Editor: Joy Press
Updated: Today
Topic:

Harry Potter

Thursday, Jan 2, 2003 09:31 PST

Justin time

Timberlake finally spills about Britney: She cheated on me; Julianne Moore likes it better with women; Pam Anderson thumps Bible. Plus: Rowling outdoes Material Girl.
By Amy Reiter

Cry him a river. Justin Timberlake is ready to come clean about what went down between him and Britney Spears at the end.

It wasn't quite the plot from his video "Cry Me a River" -- he insists that the saga of a guy getting rather torrid revenge on his cheating girlfriend is just fiction -- but it's close enough: Britney cheated on him, so he felt compelled to ditch her.

"That's reason enough, right?" he asks in the upcoming issue of Rolling Stone.

It was the same scenario, he says, that ended his relationship with his two prior girlfriends.

"They've all gone down the same way. All of them," Timberlake tells the music mag. "Three strikes, I'm out. I mean, [Britney] has a beautiful heart, but if I've lost my trust in someone, I don't think it's right for me to be with them."

And as for life since Spears, Timberlake is not denying that he's fooled around with Janet Jackson and Alyssa Milano, among others -- though he says he never got down with dirrty girl Christina Aguilera.

But his most reliable date these days might be a certain Rosie Palmer. Not that he's so happy about that state of affairs.

"Actually, I'm not a huge fan of it," he says of masturbation. "I mean, it is what it is, a safe haven, there when you need it, and I don't feel guilty about it. But I always like to do everything at its best, and that just seems like settling, doesn't it?"

Aw ... someone, give the guy a hand.

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Pam's new biblical proportions

"I'm having fun hanging out with my kids and teaching Sunday school. It's wonderful to make a difference in children's lives."

-- Pamela Anderson on finding inspiration in reading the Bible to the young 'uns, in the London Daily Star.

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Smell the love

Julianne Moore may be 100 percent hetero in real life, but when it comes to puckering up for the cameras, she'd much rather have a woman for a partner.

"You kiss an actor and you don't know what they're going to smell like. But you kiss a girl, she's going to smell good. And she's very soft. They're soft and they smell nice. Guys don't," Moore opined in an interview with the London Sunday Mirror's M magazine.

But no matter how pleasant lesbian love scenes of the sort she and Toni Collette turned out in "The Hours" may be to film, Moore will have us all know that she is well aware that movie sex is nothing like real-world sex.

"We never have sex the way people do in the movies," says the mother of two. "You don't do it on the floor, you don't do it standing up, you don't always have all your clothes off, you don't happen to have on all the sexy lingerie. You know, if anybody ever ripped my clothes -- I'd probably kill them."

Unless of course, they smelled really nice.

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Juicy bits

While most of us weren't paying attention, "Sex and the City" costar Kim Cattrall and her husband, Mark Levinson, with whom she wrote a how-to sex book, apparently took a little holiday vacation in Splitsville. But now, Peoplenews.com reports, the couple has reconciled. Or so Levinson says. "Everything is fine," the sound-system designer told the press. "We're together." I'm sure you're all quite relieved ...

The power of the pen: JK Rowling's $77 million annual income has made muggle mincemeat out of her fellow British female folk. The Harry Potter author landed far atop the London Mail's recent ranking of the wealthiest women in the U.K. The next wealthiest celebrity on the list was Madonna, who lives in London. She reportedly rakes in a comparatively modest $43 million a year. Guess that whole Material Girl persona really is a thing of the past.

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Miss something? Read yesterday's Nothing Personal.

