FLASH MAN
"It's a lot easier to seem like an impressive person when they play 'Hail to the Chief before you come into the room," says Wings alum Tim Daly, 42, of his recent visit to the White House for a sneak peek of his upcoming HBO miniseries From the Earth to the Moon. He played to a tough crowd too: President Clinton, John E Kennedy Jr. and Tom Hanks, From the Earth to the Moon's executive producer, were among the screeners. "I was like a child, I was so excited," says Daly. "I thought, 'I have to bring my camera to the White House.' So I went there and I was, like, Camera Boy. I looked like a freakin' tourist. But it turned out to be a really happy thing because I got a lot of great pictures. I took pictures of all the other actors with the President because they were trying to be too cool and didn't bring their cameras."
TWILIGHT ZONE
Did costarring with veteran actors Paul Newman, 73, and Gene Hackman, 68, in the detective thriller Twilight make Susan Sarandon feel every one of her own 51 years? "No way!" says Sarandon, who plays Hackman's wife. "Since I'm the youngest one in this picture, I didn't feel old at all." After winning the 1995 Best Actress Oscar for her portrayal of a nun in Dead Man Walking, Sarandon was happy to spice things up a bit as Twilight's femme fatale. "I loved it," she says. "It was so much fun to wear makeup and be the siren. I'm hoping to play one again and again." But not in her upcoming drama. Sarandon plays a terminally ill woman who teaches Julia Roberts how to be a mother to her children. "Well," Sarandon says with a laugh, "let's just say I'm flexible."
OF LABOR AND LOVE
Playing a single mom-to-be in the upcoming romantic comedy The Object of My Affection was hard labor for Jennifer Aniston. "It was really strange. I wore pregnancy pads and I actually felt like I was pregnant," she says. "By the end of the day my back would hurt. And around 3 o'clock I would have these weird cravings." Aniston, 29, had an easier time getting acquainted with her recent object of affection on Friends, real-life beau Tate Donovan. "I can't judge the chemistry onscreen, but it felt good," she says. "People tell me, 'We want you to get this guy.' I'm not going to tell you what happens, but it's good." Aniston is equally coy about the Friends season finale, which will be taped in London: "Maybe Rachel wants to be a Spice Girl."
ET TU, EMU?
Sure, Texas cattlemen lost their suit claiming that Oprah Winfrey had defamed beef—but that didn't intimidate another group from the Lone Star State: emu farmers. Seven of them have sued American Honda Motor Company for $75,000 each over a TV commercial that poked fun at emus as "the pork of the future." The ad "was telling America that emus are a sham," argues plaintiff Carlos Burleson of Dodge, Texas, who owns more than 2,300 emus, an ostrich-like bird. "Honda was selling cars at our expense." Honda has asked that the case be dismissed, partially on the ground that, hey, it's a joke: "No one," says a company spokesman, "would take it seriously."
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