a blessing to see myself in a new light.  I was free to express myself.”

   Asked what she taught her two film daughters, Diaz had to think for a moment.  “I’m twice their age,” she said.  “The lessons they have to learn have to come from themselves.  All I did was teach Abby how to drop the F-bomb in every way possible.”
   Breslin, 13, seemed embarrassed about dabbling with profanity.  “I felt my eyes bulge out of their sockets,” she admitted about saying the forbidden word. “‘I said a curse word.’  I had so much going through my head.  I was very nervous.”
  “Afterwards I went up to Abby’s mother Kim and said, ‘We got Abby to curse,’” Diaz reported, “and Kim said, ‘It’s about time.’”
Diaz, who will turn 37 in August, had no qualms about playing maternal.  “I don’t worry about how people see me,” she said.  “I’m not 25 any more.  I could have a 16-year-old child and might have if I had been a different person.”
  Family was very much on Diaz’s mind during production.  Her 58-year-old father Emilio died from pneumonia unexpectedly in the middle of the shoot, and she took two weeks off from filming.  “I was really fortunate to have these people to come back to,” she told reporters, looking at the girls flanking her.  “It all happened very suddenly, and I was in shock.  It was a blessing to be able to go back to a group of people who were waiting for me.  These two girls held me.  That’s the only way I was able to do it.”

Aspiring singer Jordan Shelton, winner of the Star-Spangled Banner YouTube Singing Contest that USA WEEKEND co-sponsored with the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, is feeling like a real celebrity these days. In fact, she got lots of practice giving autographs and posing for pictures after she sang the National Anthem live at the museum’s special naturalization ceremony for 25 children from 15 different countries on Flag Day, June 14. (Click read more below for pictures of Shelton from the ceremony.) Here she is singing the anthem at Baltimore Orioles game later that day. Shelton, a 24-year-old from Arvada, Colo., was one of more than 850 entrants who uploaded videos of themselves singing the National Anthem to YouTube between Feb. 15 and April 13.

Photos by Rich Strauss, courtesy of the National Museum of American History

Rocker Chris Isaak, who sometimes acts but is best known for his sexy video for Wicked Game, celebrates his 53rd today. Earlier this year, Isaak released his first studio album in seven years, Mr. Lucky. A one-time rock star with Phantom Planet, actor Jason Schwartzman is 29. He founded the solo music project Coconut Records, but is best known for his on-screen performances — he can next be seen opposite Seth Rogen and Adam Sandler in Judd Apatow's August comedy, Funny People (for which Schwartzman wrote the music). Derek Jeter, all-star Yankee shortstop, turns 35 today. Sean Hayes, the scene-stealing Jack on Will & Grace, and Chris O’Donnell, the one-time Robin to Val Kilmer and George Clooney's Batmen, are both 39. O'Donnell teams with LL Cool J this fall on the CBS spinoff, NCIS: Los Angeles.

Photo courtesy of Warner Bros. Records

The animated family comedy Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs opens Wednesday, and in this weekend’s magazine, I have a feature on Denis Leary, who gives voice to the sabretooth tiger Diego. We also have an an exclusive clip from the movie, third in the Ice Age series, below. Director Carlos Saldanha says, it’s one of the funniest scenes, which is saying a lot given this movie. Diego and the married woolly mammoth couple Manny (voiced by Ray Romano) and Ellie (Queen Latifah) — who are expecting a baby — journey to rescue their sloth pal Sid (John Leguizamo) after he gets trapped in a world full of dangerous dinosaurs. They run into the dreaded Chasm of Death, where they have to zip-line across with the help of the swashbuckling, one-eyed weasel Buck (British actor Simon Pegg) and avoid the “poison gas” — which doesn’t hurt them as much as it cracks them up. “They’re talking about maybe dying going through this dangerous journey and about all the issues that they have, but in a funny way laughing uncontrollably,” says Saldanha. Watch the clip below, then click read more for Brian Truitt’s three questions with the director.

Photos courtesy of Twentieth Century Fox

You’ve been a director on all three Ice Age films. What is it about these characters and this world that keeps you coming back?
What is cool about the Ice Age movies we’ve made so far is that we are very careful and we work really hard in trying to keep the essence of the characters and the themes. The ideal family and friendship is very strong in every movie we make, and that’s what we keep reinforcing. When you deal with family and friends, it creates a relationship to these characters that’s universal.