 

Harry Potter in the news

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Recommended Reads

Salon reviews of Harry Potter films:

"Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone"
The long-awaited movie is faithful to J.K. Rowling's book, but the fantasy isn't very fantastic and the evil just isn't dark enough.
By Andrew O'Hehir, Salon

"Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets"
Despite terrific special effects and funnier gags, "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets" finds a way to make J.K. Rowling's marvelous series into a deadly bore.
By Stephanie Zacharek, Salon

"Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban"
Hippogriffs, Dementors and Harry, oh my! Director Alfonso Cuaron finally decants the essence of J.K. Rowling's work and brings us one of the greatest fantasy films of all time.
By Stephanie Zacharek, Salon

"Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire"
Harry and his friends are growing up, but this latest Potter film may leave you struggling with your own childhood demons.
By Stephanie Zacharek, Salon

"Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix"
Patches of magical beauty rescue this sprawling adaptation of the fifth book in J.K. Rowling's beloved series.
By Stephanie Zacharek, Salon

"Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince"
The sixth film in J.K. Rowling's series has beautiful special effects, and something even more rare: Magic.
By Stephanie Zacharek, Salon

Other Salon articles related to the films:

Harry Potter doesn't get "Blue Velvet"
The boy has no profound psychosexual life, which keeps the film from being dangerous -- and important.
By David Thomson, Salon

Harry Potter and the art of screenwriting
Michael Goldenberg talks about the pleasures and pitfalls of adapting "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" for the big screen.
By Rebecca Traister, Salon

The sexual awakening of Hermione
How "Harry Potter" star Emma Watson is navigating the tricky transition from adorable child actor to mature adult.
By Joy Press, Salon

Salon reviews of Harry Potter books:

"Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone"
"Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone," like all great escapist reading, takes you happily back to where you already were.
By Charles Taylor, Salon

"Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire"
With her fourth Harry Potter book, J.K. Rowling takes her young hero to his darkest adventure yet.
By Charles Taylor, Salon

"Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix"
No, Hogwarts isn't a hotbed of drugs, smoking and sex (at least not yet). But J.K. Rowling's rich and huge new installment unmistakably brings our bespectacled hero into adolescence.
By Laura Miller, Salon

"Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince"
Harry learns more about his mysterious nemesis -- and the brutal reality of being 16 -- in J.K. Rowling's tricky, but ultimately satisfying, penultimate volume in the "Harry Potter" series.
By Laura Miller, Salon

"Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows"
Does J.K. Rowling's final installment, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows," provide the magical ending to the beloved series her readers so desperately long for?
By Laura Miller, Salon

Other articles related to the books:

Dumbledore? Gay. J.K. Rowling? Chatty.
What happens when authors like J.K. Rowling can't stop telling their own stories?
By Rebecca Traister, Salon

A.S. Byatt and the goblet of bile
The author's recent New York Times Op-Ed shows that she doesn't understand why so many of us love Harry Potter. Maybe it's just too much fun.
By Charles Taylor, Salon

A list of their own
Has Harry Potter changed the course of the New York Times Book Review -- and the children's book market -- for good or for evil? It depends on whom you ask.
By Kera Bolonik, Salon

Of magic and single motherhood
Bestselling author J.K. Rowling is still trying to fathom the instant fame that came with her first children's novel.
By Margaret Weir, Salon

Harry Potter's girl troubles
The world of everyone's favorite kid wizard is a place where boys come first.
By Christine Schoefer, Salon

Can 35 million book buyers be wrong? Yes.
The cultural critics will, soon enough, introduce Harry Potter into their college curriculum, and The New York Times will go on celebrating another confirmation of the dumbing-down it leads and exemplifies.
By Harold Bloom, The Wall Street Journal

On the Potter lifestyle:

Potterpalooza
For the Quidditch players, wizard rockers and would-be witches who gathered at a New Orleans Harry Potter convention, this is the dawning of their summer of love -- and loss.
By Rebecca Traister, Salon

For Harry Potter fans about to rock, we salute you
A global network of Potter-influenced bands inspired kids like 8-year-old Darius to make their own wizard rock. Will fans keep the music alive?
By Elisabeth Donnelly, Salon

The end of the affair
For almost a decade, Harry Potter and Tony Soprano have been my intimate companions. Now it's time to disentangle myself from their lives and say goodbye.
By Rebecca Traister, Salon

Wizard people, dear reader
The first chapter in the famed unauthorized "re-telling" of the Harry Potter films.

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