Newsmakers

‘Garden State’ stars click

WASHINGTON (AP) – Zach Braff dreamed about working alongside Natalie Portman as he prepared to make his first movie.

“Of course I thought she was gorgeous, but in addition to that, of the gorgeous Hollywood actresses, I think there’s an elite few who are also really talented actresses,” Braff told The Associated Press while promoting “Garden State,” which he wrote, directed and stars in.

But he never imagined he’d persuade the famously selective actress to sign on as his love interest.

“It was a daydream. It was never talked about or bandied about as anything realistic. We were always saying, you know, like Natalie Portman, someone like a Natalie Portman,” Braff said.

Portman, however, liked the script and accepted the part immediately after having lunch with the 29-year-old “Scrubs” star.

“When she did, we were all in shock,” said Braff, adding that Portman was the first person he approached for the role. “Who am I going to approach before Natalie Portman?”

“She’s never done an independent film before,” Braff said. “She had other offers to do bigger movies, and she chose this. I just wanted to help show how much range she has. She’s gotten stuck in parts for a while that didn’t let her show how talented she is.”

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‘Race’ couple heads home

NEW YORK (AP) – It was all business for Joyce Nicolo and Bob Barron, the Internet dating couple eliminated this week on CBS’ “The Amazing Race.”

Nicolo, 54, and Barron, 64, the oldest team in this season’s reality TV competition, blame only being able to attain business-class tickets from Argentina to Russia as their downfall. According to the show’s rules, teams can only fly coach.

“I knew in my heart that it was going to be the end for us” because they couldn’t get coach tickets, Nicolo told The Associated Press Wednesday.

The couple, a widow and widower, met online and began dating.

“We tried to stay above the fray,” said Barron. “We are nice people. We have children we still want to look up to us.”

Since the race ended, Nicolo and Barron have gotten back to pre-race life in Mount Laurel, N.J. While there aren’t plans for marriage, the couple said they are totally committed to each other.

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Lopez in ‘phase two’

NEW YORK (AP) – “J.Lo, Phase Two” isn’t a new summer movie – it’s a state of mind for the actress-singer.

“I feel like this is my phase two, like it’s a new beginning,” Jennifer Lopez tells InStyle magazine in its August issue. “Like everything I did before really doesn’t matter.”

After two failed marriages and her much publicized romances with Sean “P. Diddy” Combs and Ben Affleck, the 34-year-old pop star seems intent on not leaving a trail of glitter (and gossip) wherever she goes.

“Maybe I was a little bit careless in the past,” she says. “I’m not a perfect person. I make mistakes. I just feel like I’m in a better place about who I am. I follow my heart. That’s the one thing I can say about myself. And I love that about myself.”

In early June, Lopez reportedly married singer Marc Anthony in a small ceremony at her Beverly Hills, Calif., home. All she’ll say about Anthony is, “We have a great working relationship. I have to keep my work and my personal life separate. Otherwise it gets blurry and it gets messy.”

However, she’d like to co-star in a film with Anthony based on the life of salsa singer Hector Lavoe. “He’s kind of like a Billie Holiday, a tragic singer,” she tells the magazine. “It’s a love story between a husband and wife.”

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‘Playboy’ game to debut

NEW YORK (AP) – Carmen Electra will R.S.V.P. for your party if you push the right buttons.

Average Joes and Janes will be able to digitally mingle among celebs such as Electra and Tom Arnold when the “Playboy: The Mansion” video game hits stores this winter.

“I am very excited about my cameo in this game,” Electra said in a statement Tuesday. “I look forward to seeing myself at many of the incredible parties that gamers will throw in their virtual Playboy mansions.”

In the game, players don the pajamas of Playboy impresario Hugh Hefner and are given the task of building the Playboy empire by developing contacts, keeping the bunnies happy, selling magazines and, of course, throwing lavish parties.

Featured celebrities include David Copperfield, Willa Ford, Jose Canseco, Uncle Kracker, Andrew W.K. and Melissa Joan Hart. But gamers shouldn’t expect to have their way with the stars.

“There are some things some celebrities won’t do,” senior developer Brenda Brathwaite told The Associated Press on Tuesday.

Real-life VIPs featured in the game were given the option of which Playboy mansion activities their virtual counterparts would do.

Arnold’s character, for example, is only programmed to play sports and smoke cigars, according to senior producer Eric Marcoullier. But Sum 41 guitarist Dave Baksh’s digital clone will “play sports, drink, get drunk, make out and have sex with women, smoke cigars, but he won’t jump on the trampoline.”

“Playboy” gamers looking to become anyone other than Hefner will be disappointed.

“The player is always Hef,” said Playboy publicist Lorna Donohoe.

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