Buck is a dynamic new character, and Simon Pegg seems as animated as a cartoon weasel as he does in live-action movies.
Buck is like Indiana Jones meets Colonel Kurtz from Apocalypse Now. He’s awesome. I’ve always loved Simon Pegg’s comedic timing. When I watched Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead, you attribute that quirkiness to his character — he has this almost underdog feel to him — but at the same time he has an energy that’s really appealing. Buck is a really standout character and is very distinct from the others, but adds another chemistry to the pack.

How fun was it to add dinosaurs to the mix? That alone probably excites the kid in all of us.
The grown-up kids will be as excited as the little kids. When we decided we’d have dinosaurs, the inner child smiled big. It’s a dream come true. I’ve always loved dinosaurs, I’ve always enjoyed the idea of “What if dinosaurs existed and I could interact with them?” Instantly, when that idea got disseminated in the studio, the crew was instantly sending us emails and feedback: “Let’s use this dinosaur! This is the coolest! Look at this one!” That was another fun thing about this movie. We kept expecting to think, “It’s the third movie, there’s nothing new,” and the minute we added dinosaurs, it sparked a huge chain reaction of optimism and drive to create this world.

While you may think that’s Chris Isaak’s unmistakable voice crooning the rockabilly-tinged theme song for HBO’s hit vampire drama True Blood, it’s not. That would be Jace Everett, the bluesy singer-songwriter behind Bad Things. The song’s been such a hit since True Blood debuted last year that Everett, 37, has become the No. 1 indie Americana artist on MySpace, with more than 4 million total streams of his songs. Between True Blood’s second season starting earlier this month and Everett releasing his third album, Red Revelations, on Tuesday, it’s been a busy time for a man who counts Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, Tom Waits, U2 and Roger Miller on his short list of heroes. Our Stephanie Ostroff interviewed Everett yesterday so click read more to find out about the up-and-coming singer, and check out this video of him performing Bad Things on The Tonight Show.

Photo by David McClister

How would you say Red Revelations is different from your previous albums? You released a self-titled debut, and then you also have Old New Borrowed Blues. 
The self-titled record was a kind of modern, mainstream country record I made for Sony. And then Old New Borrowed Blues was basically a live acoustic blues record. And then this new one is kind of putting all that together in one place, with some rock ‘n’ roll thrown in for good measure. I started writing songs for it last year, actually just before the True Blood thing happened. It just kind of became clear that, wow, these new songs and the fact that I’m involved in True Blood is going to give me the opportunity to stretch in a different direction for a little while and see what that’s like.

So tell me about how Bad Things ended up on a cult vampire series.
That’s actually a really cool story of synchronicity. Bad Things was on the Sony record back in 2005, and my friends at iTunes actually gave me the opportunity to be the iTunes Single of the Week in 2006. So Bad Things was downloaded by about 210,000 people, and one of those people happened to be Alan Ball, the creator of True Blood. 

Did you grow up in a musical family? 
My grandfather on my mother’s side is a guitar player, kind of a country-jazz guy. But he’s the only one in the whole family who’s played anything. I started singing before I started talking, when I was, I guess, 2 or so, singing along to Rhinestone Cowboy by Glen Campbell, and things like that. I grew up enjoying really listening to country music, primarily as a young kid and then as a teenager got into rock and funk, and onto college got into jazz and soul and reggae. I was 20 years old when I first started touring Europe, playing bass in a cover band. We did everything from Garth Brooks to Deep Purple in the same set. 

So it wasn’t a cover band for one specific group?
Oh, no, no, not a tribute band. I don’t have the discipline for that. I can’t even be myself every single night, let alone somebody else. I did that for a year, year and a half, right up until I knocked up a waitress in the south of France. Then I had to quit. We got married and had a baby.

And what did you do then?
Started doing construction again like I had through high school. Started a dump truck business — just didn’t play at all for a few years. [Eventually] I started playing in bar bands again, down in Texas. When my marriage fell apart, I decided to go to the original scene of the crime, which was Nashville. I had left Nashville for Europe in 1994, so in 2001, I decided to go back to try to get a do-over. Even moved into the same apartment building. Very superstitious.

