Issue Date: March 9, 2008
I am still a fan of NBC's "ER." But I wonder if Shane West ever is coming back to the show.
Katie Fisher, Lebanon, Tenn.
His contract ended last May, but West, 29, tells us he has "loyalty" to "ER" and would go back if they wanted him "to tie up some loose ends." He says he has heard from fans who were unhappy that his character never got together with Parminder Nagra's character on the show. "It means a lot to me and Parminder," West says. "That grew naturally. It was never written." When we talked, West had just finished three films, had three wisdom teeth pulled and was back from a short tour with The Germs, the band he joined in 2005 after playing their late frontman, Darby Crash, in a biopic.
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Please tell me about "Mad Men" actor Jon Hamm's previous experience.
Dorothy Kazan, Dix Hills, N.Y.
Hamm, who plays smoothie ad exec Don Draper on the AMC TV series, was a teacher in his hometown of St. Louis before acting. His father, who died when Hamm was 20 (he turns 37 Monday), was a businessman whom Hamm has described as "a very Don Draper kind of guy, with both the good and the bad." Hamm was best known before "Mad Men" for his multiple-season run in "The Division."
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I love "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" and "Connie and Carla," which star Nia Vardalos. Does she have any movies coming up?
Diane Pope, Toledo, Wash.
Vardalos, 45, co-wrote "My Life in Ruins," due soon. She plays a tour guide in Greece opposite Richard Dreyfuss. Next: "I Hate Valentine's Day" with James Purefoy (of "Rome"). She wrote that script and stars. She also awaits a start date on "A Wilderness of Monkeys," which her pal Tom Hanks' production company, Playtone, has spent 3 1/2 years developing for Hanks to direct.
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Here's an idea I know will shock you: Seductive women use what they've got to get the men they want. No one knows this better than Ellen White, managing editor of the New York Public Library and author of the new book "Simply Irresistible." Her study of "sirens" led her to conclude that beauty isn't everything: "Seduction is so much more complicated." It isn't only famous sirens, like Marilyn Monroe, who drew White to this work. She comes from Southern belles; her grandmother even coached her in "come-hither remarks." Are you a siren? Find out at Ellentwhite.com.
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If NBC's "Friday Night Lights" doesn't make it another season, what will Minka Kelly, who plays Lyla Garrity, do? She is very talented.
Debby Miars, Las Vegas
No matter the future of "Friday Night Lights" (and at press time it didn't look good), Kelly will be fine for exactly the reason you say -- she's talented. Kelly, 27, who has dated singer John Mayer, wasn't available to fill us in herself (although with the show shut down, she wasn't working). And her PR people only would say that other acting plans are "under consideration."
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I understand that Cameron Diaz is making a courtroom drama in which she plays a woman being sued by her daughter. True?
Fred Moore, Lansing, Mich.
Yes. Diaz is to start "My Sister's Keeper" (from the Jodi Picoult novel) this spring. She'll play a mom whose daughter sues for emancipation, saying she was bred to provide spare parts for an older sister with cancer. Abigail Breslin will play the 13-year-old who sues. But first we'll see Diaz, 35, in May's "What Happens in Vegas," in which she wakes up unexpectedly wed to Ashton Kutcher after a wild night in Sin City.
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BIRTHDAYS
 Ask Lorrie Lynch a question about a celeb!
March 9: Brittany Snow, 22; Juliette Binoche, 44
March 10: Olivia Wilde, 24; Carrie Underwood, 25; Sharon Stone, 50
March 11: Terrence Howard, 39
March 12: James Taylor, 60; Liza Minnelli, 62
March 13: Danny Masterson, 32; William H. Macy, 58
March 14: Billy Crystal, 61; Quincy Jones, 75
March 15: Eva Longoria Parker, 33; Mark McGrath, 40
Contributing: Gayle Jo Carter, Bart Mills
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