"People are afraid to hug me because they know I'm not a huggy guy," says Ray Romano, who has been accepting kudos for the six Emmy nominations his CBS sitcom, Everybody Loves Raymond, received on July 22. The actor, whose series is up for best comedy against Ally McBeal, Frasier, Friends and Sex and the City, is already sweating the Sept. 12 awards ceremony. "I'm a comedian nominated for comedy," says Romano, 41, who is also up for best actor, comedy. "If I win this thing, I've got to be funny up there. So I have to worry about my acceptance speech. Not only that, I have to make sure I kiss my wife before I go up. Today she said, 'We're going to practice, so you stand up and you kiss me, you don't grab everybody else.' "
Yes, Mr. Ambassador
Arli$$ star and executive producer Robert Wuhl says that corporate politics came into play when he arranged for former pro basketball star and 2000 presidential candidate Bill Bradley to appear in the opening credits of his popular sitcom about a gloriously unscrupulous sports agent. "For a three-second shot of me and him playing Nerf basketball, we got involved with equal time [for the other candidates]," says Wuhl, 47. "As if being on Arli$$ for three seconds is going to make him win New Hampshire! But hey, I'd like to see [George W.] Bush and [Al] Gore come on. They can all come on." The actor says he didn't engage Bradley in any behind-the-scenes debate. "We talked more about my ambassadorship," says Wuhl.
Copy at Your Own Risk
"It doesn't really feel like stardom, it just feels like life," says Michelle Williams, who has risen to fame as torrid teen Jennifer Lindley on the WB drama Dawson's Creek. The actress, who costars with Kirsten Dunst in the political comedy Dick, due Aug. 4, is a reluctant role model. "It's strange to be 18 and looked up to by kids younger than me or my own age," she says. "I am still young and screwing up. I don't have it all figured out." Although she has missed out on such normal high school rites of passage as the prom and graduation, she doesn't have any regrets. "I always figured that I will live vicariously through some character," says Williams, who, soon will return to doing just that on the third season of Dawson's Creek: "I have fun wallowing in the misery of it all."
Saint Nick
In Runaway Bride, director Garry Marshall reunites with his Pretty Woman costars Julia Roberts and Richard Gere. The film also reteams Marshall with actress Rita Wilson, wife of Tom Hanks, who plays Gere's newspaper editor. "I knew Garry from Happy Days," says Wilson, 42, who appeared in two episodes of his hit TV sitcom. "I remember auditioning for him and just being intimidated." Wilson, unfortunately, doesn't have those good old Days on videotape. "Thank God for Nick at Nite, because my son [Chester], who is 8, has seen my Happy Days [episodes]," she says. "I know they're on when my son tells me. He runs in, 'Mom! Mom!' " Chester doesn't have as much luck catching his dad's old sitcom, Bosom Buddies. Sighs Wilson: "That's not on Nick at Nite."
The Powers That Be
British actor Michael York says that playing Austin Powers's boss, Basil Exposition, in 1997's Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery and its sequel, The Spy Who Shagged Me, has put the mojo back in his career. "It's strange—I will be out somewhere, and I will notice that literally everyone around me is smiling at me for no reason. Heads nod," says York, 57. "It's all about the Austin Powers movies. But no one has told me to 'behave.' "
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!