I had heard that you had also done some ditch-digging and bartending. Do you feel like all your varied experiences, and the different jobs that you had, affect you today in your musical career?
Yeah, I do. Even just in general, it’s kind of a family trait — we just don’t like to do the same thing over and over and over again. I’ve had 29 different mailing addresses in my 37 years. We moved a lot. And we weren’t in the military. We get bored. So I’ve been touring with country legends like Guy Clark in the past couple years, and I love doing that — just me and a guitar.  But I also love playing with a full-on rock band, just blasting it out loudly. And I’m gonna continue to do both at the same time, even if that makes record executives and marketing people frustrated.

On the plane coming back from San Francisco, I finally saw Confessions of a Shopaholic, now out on DVD, and thus had the chance to admire once again the strange but creative fashion sense of costume designer Patricia Field. She is the woman behind Sex and the City, The Devil Wears Prada (that’s Field with Meryl Streep on the right), Ugly Betty and now Shopaholic. She also has a New York boutique and a website that make her print-heavy, leggings-obsessed line to all un-famous shopaholics at surprisingly affordable prices. But, as Field confesses here to our Reyhaneh Fathieh, some of her funky clothes only work on the Sarah Jessica Parkers and Isla Fishers of this world. Click read more for the self-described professional shopper’s take on fashion.

Photos courtesy of Fox, Touchstone Pictures

What about Fisher, or her Shopaholic character, made you envision her in such bright, mismatched clothes? Her wardrobe is very bold.
Isla Fisher reminded me of Ann-Margret in Viva Las Vegas. When I read the script, her character seemed to be very frantic. She was in ecstasy when she went shopping, but it was a neurotic behavior pattern. Colors represented franticness to me. Plus, her character shops all the time, so presumably she would have a lot of colors. It made logical sense to me.

In Shopaholic, Fisher is often in a stiff, corporate environment. How do you spice-up your professional wardrobe, without being inappropriate? 
In an office, I would dress very formal secretary. I would put on the classic office uniform, the executive costume. You can be glamorous about it.

Your fashion has been criticized as “not for everybody.” It’s very New York. Who can pull off leopard leggings and giant bows?
I don’t think everybody can pull off everything. My style is a sort of hyper-reality. I am not telling people to wear the clothes I am putting on these characters. These clothes are for the purpose of storytelling, not for the purpose of telling people to go buy it. But my type of hyper-reality may just spike an idea for someone to apply to their personal style. Don’t mimic the whole thing.

What trends are you seeing in the summer of 2009?
Shorts; genie pants; simple, skimmer kind of dresses. As for shoes, Gladiators are starting to get disgusting. My eyes are looking for a Manolo type of shoe. These heavy shoes became trendy, and it has gotten to the point where it’s no longer attractive, because it’s everywhere. For accessories, I’m liking headwear. It could be a hat; it could be a scarf; it could be a hood; it could be a band. Play with headpieces.

Your specialty is mixing high-price designer pieces with low-price vintage items. How do you make an outfit look expensive, without spending a lot?
Why do you want to make the outfit look expensive? There’s no formula. Putting an outfit together is about coordinating a look with pieces. The end result is that the outfit tells a story. If you find something that’s $10 and it’s stylish, buy that, too.

So it’s possible to keep up with the trends in these economic times?
I don’t think people should act like they’re in a recession. I don’t really connect those dots. Money is not the criteria for a person looking good. Style is not synonymous with high price tags. Plus, I find that when people are in a downward [spiral], they like to have a release. Maybe, it’s going to buy a piece that’s uplifting and fun.

It didn’t take long for the giant robots of Transformer: Revenge of the Fallen to make their mark on the summer box office. Directed by action-film guru Michael Bay and featuring favorites such as the Autobot leader Optimus Prime, the sequel raked in $60.6 million in box office on opening day yesterday, shattering the previous record for a Wednesday release (Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix grossed $44.2 in 2007). All this success is a boon for producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura, who recently returned home after a globetrotting promotional adventure that took Transformers all over the world. Our Brian Truitt spoke recently with di Bonaventura so click read more for that interview.

Photos courtesy of Paramount Pictures

Were you more confident going in this time than you were when the first Transformers was released?
It’s different. The first time, you don’t know what to expect, therefore you have the fear of the unknown. Michael did such a good job the first time that the fear now is more how do you top the first one. Disappointment is what you worry about on the second one, and total failure is what you worry about on the first one, and they feel remarkably similar.

