Hotmail
by Kat Giantis
MSN Entertainment
May
24, 2004
Avril Lavigne is out promoting her brand spankin' new
album "Under My Skin," but when it comes to her pop starlet rivals,
she's still singing the same old song. "I don't really like her," the ersatz
punk rocker, 19, says -- again -- of her 16-year-old nemesis Hilary Duff, in an interview with the New York Daily News.
Though Lavigne still hasn't met the teen queen, she's certain she has her all figured out. "I can tell what she's like," she maintains. "She's too much of a kiss-a**. You can tell that she's a goody-goody." And besides, says a hubris-filled Avril, "She'll probably try to avoid me for the rest of her life."
As for Britney Spears, who Lavigne has said "dresses like a showgirl" and dances "like a ho," she has little hope of crossing her path, but tells the paper that if "Britney wanted to be cool and hang out, then I would put all ego aside." We're sure Brit will pencil that in once she finishes frenching Kevin Federline.
Avril even feels a wee bit (very wee) of empathy for the megastar's constant media scrutiny. "Imagine being an artist like Britney, where every day you have to put on these short little tops and show off your stomach," she tells USA Today. "Like, girls get bloated sometimes, you know? I just think that would be so uncomfortable, don't you?"
Despite the high school-ish rivalries, Lavigne says she's "more of a woman now," and it seems she's already learned the grown-up game of romance denial, insisting to the Daily News she was never involved with her former guitarist Jesse Colburn ("We were just friends") and isn't dating Sum 41 singer Deryck Whibley ("We're friends").
Avril also has us contemplating that age-old question about whether a person who declares herself deep is, in fact, deep. The singer rages against those who accuse her of not writing her own tunes, telling the News, "This record proves I'm a writer. The songs are personal to me. I've always been a really deep person ... It's my art. Don't [bleep] with that."
Altered States
The Osbournes once put the "fun" in
dysfunctional, but the party is definitely over -- and the family is still
cleaning up the mess. In an interview conducted by her brother Jack on Britain's ITV1, Kelly, 19, reveals her descent into addiction, admitting
she had her first drink at 12, tried drugs a few years later, and at her lowest
point was "waiting to die."
Kelly, who recently checked out of Promises rehab in Malibu, the same swanky clinic where Jack sought treatment last year, says she was a "chubby English girl" who had trouble making friends in Los Angeles. Drugs broke the ice: "... For the first time I felt like I fitted in and was comfortable."
The downside to bonding with her peers? "I was completely and utterly miserable," says Kelly. "I felt [bleeping] horrible. I'd shake and throw up. My body would ache so bad until I got the opportunity to use again ... Painkillers weren't the only drugs I did ... towards the end there wasn't a second in a 24-hour day that I wasn't high on something."
According to the singer-MTV staple, "In the beginning you do it because it makes you feel good and then it gets to the point were it stops making you feel good and you do it because you don't know what else to do ... I didn't give a s*** because at the end of my drug usage I was either waiting to die or get saved."
Kelly cautions kids to just say no: "You might think it's great now but later on you're going to be in hell."
Jack, 18, also comes clean about his drug use, divulging he started drinking and smoking pot at 13 and three years later became addicted to Oxycontin, a problem he says was captured during the second season of "The Osbournes." Jack says he was "so miserable" he attempted suicide.
"We were in denial," says less-than-proud papa Ozzy, who was also reportedly abusing prescription medication while filming the reality series. "You always want to think it's somebody else's kids, not your own."
Madonna's Freak Out
Did terrorist threats prompt Madonna to nix three concert dates in Israel? The London Sun
claims the pop icon received a series of letters from an unnamed extremist
group, apparently of Palestinian origin, and "freaked out" because they
threatened to kill not only her, but her children, Lourdes, 7, and Rocco, 3. The
menacing missives reportedly contained details about her offspring and her inner
circle.
"The notes were unbelievably scary," a source tells the paper. "Madonna is a strong woman but she freaked out when her kids were mentioned. At first she was prepared to go on stage anyway and hire extra security. But she was not ready to take chances with her kids -- they are her whole world."
Madonna originally thought she was a target because of her Kabbalah boosting, but the paper says she was singled out because she's a symbol of Western culture. Her reps insist that the September Israeli dates were canceled because she wants to focus on Europe. The Big M kicks off her 50-date Re-Invention tour Monday night in Los Angeles.
Halle's Marriage Vow
Halle Berry, soon to be seen baring her claws in "Catwoman,"
gives her bad buzz-plagued flick a boost by baring her soul to Oprah Winfrey on Tuesday. The Oscar-winning actress "opens up
about her private heartbreak" (per the Oprah website), acknowledging that the
tabloid stories that claimed her soon-to-be ex-hubby Eric Benet was cheating on
her were true. "It's probably the first time the tabloids got my life right,"
she says (via Liz Smith).
According to the twice-married star, her aisle-walking days are over: "I'll never get married again, and I always hate to say never to anything, but I will never marry again." And because all things these days relate back to the promotion of the $100 million "Catwoman" (out July 23), Berry tells Winfrey, whom she tutors in the art of whip-cracking, she believes the role -- and even her much reviled costume -- gave her strength as her marriage imploded. "I so needed to be Catwoman in that moment," she explains. "I so needed to make some tough life decisions for myself, and putting on that suit made it a whole lot easier."
Lara: I'm a Bush Girl
Lara Flynn Boyle has apparently used the time she might
otherwise have spent eating solid food formulating a theory about why
she'll support President Bush in the upcoming election. "I'm Irish Catholic, so
a Democrat by blood," the light-pole-thin actress tells Us. "But I'm 100 percent
for Bush. I want my president to be like my agent: not afraid of people, but
wants my best interest." Hmmm, what does it say about Boyle's agent -- and Bush
by extension -- that she hasn't actually worked since getting booted from "The
Practice" in 2003? At least the actress will soon be off unemployment: She
recently signed on for a guest-starring gig as a bipolar manic-depressive on the
Showtime series "Huff."
Quickies
Quit reading now if you want to be
surprised next season on "24." Really. We're not kidding ... Agent Jack Bauer
(Kiefer Sutherland) will have far fewer CTU agents to threaten
in that sexy, gravelly voiced way of his. The Hollywood Reporter says Reiko Aylesworth (Michelle Dressler), James Badge Dale (Chase Edmunds), and Carlos Bernard (Tony Almeida) won't be back as series regulars,
though they could return for guest stints. Elisha Cuthbert, who plays Jack's perpetually annoying daughter
Kim, is considering several film offers and will reportedly "recur next season
subject to her availability."
"Apprentice" champ Bill Rancic was
spied "tongue-wrestling" with former co-worker Amy Henry in New York recently,
says the New York Post.
The rise and fall and sorta rise of the Brat Pack will be chronicled in a four-hour miniseries on VH1, reports Variety. The fast times of '80s icons such as Molly Ringwald, Judd Nelson, Rob Lowe, and Demi Moore will get dramatized on the music channel. No word on whether Long Duk Dong will make an appearance.
Rumors of the demise of the romance between Elizabeth Jagger and Sean Lennon have been greatly exaggerated. The New York Post reports the daughter of Mick and Jerry was playing tonsil hockey with the son of John and Yoko after his performance Tuesday night in New York.
Mandy Patinkin, who once played an M.D. on "Chicago Hope," has found himself on the other end of the stethoscope. People reports the actor had his prostate removed May 14 after a cancer diagnosis. The mag says his prognosis is "good" and he's expected back on Showtime's "Dead Like Me" after a short recuperation. We wish him a speedy recovery.
