by Nicole Powers
“This need for expression, and large gestures, and connection…”
– Gavin Rossdale
For a man capable of making so much noise, Gavin Rossdale is very soft-spoken, his somewhat guarded reticence being understandable given all that he’s been through.
The singer, songwriter and musician is currently enjoying his first Billboard Top 40 hit since the heady days when he fronted the post-grunge band Bush. For a while in the mid-nineties their singles (“Comedown” and “Glycerine”) ruled the airwaves, and the band toured virtually non-stop – with a quaint little Orange County band called No Doubt supporting them.
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by Tamara Palmer
“I was a really big fan of Christina’s…”
– Lady GaGa
At age 22, Lady GaGa (born Stefani Germanotta) has already written songs for Britney Spears and the Pussycat Dolls, gone number one in two countries and topped the iTunes chart with her debut album The Fame. Named after the Queen song “Radio Ga-Ga,” she’s also been accused of influencing the current sounds and visuals of another pop superstar, Christina Aguilera, who rocked a suspiciously GaGa-esque look at the MTV Video Music Awards and in recent promotional photographs. We spoke with this engaging ingénue in the making about these “dirrrty” claims, fame and the legacy of her idol, Andy Warhol.
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by Carrie Borzillo
“It’s like going to your high school reunion.”
– Rob Zombie
When Rob Zombie got to work on compiling the White Zombie box set, Let Sleeping Corpses Lie, his first thought was “I don’t really remember all of this.” The second thought was, “What were we thinking?!” Anyone familiar with the musical horror show that is White Zombie knows that the band’s 1998 demise wasn’t exactly an amicable one. So, putting the 5 CD/1 DVD career-spanning box set together wasn’t exactly a fun trip down memory lane for Mr. Robert Bartleh Cummings.
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by Nicole Powers
“I think I won a wet T-shirt contest in college.”
– Kristen Schaal
Kristen Schaal has much to hide: She’s somewhat pathological when it comes to winning things, has a wet T-shirt attired skeleton rattling around in her closet, and has a proclivity for the sexy bits in Harlequin romance novels. But as The Daily Show’s Senior Women’s Issues Commentator, she was loud and proud in her support of Hillary Clinton for president. Sadly, that didn’t work out so well (though the Secretary of State gig is not such a bad consolation prize).
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by Nicole Powers
“I’d love it if the government functioned properly.”
– Shepard Fairey
Having been harassed and arrested by agents of the United States’ government as he perpetrated his graffiti art from coast to coast, Shepard Fairy has since earned the respect and gratitude of an American president. Using the visual vocabulary of popular revolution, the humble DIY poster and sticker maker-cum-revered gallery and populist street artist used his graphic skill to transform Barack Obama from a presidential hopeful to a visionary icon.
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by Ryan Stewart
“A lot of my life depends on what male actors are gonna be doing.”
– Elizabeth Banks
If you’re Sam Raimi, you have an interesting little dilemma to solve. One constant of the three Spider-Man films has been the Betty Brant character, a Peter Parker-smitten secretary who pops in for a couple of quick minutes to bat an eyelash at Peter or take a dig at her Daily Bugle boss, J. Jonah Jameson, before disappearing again. No one suspected, when the last film completed lensing in early 2006, that by the time pre-production on a fourth one rolled around, Elizabeth Banks, the actress who plays Betty, would have mushroomed into a bonafide A-list actress with starring roles in Oliver Stone’s W. and Kevin Smith’s Zack and Miri Make a Porno under her belt. The rumor mill has been heating up lately with talk that Raimi may pursue the obvious solution of expanding the Betty Brant role into a lead part in Spider-Man 4, but for now it’s just talk.
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by Fred Topel
“Darren and Mickey and I all decided that we were going to keep our distance…”
– Evan Rachel Wood
Evan Rachel Wood has a lot to say about a little role in The Wrestler. She only appears in two scenes in the movie, but they are pivotal. She plays the estranged daughter of Randy “The Ram” Robinson (Mickey Rourke), a professional wrestler who continues to prove hes an unreliable dad as he has flings with strippers and groupies on the road. Off the set, rumors were that Rourke and Wood were having a fling of their own.
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