Because Bay has a knack for explosions and big event movies, did you ask for more of everything for the sequel, or did you just let him go with his imagination?
The thing about Michael that people don’t seem to credit him with is he trusts human emotion. All his films are successful because, sure, it’s great to have the understanding of the thrill ride of it, but the truth is he finds a way for the audience to connect to the people in the movie in a very personal way because he trusts simplicity of emotion. The first movie, it was a simple construct of boy gets car gets girl, and that rite of passage that all of us have experienced in different forms and ways. And this movie, it’s about what’s it like to become a young adult and the responsibility that comes with that and which none of us really wants at first. It’s the growing into that that's really the backbone of the adventure.

Shia LaBeouf and Megan Fox were relative unknowns two summers ago. In a sense, they’ve grown up through fans’ eyes watching them in these movies.
I think that’s right. We have this interesting confluence of events where we have a young cast. A couple years in your life, in your late teens and early 20s, are big changes, and that can be reflected in the character.

As for your mechanical characters, you did get some longtime fan favorites into the second movie such as Soundwave and the massive Devastator, an amalgam of six separate Transformers. That must have taken a lot of planning in terms of scale.
One of the greatest things that Michael brings to the table, actually, is the ability to keep that 5- or 6-foot creature called a human in frame with the now 125-foot Devastator. A lot of directors can do one or the other very well — to do both at the same time is very difficult. He did a lot of planning, like how do you manage that 125-foot thing? Our visual effects supervisor from ILM told me that the number of pieces on Devastator is a factor of 10 times Optimus. And my recollection is Optimus is 8,000 to 10,000 pieces. That means there’s 100,000 pieces? You can only imagine what that means from a rendering point of view. It’s an eye-opening thing.

Are you ready for talk of the next sequel to start tomorrow and over the weekend?
It’s already started. [Laughs] I feel like there’s an arrogance in presuming success, which I try to avoid, and I also frankly think it’s a little bit bad luck. You can’t be naive and say you’re not cognizant of the possibility of a third movie, but we haven’t had any meetings. We learn a lot from the fans, so there’s a really great symbiotic relationship that occurs. Like how everybody wanted Soundwave.

And I’m sure everybody wants the Dinobots for a third one.
People love the Dinobots. The hard part with the Dinobots is that Michael and I both love reality, and it’s very hard to get your head around a dinosaur in our reality. Not to say it’s impossible, but that’s sort of the obstacle in my head.

Fox TV is trying out a new sci-fi series Friday night from the creators of Battlestar Galactica Ronald D. Moore and Michael Taylor. It's called Virtuality and it follows the crew of Phaeton through their outer-space journey as they try to save Earth. The crew uses virtual reality to ease the tension on board the ship, which is naturally high because it is all being filmed for a reality TV show back on Earth. Did you follow that? The two-hour pilot will air at 8 p.m. ET Friday but the show has yet to be picked up by Fox for a full season. Two stars of the show, Sienna Guillory (at right) and Clea DuVall, were on a conference call today trying to save Virtuality from falling into the black hole of TV movies. Click read more to see what our Steve Thompson found out about the two sexy actresses and their time filming the sci-fi flick.

Photos by Kharen Hill/Fox

For the British-born Guillory, the set of Virtuality, which consists of a lot of green screens, is the perfect canvas for creativity. “It gives you a life without limitations,” Guillory says.  “You can imagine it exactly the way you want it to be.” This is also the case for the characters on the show: The crew is stuck on the spaceship Phaeton, so they each have a virtual reality to escape to. DuVall’s character, Sue Parsons, likes to explore nature, hiking and biking in her own little world. Ironically, DuVall says that if she could pick a virtual reality, it would be in space. “It’s something that I’ve always been so intrigued by,” DuVall says.

Which is maybe why DuVall was so interested in the show to begin with. Both actresses say they thought the script was the best thing they’ve ever read, but more importantly the environment on set was “very supportive.” According to them, a lot of the acting was improvised, and the show features sequences where the characters talk directly into the camera, simulating the reality show aspect. Those two aspect were the most difficult, DuVall says. “Any preparation had to be thrown out the window."