It may be shameful, but I use a portion of my brain to store such information as: Gwyneth Paltrow dated Brad Pitt and Ben Affleck, is now married to Chris Martin, and has two children named Apple and Moses. She is a vegan living in London (or, as 501 Movie Stars puts it, “pursues a detoxified lifestyle”). So I don’t need 501 Movie Stars for that kind of info, although it’s all in there.
Annoying, self-satisfied vegans who could do with a few martinis aside, there’s interesting material in the book, which, like 501 Movie Directors, is a kind of crash course in Hollywood folk. Admittedly, the best tidbits are nothing more than old gossip recycled. For example:
• Milton Berle was a “well-endowed ladies’ man who was married five times.”
• Bette Davis once said, “An affair now and then is good for a marriage. It adds spice, stops it from getting boring. I ought to know.”
• Rudolph Valentino’s role in The Sheik was commemorated with “Sheik” condoms in the 1930s.
• Errol Flynn, not allowed to drink on set, would “inject oranges with vodka to make his breaks more entertaining.” Also: the middle-aged Flynn died in the arms of his teenage lover at a party!
Oh, and if you want to know more about the stars’ actual careers, the book is a good resource for that too. – Cathy Matusow
This article appears in Nov 1-7, 2007.