Ben Affleck's been out of Promises, the schmantzy Malibu rehab center, for a while now. But don't go thinking he's some kind of cheery, changed man or anything.
Oh no. The newly sober actor may be taking it one day at a time and swearing off the good-swill hunting, but he's not very happy about it.
"I don't want to sit here and pretend that everything's great, that I'm some sort of enlightened person," he says in one of his first post-Promises interviews, in the upcoming issue of Details. "I have a lot of struggles, I'm conflicted, I think about things, I wake up in the middle of the night, I have regrets, I'm very insecure. So it's not like I'm living in some great tranquil state out in my rock garden."
Which is not to say that things are any worse than when he went in. Back then, he was in "a really dark place," drinking and acting "infantile and obnoxious."
"[I was] miserable and corrupt and compromised in a lot of ways," Affleck says. "I wasn't happy with my life and felt as if the pressures had become like a creeping vine. One moment you wake up and there's a stranglehold on you."
He thought checking himself into Promises -- and forking over $33,850 a month for the privilege -- would help him break out of his misery, but in some ways, it just exacerbated the problem.
"I was so naive," he says. "I thought I could go someplace -- Camp fucking Snoopy or whatever -- and have every asset available to me and spend 30 days getting my act together. I thought it was going to be a private thing. Wrong!"
Uh, I guess we won't see Ben doing any Promises commercials.
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And grab her a hand towel, too, Tom, wouldja?
"I never once said I want [Tom Cruise] naked in bed doing the nasty. I want him to mow my lawn and get me a lemonade. He makes my palms sweat."
-- Rosie O'Donnell on how she wasn't trying to use "cutie patootie" Cruise as a beard or anything by perpetually praising him on her show, on "Prime Time Live."
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From Bing to Ka-ching?
Unless they grease a few key palms, the British tabloids may be losing their line on the Elizabeth Hurley baby scoopage.
Rival Brit celeb mags OK! and Hello! are apparently duking it out for the exclusive rights to cover the rest of the actress/model's pregnancy, the birth of her baby and possibly even the first two years of the little tyke's life. And one of the magazines has reportedly offered to pay the actress nearly $2.5 million for the privilege.
Whether the magazines initially approached the actress or the actress made overtures to them is not clear. But if the publications are feeling as free with their cash as they say, Hurley'll be able to afford clean nappies for the little one for a good long while.
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Magnum misses Monica
"I am waiting for them to call me back. I know they love me."
-- Tom Selleck on his dream of making a triumphant return to "Friends," on Ananova.com.
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Sartorial Spears
Get ready to bare your bellies.
Britney Spears says she's hoping to start her own signature line of clothing.
"That would probably be something I do when I take a little break," the pop princess tells the Associated Press. "Because I love clothes, I would really be able to put all my time and energy into it."
Crop-tops for all!
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