Sunday, March 2, 2003		Lead Article

Among the glitterati
Hero worship

WHAT’s up with Charlie Sheen these days? The fast rising superstar of Oscar-winning films like Wall Street wears a hangdoggish look and stays away from most Hollywood dos that he so passionately frequented. It looks like the wild days of drinking and gambling are behind him.

According to a family source, the man behind the dramatic change is none other than dad Martin Sheen, superstar of yesteryear. Sick of his reckless lifestyle, Martin has stacked up his son’s room with $ 60,000 worth of pinball machines to keep him on the straight and narrow. His drinking too has been rationed and only those pals who are straight are allowed entry into his pad.

Everyone is surprised at the way Martin exercises army-like discipline on his son. But what’s more surprising is why Charlie acquiesces to his dad’s tough regimentation. "It’s probably hero worship," says a source. "And Charlie has not got over the fact that when he was a child his biggest hero was his father.

Even though she carries on one of the noblest crusades of saving animals from cruelty, yesteryear screen siren Brigette Bardot has been running into a host of problems. Some time ago, the actress almost sparked off race riots in France when she condemned the ritual sheep slaughter practised by some Islamic immigrants.

The widely publicised statement brought to surface simmering racial tensions and Bardot had to do a deft face-saving by saying that she was not anti-Muslim but was equally opposed to Jewish ritual slaughter, British fox hunts, Spanish-bullfights and South African mass seal killings.

The commotion has had a favourable fallout in that a South African company suspended its plan to slaughter 30,000 seals for dog food. A Taiwanese firm which wanted to kill 25,000 seal cubs and 6,000 bulls for Oriental aphrodisiacs has also abandoned its plans after protests from Bardot, more popularly known as the cat with deadly claws".

Some for the silver screen’s top stars are facing problems at home. Don Johnson isn’t an idol for his impoverished sister Jamie Skylar. She is cut up with the Miami Vice superstar for not helping her with money despite his multi-millionaire status.

Stallone’s younger brother Frank is sick of being just Rambo’s little brother’. The two don’t see eye-to-eye on anything and rarely meet. What infuriates Frank is people unfavourably comparing him to Stallone.

Michael J. Fox is in a frantic state ever since sister Kelli decided to get into films. Michael is highly embarrassed when little known producers call him up saying his sister is badgering them for roles. He has now decided to lend a helping hand so she’ll stop knocking on the doors of Hollywood’s riff-raff.

Griffin, younger brother of Tatum O’Niel won’t see his sister ever again. A psychiatrist has told him that his drug problem can be traced back to a childhood insecurity when 9- year-old Tatum won an Oscar for Paper Moon.

"Tatum became Daddy’s girl," recalls Griffin, " and I felt like a puppy who wasn’t petted." From then on he began doing things to attract attention. Drugs, violence and other forms of delinquency followed, "I began disliking and distrusting Tatum. I don’t think we can ever come together again."

There’s another kind of sickness in Elizabeth Taylor’s life. The yesteryear’s star says she’s sick of being misquoted. Now to avoid any embarrassing slip-ups, the Cleopatra of the sixties has devised a clever strategy.

Whenever a journalist interviews her, Taylor has two assistants with her. One makes a video film of the entire interview while the other furiously takes notes, which are then quickly punched into a computer and the journalist is asked to sign the printout for authenticity.

For an actress who hasn’t done a movie in years and whose only claim to fame now is her past glory, that sure is going to extraordinary lengths to protect her privacy!

Life’s not always a song even if your names happen to be Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg.

Recently, America’s number one actor and director spent a pleasant evening at a UB40 concert in Paris. Once the show was over the two tried to get backstage to congratulate the group. But the four-newly-appointed Algerian bouncers at the gate asked them who they were and why they wanted to meet the group members.

The embarrassed celebrities first thought of telling them who they were. But then they just backed off thinking it too much of an effort to identify themselves.

Back in the early sixties, a bright young student of the London School of Economics going by the names of Mick Jagger chucked up his academics for a career in music. Roping in four more friends — Keith Richards, Bill Wyman, Brian Jones and Charlie Watts he formed a group called the Rolling Stones. The first performance of the group came in London’s Hyde Park on January 31, 1963. By the time the group had belted out the entire repertoire of six songs the ecstatic crowd of around a thousand was on its feet mesmerised and dancing. Forty years later, today, though Jagger is touching 60, he is the pop icon who has defied age and looks like going on forever. On July 23, 2003, Jagger will be 60. But despite his years he still bears the traces of the wayward mocking youth which has made him such a big star. He wears his age lightly, looking robust enough even though traces of abuse of his high living days are visible. Jagger is a man who is on the move constantly. And today he is ready to shake the world again with the Rolling Stones — the greatest rock ‘n’ roll band ever.

— Newsmen Features