Newly crowned Oscar winner Kim Basinger, who trembled visibly through her Best Supporting Actress acceptance speech for L.A. Confidential, admits she can't hide her nerves when it comes to public speaking. "Can you say nightmare?" says Basinger, 44. "I've never been one to give speeches. And I especially hate it when I have to talk about me. There's something very difficult about having to get up out of that chair. It paralyzes me. I've been trying to beat that demon my whole life. I could never stand up in front of a classroom or read out loud. Don't ask me why I'm in this business."
INVISIBLE MAN
Playing a street hustler in the hit romantic comedy As Good as It Gets, Skeet Ulrich may not have gotten as good as he gave. "I did about 20 scenes, and three were left in the movie," says Ulrich, 28, who costars with Matthew McConaughey, Ethan Hawke and Vincent D'Onofrio in the new adventure The Newton Boys. "But it wasn't frustrating. Honestly, getting to work with [director] James Brooks was payback enough. His first cut was five hours, so some things had to go. I understand that." So did we miss anything good? "We had a party sequence," he says. "It was actually a strip scene where I was introduced." But Ulrich didn't take it as a personal affront that he missed the extra exposure. "[Brooks] shot it at chest height," he says, "so you didn't see anything."
GUT INSTINCT
Jeff Bridges, who costarred with his big brother Beau in 1989's The Fabulous Baker Boys, was quick to look for signs of sibling rivalry on the set of his Coen brothers comedy The Big Lebowski. "I'm interested in working with my own brother again, so I wanted to see if it would work," says Bridges, 48, of the long-running partnership of director Joel Coen and producer Ethan Coen, who also wrote the screenplay together. "I wondered if they would have conflicting directions, but there was none of that. This set was very relaxed." Which may explain why Bridges had no trouble packing on a beer gut for his role as a laid-back unemployed bowler. "I just let it go," he says. "I ate Haagen-Dazs. I did whatever I wanted to do. Not working out helps too. But I think I gotta cool it with that stuff. Next time I'm going with a fat suit."
WAR GAMES
"I'm tired of taking chicken s--t and trying to make chicken salad," says Damon Wayans, 37, of his return from feature films to series television with his new FOX sitcom, Damon. "So until a great movie comes along, I am just going to work really hard in television." In Damon, Wayans reteams with his former In Living Color castmate (and fellow finger-snapping Men on Film critic) David Alan Grier. As for the comedy duo's chemistry, Wayans believes it's parked by competition. "It's like going to war with your best friend," he says. "You laugh a lot, but in the end you're going to have to fight a battle." So which comedian wins the war of wits offscreen? "David," concedes Wayans, "because he is single now and needs the attention."
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
