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Issue date: July 9, 2000
In this article:
Birthdays
Last week's Who's News
Who's News

Q: Bruce Willis is a huge movie star today, but many of us remember him from the '80s TV comedy Moonlighting with Cybill Shepherd. I heard they might work together again. True?
Jay Gutierrez, El Paso

False. His star eclipsed hers a long time ago. Wonderfully funny as Moonlighting was, the two wouldn't pair well now. At 50, she's writing about sex and flings of the past while he, at 44, is pursuing a hot romance with Spanish model Maria Bravo. Still, if you miss Moonlighting, read Shepherd's Cybill Disobedience, published in May. She confesses an offscreen lusty episode with Willis and details the show's demise - only from her perspective, of course.

Q: Is Hal Sutton the only pro golfer with a black caddie? Are there any female caddies on the PGA tour?
J.W. Pate, Las Vegas

The Professional Caddies Association says about 20% of 2,400-plus members are minorities, including women. Maybe so, but Freddie Burns doesn't see them. Burns, 48, has caddied for Sutton, ranked fifth in the PGA, for 24 years. "In 1981," he tells us, "it was 50-some black caddies - twice as many black caddies as whites. Now I'm the only [African American] carrying a top-50 bag." Today, Burns says, many golfers hire family members to caddie. Burns got his first job at a Shreveport, La., country club at age 8. He had dreamed of someday becoming a golfer, but the caddie job helped his family. Now he's been at it so long, he says, he'll probably retire from it. So what does it take to be a great caddie? "You have to be responsible and always be on time."

Q: How are newlywed stars Ryan Phillippe and Reese Witherspoon coping with their new life as parents?
Amanda Stimmel, Falkville, Ala.

They're still seen at parties and premieres, and both are busier with work than before parenthood. Witherspoon, 23, took on a Friends appearance (as Jennifer Aniston's sister) soon after the September birth of Ava Elizabeth Phillippe. Now she's producing as well as starring in Slow Motion. She plays a college student seduced by her roommate's father. Phillippe, 25, was mentioned as an Anakin Skywalker candidate for the next Star Wars prequel. An unknown got that, but Phillippe has been making a thriller, Anti-Trust, for which he reportedly will make his first $1 million paycheck. Just what a new daddy needs.

Q: Thora Birch hasn't gotten as much attention as Mena Suvari and Wes Benton, American Beauty's other "kids." She was equally good. Has she been acting long?
Joan Nathan, Detroit

Named after Thor, the Norse god of thunder, Birch, 18, was just 4 when she made Quaker Oats commercials. At 6, she joined the cast of the sitcom Day by Day, and when it ended after a year, she moved to movies. She played with a capuchin monkey in Monkey Trouble and chased witches in Hocus Pocus. She was Harrison Ford's spunky daughter in Patriot Games and Clear and Present Danger, and a young Melanie Griffith in Now and Then. Birch and brother Bolt, 9, grew up on a ranch two hours outside of L.A., but it was a talent for mimicking commercials that got her into show business. "Telly Savalas was advertising for Ford," she recalls, "and I'd blow my face up to look like him. My mother's friend took pictures and sent them to agencies." Birch has been working ever since.

Q: My family followed the Colorado Rockies till half the team was traded away during the off-season. Now we watch our favorites play elsewhere. We still catch the Rockies occasionally, but it's not the same.
Vanda Ferguson, Laramie, Wyo.

It's not the same because the team is winning, thanks to trades that brought in 18 new players and a new manager, Dan O'Dowd. O'Dowd said he wanted to make the Rockies "more athletic, with more speed." Former players like first baseman Andres Galarraga (left), now with the Atlanta Braves, are missed. But Galarraga, 39, is the comeback story of the season, having missed all of '99 recovering from non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. "There's no question I'm back," he says, "and I'd like be here another two years."

Q: Who sings the theme song for NBC's Providence? As a big fan, I hear it every week.
Roberta Jackman, Latrobe, Pa.

TV tunes strike a chord; we get dozens of questions about them. Providence's opener - the one we're asked about most - is a remake of the Beatles' In My Life sung by Chantal Kreviazuk. But TV viewers hear plenty of contemporary bands and hits: The Rembrandts recorded I'll Be There for You specifically for Friends; the Dawson's Creek song, I Don't Wanna Wait, was a 1997 Paula Cole hit. A few themes showcase stars' "hidden" talent: Kelsey Grammer sings the jazzy Frasier theme, and Amy Jo Johnson croons her way through the Felicity tune, by noted TV composer W.G. Snuffy Walden. Walden tells us simplicity is the key. The most memorable TV theme song ever? The Andy Griffith Show's, he says. It "sticks with you."

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This Week's Birthdays

July 9: Fred Savage, 24; Courtney Love, 36; Tom Hanks, 44; Jimmy Smits, 44.
July 10: Jessica Simpson, 20.
July 11: Richie Sambora, 41; Deborah Harry, 55.
July 12: Topher Grace, 22; Kristi Yamaguchi, 29; Lisa Nicole Carson, 31; Richard Simmons, 52; Bill Cosby, 63.
July 13: Spud Webb, 37; Harrison Ford, 58.
July 14: Matthew Fox, 34; Gerald Ford, 87.
July 15: Brian Austin Green, 27; Forest Whitaker, 39; Linda Ronstadt, 54.


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